Jacob Ammon & the "Martyrs Mirror"

[Jeff Altweg]

Jacob Ammon , The father of the Amish beliefs, was a young teenager when the great book "The Martyrs Mirror", was first published in Dutch, in 1660..The main part if not all ,of the burning at the stakes , and drownings , described in the big book was in the past , by 30 or more years ,when Jacob ,through much wrangling and arguments and all ,formed what we today know as the Amish..
I find that most Amish today feel that they're the ones described in the book , That the Amish were put to death for their beliefs , which is not correct , It was a lot of the Mennonites , followers of Menno Simons ,who died in the mid-1500's that took the brunt of it ,
So, the Mennonites pre-dated the Amish belief , by several generations ,
Try and explain that to a strict Amishman , who often tend to think of themselves as the "True believers" ,they probably won't believe it ....

[Josh]

Amish are a subsect of Mennonites. One group of Swiss Mennonites with Amman and the other group went with Reist.

Virtually none of the people who followed Reist remain Anabaptist or nonviolent to this day; almost all present day Mennonites (whether liberal or conservative) have their lineage from the Amman side of things. With that in mind, perhaps Amman was right about some things and Reist was wrong.

[Swiss Bro]

Dude was named Ammann. Ammon is an ancient people going back to Lot, the brother of Moses. Fun fact: The capital city of Jordan (the country) is still named Amman, after Ammon, not Jakob Ammann.

Sorry for being a wisecrack, I know nobody likes those.

[Neto]

Jacob Ammon , The father of the Amish beliefs, was a young teenager when the great book "The Martyrs Mirror", was first published in Dutch, in 1660..The main part if not all ,of the burning at the stakes , and drownings , described in the big book was in the past , by 30 or more years ,when Jacob ,through much wrangling and arguments and all ,formed what we today know as the Amish..
I find that most Amish today feel that they're the ones described in the book , That the Amish were put to death for their beliefs , which is not correct , It was a lot of the Mennonites , followers of Menno Simons ,who died in the mid-1500's that took the brunt of it ,
So, the Mennonites pre-dated the Amish belief , by several generations ,
Try and explain that to a strict Amishman , who often tend to think of themselves as the "True believers" ,they probably won't believe it ....

You are correct - although there are a few stories in MM about persecution in the Swiss areas, by far the majority of the stories are about the Dutch "baptism-minded". As a Dutch-background Plautdietsch Mennonite, I find it strange that my own people rarely read Martyrs' Mirror, or even have a copy of the book. (I have read through it, taking lots of notes, but the first time I ever laid eyes on a copy of the book was after my wife and I married. Typically, she is from a former Amish family - her parents were Amish until she was 12 years old. Her dad gave a copy to each of their children. My wife has read little if any of it. It was apparently just something each Amish person should have in their home. Some of her cousins have collected a whole library of old books, and they have one of the first editions of Martyr's Mirror. So yes, it is treasured most by a people whose history it is not.)

[Ernie]

Amish were called "Amish-Mennonites" until the Old Order division following the minster's conferences of 1862-1878.

Hollanders were the first to be called Mennonites (Mennists) but eventually the Swiss/German Brethren were referred to by this name also. So the ancestors of many Amish would have been called Mennonites for awhile before taking on the name Amish-Mennonites (Amman Mennonites).

[silentreader]

Dude was named Ammann. Ammon is an ancient people going back to Lot, the brother of Moses. Fun fact: The capital city of Jordan (the country) is still named Amman, after Ammon, not Jakob Ammann.

Sorry for being a wisecrack, I know nobody likes those.

Lot the brother of Moses?

[mike]

Virtually none of the people who followed Reist remain Anabaptist or nonviolent to this day; almost all present day Mennonites (whether liberal or conservative) have their lineage from the Amman side of things.

How, for example, did Lancaster Conference Mennonites derive from Amman's group?

[Judas Maccabeus]

Virtually none of the people who followed Reist remain Anabaptist or nonviolent to this day; almost all present day Mennonites (whether liberal or conservative) have their lineage from the Amman side of things.

How, for example, did Lancaster Conference Mennonites derive from Amman's group?

Or, for that matter the “Russian” Mennonites?

[ken_sylvania]

Virtually none of the people who followed Reist remain Anabaptist or nonviolent to this day; almost all present day Mennonites (whether liberal or conservative) have their lineage from the Amman side of things.

How, for example, did Lancaster Conference Mennonites derive from Amman's group?

It's all in the meaning of words. "Almost all" = "more than ten individuals."

[Soloist]

Virtually none of the people who followed Reist remain Anabaptist or nonviolent to this day; almost all present day Mennonites (whether liberal or conservative) have their lineage from the Amman side of things.

How, for example, did Lancaster Conference Mennonites derive from Amman's group?

It's all in the meaning of words. "Almost all" = "more than ten individuals."

Words… words. Meaningless babble. Math is the real language here almost all = 10