wow- did anyone see the Amish on Oprah? Anymore info on ex-members?
check this site for some info:
Amish
by happysunshine 3 Replies latest jw friends
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AGuest
Most Americans are familiar with the Amish of Lancaster County Pennsylvania
Most, that is, except for Jehovah's Witnesses, who quite BLINDLY can't see the similarities and correlation between the Amish concept of adhering to "ordnung" and being "no part of the world"...
New settlements result mainly from migrations. The Amish typically migrate in search of more reasonably priced farmland, or to avoid government regulations which conflict with their religious beliefs (they will not defend themselves in court), or over internal disagreements as to Ordnung, the rules by which each community lives, in addition to the core beliefs expressed in the Dordrecht Confession. These fissions are often emotionally traumatic, testing as they do the relative strength of commitment to loved ones and to what they regard as Gods call to live apart from the ways of the world: What fellowship can the light have with the darkness? they ask"...
"shunning" and "excommunication"...
Persons who break the rules of conduct and the vows of obedience taken as part of adult baptism present the community with a heart-rending challenge: shall we change what we do, rooted as it is in our understanding of what God wants, for the sake of this person we love? Sometimes that is indeed the choice that is made, and loved ones follow the innovator (or transgressor, depending very much on one's point of view) into excommunication. Those who choose faithfulness to the ways of the original group are required to shun the breakaways, a practice known as meidung, or avoidance. In most cases, the particular issue seems trivial, at least to non-Amish: the use or non-use of tobacco (interestingly, largely accepted among conservatives, but rejected among the more liberal or "modern"),
following earthling man (i.e., Russell vs. Rutherford vs. Knorr vs. Franz)...
Every society eventually encounters its own internal contradictions, and for the Amish, certainly one tension is between the will to obey God and conform to the community's understanding of the Divine will, on the one hand, and the natural (they would call it the "fallen") tendency of humans to do as they please, on the other. But a more profound fissure exists between the impulse to purity of belief and practice in service of a God Whose will is absolute, and the desire to remain in community with fellow humans, whose understanding is limited, whose drives are contradictory and whose will is imperfect. In fact, the Amish originated during the Reformation, in a 1693 rupture with the Anabaptist followers of Menno Simons. Jacob Amman differed with other leaders over the frequency of communion, among other issues. When no meeting of the minds proved possible, his followers broke away, founding a group that would later be called Ammanish Mennonites.
and penchant for home schooling due to their views of what public schooling can/will do...
Their rejection of public high schools is similarly misunderstood: it is not that they do not value knowledge (although they have little interest in non-practical, abstract or speculative studies) but that the public school system foregrounds competition, careerism, independence, individual vision, personal understandings and self-advancement all values of the larger society which the Plain People, for whom humility and community are the greatest of virtues, reject.
and the FACT that Charles Taze Russell was a Congregationalist pastor (which sect believes in some autonomy for each congregation, a board of "deacons" (elders), and call their meeting places "Halls")... from Amish-influenced Allegheny, Pennsylvannia.
True, Russell did not start "Jehovah's Witnesses"; Rutherford did. However, Russell "sold out" to the men who became the Board of the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society when he allowed them to remove Maria... and from then on, those "false prophets" have used the "wild beast"... the ORGANIZATION... which has "two horns LIKE a lamb, but speaks "as a dragon"... the WT & AW... has been instrumental in misleading... even the chosen ones.
But... they can't "see" it. Too bad, too bad...
Peace to you.
A slave of Christ,
SJ
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Kenneson
There was a real good discussion on the Amish on this Board sometime ago. Check it out:
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.aspx?id=3260&site=3
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Mary
"......that the public school system foregrounds competition, careerism, independence, individual vision, personal understandings and self-advancement all values of the larger society which the Plain People, for whom humility and community are the greatest of virtues, reject....."
This sounds eerily close to why JWs discourage higher education. Learning and knowledge result in someone having "independence, individual vision, PERSONAL UNDERSTANDING and self-advancement" - all threats to a cult. The Amish are just as much a cult, if not more, that what JWs or Mormons are. Women have absolutely no rights whatsoever and neither to the children. The "spare the rod and spoil the child" is taken literally by the Amish and a program last year on 20-20 that interviewed some ex-Amish members detailed life in this community. Children are beaten for the smallest infraction, quite often with a literal rod or whip, pedophilia is not unknown to them and neither is incest. However, seeing as the victim has virtually no knowledge of the outside world, they have to choice but to endure and accept this sort of treatment. The man generally rules the roost.
It also detailed an Amish man that decided to leave the group and venture out into the world on his own as he came to the conclusion that they were a cult. His wife was a strict member who used to beat their children for just about anything. He was granted sole custody of the kids by a court, but before he could get the kids, the Amish Community hid both the mother and their children so that he couldn't get them. After a year of investigation, searching and private eye work, the father and two law enforcement agents tracked her down on the way to or from church, took the kids and that was that. She was 31 years old and looked like she was 60.
The Amish are fanatical about the most minut detail of life: they're not allowed to wear buttons because someone decided that they're not "plain". And of course, they shun all modern technology, supposedly because they're trying to live the same way Jesus would if he were alive today. Of course, if anyone actually thought about it, when Jesus was alive, he lived his life according to the customs of the day. He didn't dress 500 years out of date and he spoke the language of the day.
Another reason for shunning all modern technology is so that they're "dependent" on one another is also another ploy of a cult that we're all familiary with: if your family, friends and very life are "dependent" that much on each other, it makes leaving the cult a hell of a lot harder. It would even be harder than leaving the JWs, because at least the average Witness can drive a car, read and write English and have a knowledge of how the world works - an Amish person doesn't.
Edited by - Mary on 24 November 2002 11:50:24