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BBC article - The Amish

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The Amish

Introduction

The Amish (pronounced 'Aahmish') are an American Protestant group with around 200,000 members descended from European Anabaptists who came to the USA more than two centuries ago to escape persecution.

They are best known for their 19th century way of life that was portrayed in the 1985 Harrison Ford film Witness, in which violent crime clashed with their peaceful existence.

Their old-fashioned traditions are not what is now called a 'lifestyle choice'. Amish believe that their religious faith and the way they live are inseparable and interdependent.

The Amish originated in Europe after splitting from Mennonite Swiss Brethren in 1692 over the treatment of members who had been found guilty of breaches of doctrine.

The first Amish arrived in Pennsylvania in the 1730s to escape persecution in Europe.

Basic features of Amish life

Amish believe that the community is at the heart of their life and faith, and that the way to salvation is to live as a loving community apart from the world. Individualism is avoided.

Self-help

Members of the community help each other, and the whole community will work together to help a member in trouble. They do not accept state benefits or use insurance, but rely on community support instead.

Separate

The Amish believe that it's essential to keep themselves separate from the 'world', so they live in their own small communities and differ from other Americans in their dress, language, work, travel and education.

Not exclusive

The Amish are not exclusive, and have many contacts with outsiders, who they call 'English'.

Amish groups

Each Amish district is fully independent and lives by its own set of unwritten rules, or Ordnung. The Old Order is the strictest of these groups. There is no central authority.

Simplicity and humility

The Amish stress simplicity and humility. They avoid anything associated with self-exaltation, pride of position or enjoyment of power.

Harmony with nature

Amish believe that God is pleased when people work in harmony with nature, the soil, the weather, and care for animals and plants. Amish always live in rural communities.

Technology

Some modern 'conveniences', such as cars, electricity and telephones are avoided. They only avoid technology where it might damage the community, not because they are Luddites or think technology is inherently evil.

Non-confrontation

Amish are pacifists and conscientious objectors. They avoid all violence - including angry words or going to law.

Discipline

The Amish community governs itself strictly. Baptised members are morally committed to church rules. Erring members may be shunned until there is repentance, forgiveness and restoration to full fellowship.

Language

Amish use three languages, a German dialect called Pennsylvania Dutch at home, High German for worship and English with outsiders.

Family

Amish only marry other Amish and don't divorce. They have large families averaging 7-8 children.

Education

Amish children are educated in their own schools. Schooling stops at 14 after which they learn practical skills on the job.

Holy days

Amish celebrate the same holy days as other Christians.

Growing up

After 16 Amish children can experience life outside the community for a few years to decide whether they wish to become full baptised members of the community. 90% decide to do so.
Partially based on The Amish In Northern Indiana, by Samuel L. Yoder
Amish customs

Separation

The Amish keep themselves separate, but not exclusive, following the Biblical text "be not conformed to this world" (Romans 12:2).

Amish live like this not because they dislike or fear other human beings but because they believe that salvation comes from the redeeming power of living a loving life in a pure community of believers who live in separation from the world.

The Amish keep themselves apart from the communities around them in several ways:

they wear distinctive clothes; straw hats, dark shirts and trousers with braces for men and plain and modest dresses with bonnets or caps for women.

they are pacifists and don't serve in the military -- guns are used only for hunting

they don't swear oaths or hold elective office, and usually don't vote

they don't go to law because that is seen as too confrontational

they don't own modern technology

they don't accept any state benefits or use insurance

they have their own education system

they speak a German dialect among themselves

they marry among their community

Although the Amish separate themselves from the mainstream communities around them, they aren't exclusive and do business with their neighbours. The ideal Amish occupation is to be a farmer, but Amish men also do factory work.

Pragmatism

The Amish interpret their beliefs pragmatically. They adapt to the world in order to be able to continue to continue their redeeming life in a pure community separate from the world.

The doctrine of separation is regarded as an ideal, but is interpreted in a practical rather than a rigid way. This permits the Amish to build productive working relationships with the outside world, and to establish a network of contacts that they can use for the benefit of their community.

Stephen A Marglin gives an example of how the Amish rejection of one modern practice, insurance, is entirely in line with the preservation of the community:

In the last 50 years the Amish have become more pragmatic in their approach to technology, while perhaps becoming more separate as a community:

Limits on technology

Amish own horse-drawn buggies, not cars (but they can take a ride in someone else's car).

Farm machinery is generally horse-drawn, although some communities permit tractors with steel wheels as such tractors can't be used on the road.

They don't allow telephones or electricity in their houses, because both of these technologies would literally connect them to the world through their wires. Electricity and petrol/diesel power are used in barns for work purposes. Shared telephones are available outside houses in business premises or telephone booths.

Televisions, radios and stereos are not used, which helps keep the Amish unpolluted by the values advanced by the mass media. One Old Order Amish told the scholar Donald B Kraybill that "television is the sewer line that connects you directly to the cesspool of Hollywood". As with other technologies there is a compromise - listening to someone else's radio or watching the TV in a hotel might well be accepted.

For similar reasons, computers with internet access are banned, although Amish can use a computer at an outside workplace.

They don't use cameras because photos break the biblical ban on making 'graven images' (Exodus 20:4)

Why technology is limited

The Amish avoid modern technology not because they want to live ascetic and uncomfortable lives but to preserve the uniqueness of their way of life.

New conveniences are assessed to see how they would affect the social patterns and cohesiveness of the Amish community, and anything that might damage their way of life is rejected. Less dangerous technology may be adapted to fit.

Hostetler and Kidder point out that conveniences are accepted when it is necessary to do so - electricity is barred in the home, but accepted in farm buildings because if the Amish did not comply with regulations to refrigerate milk at the farm, they would not be able to continue as dairy farmers and the community would suffer economic damage.

Language

Most Amish speak three languages: a German dialect called Pennsylvania Dutch at home, High German at their worship services, and English when talking to non-Amish (whom they call 'English').

Gender roles

Amish adopt traditional gender roles in which wives are subordinate to their husbands.

Men are in charge of the spiritual life of the family and are responsible for providing sustenance. Women do domestic tasks, look after the children and take on light farm work such as feeding chickens and milking cows.

Dress

Amish dress is a highly distinctive outward symbol of membership in the group, but through its plainness and simplicity rather than through any eccentricities.

The idea is that a person's clothes should reflect humility and avoid individual distinctiveness. Breaches of the Amish dress code may lead to a reproof from a community leader.

Old Order Amish women wear modest dresses with long sleeves and a full skirt, a cape and an apron. They usually wear their hair in a bun on the back of the head, often covered with a bonnet or a white organza prayer cap. Amish women don't use makeup.

Men and boys wear dark trousers, braces, straight-cut coats and broad-brimmed straw hats. Their clothes don't have stripes or checks. Amish men grow beards only after they marry and don't grow moustaches because 19th century generals wore beards and moustaches and anything military is shunned.

Dark blue, green, purple, brown and black are the most common clothing colours.

Although the dress code is partly intended to prevent visual statements of individuality, there is scope for individual taste, as this anecdote demonstrates:

Conflict

The Amish are pacifists who refuse military service and who try to live peacefully with each other and with outsiders.

They have a policy of 'non-resistance', which means that when governments instruct them to do things that are against their faith, they refuse to do them, but accept the consequences of their refusal without argument.

They don't go to law, regarding this as confrontational, although they have used lawyers to defend themselves if they are involved in a lawsuit started by someone else. In the famous case of Wisconsin v Yoder the Amish got round the issue of not going to law by letting a committee of non-Amish defend the case pro bono.

Internal disagreements are usually resolved by the community as a whole.

Although the Amish present a unified face to outsiders, communities are sometimes troubled by disputes which may lead a family to join another community or found a new one.

Education

The Amish have their own private education system of around 1,200 schools which stresses the 'four Rs' of reading, writing, arithmetic and religion.

A typical school has between 25 and 35 pupils, with only one room and one teacher to cover all ages. Teaching is in English. Teachers are usually younger women without specialist training. Children will often do farm work before and after school.

Amish children are educated in schools until they're 14 (eighth grade). This exemption from US law which generally requires schooling until age 16 is the result of a Supreme Court Case (Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972), see related links), in which the Amish successfully argued that education beyond aged 14 exposed their children to modern values that clashed with their beliefs and might put their salvation at risk.

Amish education has some unique strengths, described by Donald Kraybill, a senior fellow in the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College in Lancaster County.

After they leave school Amish boys learn work skills such as farming and carpentry on the job, while Amish girls concentrate on practical domestic matters.

State benefits

The Amish will not accept any form of state benefit because they believe that the community should care for its members.

They don't use public or private health insurance, and join together to pay for outside medical treatment.

Rumspringa

At the age of 16 Amish children are given a great deal of freedom which they can use to experience the outside world. Some may even choose to 'live English', as it's known. This practice is called rumspringa, which means 'running around'.

After this period, most children prefer to return to the full Amish lifestyle with both its restrictions and rewards, and are baptised into full membership.

Moving community

Some Amish decide to move to another Amish community rather than remain in the one where they were brought up. The main reasons for doing this are to acquire less expensive farm land or to live in a community that is either more or less strict.

Marriage

Amish only marry other Amish, although not necessarily from their own community. They may not marry a first cousin, and are discouraged from marrying a second cousin.

Amish beliefs

Beliefs

The Amish are closest to the Anabaptists: Protestant Christians who believe in adult baptism, pacifism, the separation of church and state and the importance of the community to faith. The denomination is closely related to the Mennonites.

They base their daily life and religious practice on a literal interpretation of the Biblical instruction "be not conformed to this world" (Romans 12:2). Their separateness may also have been a reaction to the persecution they has suffered in Europe.

Belief as a way of life

Although the Amish are sometimes painted as people who live an old-fashioned life because they are welded to their traditions or because they fear the modern world, those are both misunderstandings.

The Amish way of life grows out of the belief that salvation comes from the redeeming strength of living a loving life in a pure community of believers who live in separation from the world.

Amish are less concerned with achieving individual salvation through a personal belief in Jesus Christ. It's said that they regard any claim by an individual to be 'saved' as an expression of pride, and something to be avoided.

Gelassenheit

One important principle is Gelassenheit. This is the idea that a believer should surrender to God by living in a way that pleases God and by obeying legitimate religious authority.

Amish see self-denial and obedience to church authority as important virtues.

Farming

Amish believe that they should farm as stewards of God's creation, and that this is a spiritual activity.

Discipline

Because of the emphasis on community, members are expected to believe the same things and follow the same code of behaviour (called the Ordnung). The purpose of the ordnung is to help the community lead a godly life.

This unanimity of belief and behaviour is maintained by strong discipline; if a person breaks the rules they may be 'shunned', which means that no-one (including their family) will eat with them or talk to them.

Shunning ( meidung) is not done to hurt the rule-breaker but to give them an experience that may redeem them and bring them back into the community.

If a person persists in rule-breaking they may be excommunicated. If a person repents they are accepted back into the community.

Shunning is based on two Bible verses, I Corinthians 5:11 and Romans 16:17.

However, if someone brought up in the Amish community decides that they do not wish to join the community and obey its rules they are not punished in any way. They often remain in the area and join similar but less strict denominations, and maintain contact with their former community.

Conversion

Amish do not seek to attract new believers. Although it is possible for an outsider to join an Amish community, it would be difficult.

Ethics

The Amish have a traditional code of ethics that rejects sex outside of marriage, divorce, homosexuality and public nakedness as sins forbidden by the Bible. Modesty and purity are vital virtues.

The Amish are pacifists, basing this on Jesus' instruction that one should love one's enemy. They reject all forms of violence.

The Amish admire large families and tend not to use birth control other than to control the spacing of children.

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The Amish (pronounced 'Aahmish') are an American Protestant group with around 200,000 members descended from European Anabaptists who came to the USA more than two centuries ago to escape persecution. They are best known for their 19th century way of life that was portrayed in the 1985 Harrison Ford film Witness, in which violent crime clashed with their peaceful existence.

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The Amish: a people of preservation

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"Tech giants battle for classrooms in Amish Community"

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Advance Rumley Steam Engine Threshing Oats

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Tech giants battle for classrooms in Amish country

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Tech companies like Apple, Google and Microsoft are competing to get their products into classrooms around the U.S. Even in Amish country, where families live simply without technology like television or phones, some Amish children are learning to use these high-tech devices as part of the curriculum.