Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy (16 page)
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Authors: Donald B. Kraybill,Steven M. Nolt,David L. Weaver-Zercher
BOOK: Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy
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This story clarifies the Amish view that God’s continuing forgiveness depends on their willingness to forgive. Even though they are aware of God’s gracious activity in the past—in the world, their churches, and their lives—they are clear that they continue to need God’s grace. They not only anticipate a judgment day when God will reward the faithful and punish the unfaithful, but they believe their actions will influence how they will be judged. To the Amish, granting forgiveness to one’s debtors is an act that God requires of those who seek divine forgiveness.
Before the shooting, Amish people would have heartily agreed that forgiveness was woven into the fabric of their faith. But many didn’t realize how tightly intertwined it was until the publicity on forgiveness stirred them to deeper reflection.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Spirituality of Forgiveness
We daily need forgiveness, because we are frail.
—ANABAPTIST MARTYR, 1572
T
wo weeks after the Nickel Mines shooting, we visited an Amish family that lives about five miles from the school. Even at that distance they had heard the sirens and seen the helicopters flying overhead on the day of the shooting. Now, two weeks later, the mother wept openly as she recalled the excruciating losses of October 2. Like so many in the tight-knit Amish community, Mary has friends and relatives near Nickel Mines. “I can’t imagine the grief they’re feeling,” she confided. Clearly, however, she had some sense of it. Mary is the mother of six children, two boys and four girls. The oldest, a thirteen-year-old daughter, moved quietly around the dining room, collecting our dishes as we talked over dessert.
wo weeks after the Nickel Mines shooting, we visited an Amish family that lives about five miles from the school. Even at that distance they had heard the sirens and seen the helicopters flying overhead on the day of the shooting. Now, two weeks later, the mother wept openly as she recalled the excruciating losses of October 2. Like so many in the tight-knit Amish community, Mary has friends and relatives near Nickel Mines. “I can’t imagine the grief they’re feeling,” she confided. Clearly, however, she had some sense of it. Mary is the mother of six children, two boys and four girls. The oldest, a thirteen-year-old daughter, moved quietly around the dining room, collecting our dishes as we talked over dessert.
Have your ministers made references to the martyrs? we wondered. Mention of “the martyrs” needed no explanation in this setting. For almost one hundred years, beginning in the 1520s, civil and religious authorities hounded and harassed Anabaptists, condemning hundreds to the medieval equivalent of the electric chair. Eventually some twenty-five hundred were beheaded or burned at the stake. Mary, who had attended one of the schoolgirls’ funerals as well as a recent Sunday church service, nodded her head. “Yes, the ministers have talked about the martyrs since the shooting,” she said, but quickly added that such references are not unusual. “We hear about the martyrs almost every time we have church.”
Although they lived and died almost five hundred years ago, the martyrs hover close to the Old Order present, offering flesh-and-blood blueprints for how to lead lives that are yielded to God. Stories of the martyrs, told and retold in church services, family conversations, and school curricula, teach the Amish a variety of lessons—about God’s providence, the world’s evils, and the necessity for Christians to remain faithful to God even in the most difficult of circumstances. And while Jesus’ teaching, especially in the Lord’s Prayer, is the theological taproot for Amish understandings of forgiveness, the movement from prayer to practice draws strength from the witness of the martyrs. In retelling the martyr stories, the Amish surround themselves with historical role models who not only submitted their lives to God but also extended forgiveness to those who were about to kill them. These illustrations, converted into story, song, and sermon, link forgiveness to other theological themes, such as humility, submission, nonresistance, and love of enemy, all of which nourished the community’s response to the shooting.
Quaker theologian Sandra Cronk describes Old Order spirituality with the German word
Gelassenheit,
commonly translated “yieldedness” or “submission.” The Amish, Cronk says, “see God working in the world with the power of powerlessness.” As they seek to emulate this paradoxical pattern, “Old Order people believe they are living the divine order revealed by Christ.” The Amish believe that submission should characterize one’s relationship with God, as suggested by the phrase “thy will be done” in the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:10). But a spirituality of yielding “is not just a personal experience,” according to Cronk. It expands into an ethic of yielding to one another, renouncing self-defense, and giving up the desire for justification or efforts at revenge.
Gelassenheit,
commonly translated “yieldedness” or “submission.” The Amish, Cronk says, “see God working in the world with the power of powerlessness.” As they seek to emulate this paradoxical pattern, “Old Order people believe they are living the divine order revealed by Christ.” The Amish believe that submission should characterize one’s relationship with God, as suggested by the phrase “thy will be done” in the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:10). But a spirituality of yielding “is not just a personal experience,” according to Cronk. It expands into an ethic of yielding to one another, renouncing self-defense, and giving up the desire for justification or efforts at revenge.
Gelassenheit
does not necessarily breed fatalism, however. In their everyday lives Amish people make choices, calculate risk, and plan for the future. And although they often speak of “God’s plans” behind events that are tragic or painful, they do not believe that God predestines history or that they are merely puppets in a divinely determined script. The Amish believe that humans possess choices of ultimate significance, choices such as whether or not to make a commitment to Christ. For the Amish, this decision—made as an adult and sealed by baptism—signifies a person’s entrance into church membership. Submission to the will of God can also translate into stubborn refusal to follow the government’s rules, as when Amish men rejected military induction or when Amish parents refused to send their teenagers to public high schools.
does not necessarily breed fatalism, however. In their everyday lives Amish people make choices, calculate risk, and plan for the future. And although they often speak of “God’s plans” behind events that are tragic or painful, they do not believe that God predestines history or that they are merely puppets in a divinely determined script. The Amish believe that humans possess choices of ultimate significance, choices such as whether or not to make a commitment to Christ. For the Amish, this decision—made as an adult and sealed by baptism—signifies a person’s entrance into church membership. Submission to the will of God can also translate into stubborn refusal to follow the government’s rules, as when Amish men rejected military induction or when Amish parents refused to send their teenagers to public high schools.
Gelassenheit
has many dimensions. One aspect reflects an individual’s willingness to surrender self-will to God’s will. Ideally, a person filled with
Gelassenheit
does not argue with God. The martyrs burned at the stake for their faith epitomize the deepest form of spiritual yieldedness, of literally giving up their lives to God. Yet in the daily lives of twenty-first-century Amish,
Gelassenheit
means yielding to church authority and being willing to accept the
Ordnung,
or rules of the church, and the collective wisdom it embodies. Moreover, a lifestyle of humility and modesty also gives witness to the gentle spirit of
Gelassenheit
. For the Amish, the Pennsylvania German verb
uffgevva
(to give up) captures one aspect of
Gelassenheit:
the willingness to give up one’s self to the authority of the community and its God-ordained leaders. Indeed,
uffgevva
is the word the Amish typically use when speaking about submission. Its multiple meanings include giving up self-will, submitting to an authority (a parent or the church), and yielding to God’s will.
has many dimensions. One aspect reflects an individual’s willingness to surrender self-will to God’s will. Ideally, a person filled with
Gelassenheit
does not argue with God. The martyrs burned at the stake for their faith epitomize the deepest form of spiritual yieldedness, of literally giving up their lives to God. Yet in the daily lives of twenty-first-century Amish,
Gelassenheit
means yielding to church authority and being willing to accept the
Ordnung,
or rules of the church, and the collective wisdom it embodies. Moreover, a lifestyle of humility and modesty also gives witness to the gentle spirit of
Gelassenheit
. For the Amish, the Pennsylvania German verb
uffgevva
(to give up) captures one aspect of
Gelassenheit:
the willingness to give up one’s self to the authority of the community and its God-ordained leaders. Indeed,
uffgevva
is the word the Amish typically use when speaking about submission. Its multiple meanings include giving up self-will, submitting to an authority (a parent or the church), and yielding to God’s will.
Gelassenheit
also shapes Amish perspectives on women’s roles in their community. Based on their understanding of certain New Testament passages and in a fashion similar to other traditional societies, the Amish hold that men are the spiritual head of the home and that wives should submit to their husbands’ authority. Women with young children rarely hold full-time jobs outside the home, although they are increasingly involved with running family businesses in addition to managing households. And although women vote on various church matters, they do not hold ministerial office or wield official authority. Men’s and women’s spheres of work and influence are clear, and the idea of submission is frequently invoked to describe women’s relationship to men. At the same time,
Gelassenheit
is valued across gender boundaries and understood to be a desirable trait among both men and women.
also shapes Amish perspectives on women’s roles in their community. Based on their understanding of certain New Testament passages and in a fashion similar to other traditional societies, the Amish hold that men are the spiritual head of the home and that wives should submit to their husbands’ authority. Women with young children rarely hold full-time jobs outside the home, although they are increasingly involved with running family businesses in addition to managing households. And although women vote on various church matters, they do not hold ministerial office or wield official authority. Men’s and women’s spheres of work and influence are clear, and the idea of submission is frequently invoked to describe women’s relationship to men. At the same time,
Gelassenheit
is valued across gender boundaries and understood to be a desirable trait among both men and women.
What is most striking to persons accustomed to the assertive individualism of Western culture is
Gelassenheit
’s ability to trump personal desire and produce submissive and self-giving behavior. Amish people practice
Gelassenheit
every day as they dress in prescribed clothing, decline to pose for photographs, and make themselves vulnerable by driving buggies amid fast-moving traffic.
Gelassenheit
shapes personalities that are not aggressive, that hesitate before responding to questions, and that express joy with a gentle smile or quiet chuckle rather than a loud, boisterous laugh.
Gelassenheit
is closely related to nonresistance, the Amish commitment to taking literally Jesus’ teaching to “resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:39). The spirit of
Gelassenheit
rejects self-defense and revenge.
Gelassenheit
’s ability to trump personal desire and produce submissive and self-giving behavior. Amish people practice
Gelassenheit
every day as they dress in prescribed clothing, decline to pose for photographs, and make themselves vulnerable by driving buggies amid fast-moving traffic.
Gelassenheit
shapes personalities that are not aggressive, that hesitate before responding to questions, and that express joy with a gentle smile or quiet chuckle rather than a loud, boisterous laugh.
Gelassenheit
is closely related to nonresistance, the Amish commitment to taking literally Jesus’ teaching to “resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:39). The spirit of
Gelassenheit
rejects self-defense and revenge.
The spirituality of
Gelassenheit
is “caught” as much as it is taught. Children are brought up in a world soaked in rituals and habits that express submission and endorse self-surrender. That world is also filled with people from the past—a past that touches the present—who witness to the importance of submission, nonresistance, and forgiveness.
Gelassenheit
is “caught” as much as it is taught. Children are brought up in a world soaked in rituals and habits that express submission and endorse self-surrender. That world is also filled with people from the past—a past that touches the present—who witness to the importance of submission, nonresistance, and forgiveness.
The Amish are a story-telling people, and perhaps the best-known story in Amish circles is that of Jacob Hochstetler, an eighteenth-century Amish man who lived with his family on the Pennsylvania frontier. In 1757, as the French and Indian War reached their corner of the world, the Hochstetlers awoke one night to find Native Americans attacking their cabin. Two of Hochstetler’s sons, Christian and Joseph, reached for their hunting guns, but Jacob would have none of it; he forbade them to use violence. Instead, the family took refuge in the cellar. The mother, one son, and one daughter were killed. Two of the surviving sons later fathered large families, from which a sizeable percentage of today’s Amish population can trace its ancestry—no doubt one of the reasons the story is so often repeated.
The tale is also told because it conveys a central cultural concern for nonretaliation and submission. A father who does not try to protect his children might appear negligent to outsiders, but the Amish see Jacob Hochstetler as modeling faithfulness to Jesus’ call to nonresistance. Jacob did so, the story suggests, as a loving parent who curbed his sons’ impulse to defend their lives through violent means. In this story, reprinted in genealogies, included in Amish school textbooks, and repeated around dinner tables, Jacob Hochstetler is no fool. In contrast to many popular models of manhood, Jacob offers a model of Amish masculinity that illustrates the character of
Gelassenheit
.
Gelassenheit
.
Nowhere do examples from the past merge with the spirituality of the present more than in Amish worship. Amish church services are awash in the language and rituals of self-surrender. Sunday morning gatherings, three hours in length, begin with hymn singing from the
Ausbund,
the sixteenth-century hymnal that includes songs written by imprisoned Anabaptists. Amish hymn singing, like other aspects of Amish life, is remarkably unhurried by modern standards. Singing a four-verse hymn may take fifteen to twenty minutes. The tunes, passed on orally because the hymnal includes no musical notation, linger in the air as members extend syllables and hold notes. In the spirit of
Gelassenheit,
not even time is forced.
Ausbund,
the sixteenth-century hymnal that includes songs written by imprisoned Anabaptists. Amish hymn singing, like other aspects of Amish life, is remarkably unhurried by modern standards. Singing a four-verse hymn may take fifteen to twenty minutes. The tunes, passed on orally because the hymnal includes no musical notation, linger in the air as members extend syllables and hold notes. In the spirit of
Gelassenheit,
not even time is forced.
Ausbund
hymns speak of dependence on God and the fleeting nature of human life on earth. The Lord’s Prayer is one of the hymns. Others are martyr ballads, recounting stories of biblical figures, early Christians, or Anabaptists who died as Christ did—without a fight—and left justice in God’s hands, praying for the salvation of their executioners. One hymn, written by Christopher Baumann, describes his torture at the hands of authorities:
hymns speak of dependence on God and the fleeting nature of human life on earth. The Lord’s Prayer is one of the hymns. Others are martyr ballads, recounting stories of biblical figures, early Christians, or Anabaptists who died as Christ did—without a fight—and left justice in God’s hands, praying for the salvation of their executioners. One hymn, written by Christopher Baumann, describes his torture at the hands of authorities:
They stretch me [on the rack] and torment me,
They tear at my limbs.
My God! To you I lament,
You will see into this.
Baumann goes on to confess total dependence on God, but his prayer is not for divine retribution on his torturers:
My God, I plead from my heart,
Forgive them their sin,
Those who inflict upon me this pain.
Another hymn, by the martyr Georg Wagner, presents Jesus’ crucifixion and refusal to defend himself as an example for others:
Take notice how
That we also in such manner
Patiently suffer here
To help Him bear the reproach.
Amish worship involves kneeling for prayer, listening to the reading of two chapters from the New Testament, and hearing two sermons, one about twenty minutes long and the other about an hour long. Without fail, the bishops or ministers who preach begin by emphasizing their own shortcomings and unworthiness to speak. This embodiment of humility resurfaces again at the end of the sermon. The preacher concludes by apologizing for his weaknesses and calls on other ministers to correct any errors he may have made. The other ministers might do so, but not without first citing their own limitations.
Delivered extemporaneously by men without seminary training, sermons rely heavily on the retelling of stories from the Bible and from Anabaptist history, mixed with observations and lessons drawn from everyday life. It is not uncommon for sermons to refer to stories recorded in
Martyrs Mirror,
a thousand-page book filled with accounts of early Christian martyrs and sixteenth-century Anabaptist men and women who died for their faith. Their example of dying well is offered as a model of patience even for twenty-first-century Amish listeners who are not sitting in dungeons.
Martyrs Mirror,
a thousand-page book filled with accounts of early Christian martyrs and sixteenth-century Anabaptist men and women who died for their faith. Their example of dying well is offered as a model of patience even for twenty-first-century Amish listeners who are not sitting in dungeons.
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