Heritage

Our community is but a small part of what God – the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – has done through the ages. Glimpses of his divine truth have been caught throughout history by sages, philosophers, and poets; from early peoples in their reverence for the Creator; to Socrates, Buddha, and Zoroaster; to visionaries such as Leo Tolstoy, Albert Schweitzer, and Simone Weil. Right down to the present, wherever people strive for truth, justice, brotherhood, and peace, God is at work. We do not seek to imitate those who have gone before us; rather, we wish for their example to inspire us to live more wholeheartedly for God’s kingdom.

Heb 1:1–4;11:1—12:2
Acts 17:24–28
Rom 2:14–16
Matt 25:31–46
Ps 44:1–3; Deut 6:20–25
Rev 14:13

Our community was founded in 1920 in Germany by the Protestant theologian Eberhard Arnold, his wife Emmy, and her sister Else von Hollander. Appalled by mounting social injustice and the horrors of World War I, they sought answers in Jesus’ teachings, especially his Sermon on the Mount. Through this search they felt a call to radical discipleship: to give up everything for Christ.1 They moved from their Berlin townhouse to a remote village, Sannerz. There, with a handful of like-minded seekers, they began to live in community of goods after the example of the first church in Jerusalem. Soon they adopted the name Bruderhof – literally, “place of brothers.”

Over the next fifteen years, the community’s ranks swelled with young people from all over Europe, eventually numbering 150. After Hitler’s rise to power in 1933, however, the community became a target of National Socialist oppression because of its stand of conscience. For instance, members refused to use the Heil Hitler greeting, serve in the German army, or accept a government teacher in their school. In 1937, the secret police dissolved the community at gunpoint, seizing its assets, imprisoning several members, and giving the rest forty-eight hours to leave.

With the help of Mennonite, Quaker, and Catholic friends, all members were eventually reunited in England, and by 1940 the refugee community had doubled in size through an influx of English members. Meanwhile, World War II had broken out, and the British government advised the group either to accept the internment of its German nationals or to leave the country. Determined to remain together, almost all members of the community – mostly city-raised Europeans – emigrated to Paraguay. There they spent the next twenty years as pioneer farmers in a harsh, unfamiliar climate, while also founding a hospital that served thousands of local patients. Three members remained in England and soon were building up a new community there as dozens of newcomers continued to arrive.

In 1954, the first American community was founded in Rifton, New York. Today there are Bruderhof communities in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Paraguay, and Australia.

We look for our example to the first church founded at Pentecost in Jerusalem.1 Here the Spirit worked with unique power, leading Christians to share all they had, to serve the city’s poor, and to proclaim the gospel boldly. We believe that this first church community’s life and teaching demonstrate what God’s will is for humankind.

The church in Jerusalem was eventually dispersed through persecution. Yet its spirit could not be quenched. It lived on even after the death of the apostles, as attested by the early Christian martyrs. We affirm the early church’s rule of faith and we value its witness, including the Didache and the writings of church fathers such as Clement of Rome, Hermas, Ignatius, Justin, Tertullian, and Origen.

Acts 2–7

Over the centuries since, the apostolic witness of church community has shone out repeatedly. Though often suppressed or forgotten, it has reemerged again and again in new places and forms. It appeared in the monastic movements from the third century onward – notably among the Desert Fathers, in the community around Augustine of Hippo, and in Celtic Christianity. It appeared in the itinerant Christian communities of the Middle Ages, among the Waldensians, the Beguines and Beghards, and among the followers of Francis of Assisi and Clare of Assisi. It was there among the radical Anabaptists as well as among the early Quakers in the time of George Fox. It was there in the Moravian church of Zinzendorf, and it can be seen in many other movements up to the present day.

In addition to these church communities, the witness of other individual men and women of God is also important to us. These include the medieval mystics Thomas à Kempis and Meister Eckhart in their discipleship of the heart; John Wycliffe and Jan Hus in their courage for the gospel; the early Martin Luther in his experience of undeserved grace; and inspired artists such as Bach and Handel, whose works such as St. Matthew Passion and Messiah give glory to God. They include the evangelists John Wesley, Charles Finney, Hudson Taylor, and Sadhu Sundar Singh with their zeal for Christ; William and Catherine Booth of the Salvation Army in their care for the poor; Fyodor Dostoevsky in his solidarity with suffering humanity; and Dorothy Day and Mother Teresa with their devotion to the works of mercy. They also include martyrs such as Sophie and Hans Scholl, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King, Jr., Oscar Romero, and many others who stood up for truth at the cost of their lives.

Three forerunners stand out as defining influences on our communal life and as guides for our future:

The early Hutterian Church. This communal church arose in central Europe after 1525 when the Anabaptists Felix Manz, Conrad Grebel, and Georg Blaurock set the Radical Reformation in motion by accepting believer’s baptism. Soon tens of thousands were following them, despite a bloody campaign of persecution. Unified by the Schleitheim Confession, they championed freedom of conscience and a return to original Christianity in obedience to Jesus’ words in the Gospels, rejecting armed force, infant baptism, and the institutional churches.

One sector of this movement, known as Hutterites after their leader Jakob Hutter, settled in communities, sharing money and possessions, work, housing, and a common daily life founded on brotherly and sisterly love. Zealous to spread the gospel, hundreds suffered martyrdom in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

In the 1920s, the founding members of our community took inspiration from the witness of the early Hutterites, and made contact with their descendants living in North America. In 1930, Eberhard Arnold was ordained as a minister by all branches of the Hutterian church.

At present our community is not affiliated with the Hutterian colonies. We nevertheless seek to live in the same spirit as the original Hutterites during the time of their first love and active mission (1528–1578). We treasure the Hutterian chronicles and spiritual writings – for example, those of Jakob Hutter, Peter Riedemann, Ulrich Stadler, and Peter Walpot.1

Matt 5—7; 18:15–20

The Blumhardts. Johann Christoph Blumhardt (1805–1880) and his son Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt (1842–1919) were widely known German Lutheran pastors. Both men approached all questions of life – whether the personal needs of those they counseled or broader social and political ills – with the conviction that Jesus is victor. They fervently expected that God’s kingdom would soon become a reality on earth, bringing redemption not just to an elect few but to all humankind.

The Blumhardts’ bold attitude of faith and expectation of the kingdom continue to inspire and guide us.2

Col 2:13–15
Acts 2:17–21
Joel 2:28–32
Rev 21:3–5

The European Youth Movements (1896 –1925). Our community was founded in the midst of a wave of youth movements that swept Germany, Austria, Poland, and Switzerland in the years preceding the rise of National Socialism. Though the young people in these movements held diverse political and religious views, they shared certain common convictions. They rejected materialism and the formalities of social and class-based conventions in favor of genuineness, freedom, equality, and simplicity. They loved hiking, the outdoors, folk culture, and life on the land. Many of them pioneered new approaches to education and work, and – influenced by Jewish philosopher and pacifist Gustav Landauer – saw community as the answer to poverty and social need. By the early 1920s, youth movement ideals were being lived out in more than a hundred communities across Germany, as well as in kibbutzim founded in the Holy Land by the Jewish branches of the movement.

By 1925 the youth movements in Germany were on the wane, and political affiliations were robbing them of their earlier independence. After 1933 they were destroyed by Hitler’s regime, which co-opted their energy for its own ends. But their original genuineness and rigor, their emphasis on simplicity and respect for creation, remain essential to our community today.

Rom 12:9; Phil 4:8–9

Our particular movement will pass away, but the stream of life to which it belongs can never pass away. We want to remain part of this living stream of God’s spirit. This is possible only through an ever new encounter with Christ. As a church community and as individuals, we constantly need times of refreshing through him. God is the Lord of history; as he has ordered the destinies of the nations through the ages, faithfully caring for his covenant people, so he will continue to move and act today. We await his future: the day when he will fulfill all his promises, establishing his kingdom of peace and renewing creation.

Matt 24:35
John 4:23–24
Acts 3:19–21
Deut 32:8; Job 12:13–25
Gen 17:1–8; Deut 7:6–11
Luke 24:44
Num 23:19; 2 Pet 3:9–13
Rev 21:5