A People Apart

We have both Old Order Mennonites and Old Order Amish in our community, and a quick way to tell them apart is that the Mennonite women can wear print dresses, while the Amish women must stick to solid colors like black, blue, and green. Mennonite men are sometimes clean-shaven, whereas Amishmen are always bearded. Both religious groups are descended from the Anabaptists, who originated in sixteenth century Europe coincident with the beginning of the Protestant reformation. Zurich, Switzerland was the original home of the Anabaptists who disagreed with the 'mainstream' Protestants of the time over infant baptism. The Anabaptists believed that baptism should only be conferred on adults who were willing to following the disciplines of the new Church. They also renounced oaths, reveling and drunkenness, the use of force in war or civil government, and personal adornment. These practices did not make them popular with their fellow Protestants or the local rulers, and the book "Martyr's Mirror" records the persecutions of this period. Gradually, the Anabaptists split apart into the Mennonites, Amish (mainly because of disagreements over the practice of shunning), and Hutterites, and migrated to America and Canada. Currently the Mennonites live in forty different countries, which is one thing that differentiates them from the Amish, who stick pretty close to home in North America. The Mennonites are more like the Society of Friends in this respect, as they are heavily into works of charity in less fortunate nations. The author and photographer of this 64-page book paint a picture of everyday life in an Old Order Mennonite Community, including a look into a Mennonite school, church-going activities, and a barn-raising. One of my favorite photographs is of a stern-looking teacher in bonnet and glasses running the bases in a lunchtime baseball game, while one of her students tries to tag her out. It surprised me to learn that "about one quarter of any Old Order population never marries. They often set up their own farms or households, sometimes with another unmarried friend or relative." This practice quite definitely distinguishes them from the Amish.

This book, published in 1995, is an interesting peek into the life of Old Order Mennonites. Old Order Mennonites believe that the biblical injunction to live separately from the world requires them to forswear certain "modern" conveniences (the Amish broke away in 1693, believing that the Mennonites had become too modern). Some Old Order Mennonites drive cars and others don't, some use electricity and others don't, and some use telephones and others don't.In this fascinating book, the authors visited several Old Order communities, took some black-and-white photographs, and got to learn what life is like for these believers. This book is the fruit of their labors. Eschewing any discussion of theology, the book instead looks at the daily life of Old Order Mennonites, how they live, work, go to school, and even court.I deeply enjoyed this book; the pictures are interesting, and the text doubly so. If you are interested in the Old Order Mennonites, then I highly recommend this book. Also, and excellent companion would be Sarah Blosser Oberlin's book, A Heritage That Money Can't Buy.

Over all I thought that the book did a great job of describing Old Order Mennonites to children. I was a little dissapointed in that it seemed to me that the pictures were of one group of Old Order Mennonites. It would have been nice if the auther identfied the different groups by name, ie Wenger(Groffdale Confence), Horning (Weaverland Conference), etc. and shown pictures of the diferent groups.