A History of the Mennonite Brethren Church, Ja Toews

burg up to 1870 was a Supervisory Commission {Fuersorge- komitee) appointed by the Tsar. This commission, located in the city of Odessa, performed primarily administrative functions. Thus, for the first time in their history, the Mennonites had to assume civic 1. Molotschna Mennonite Colony FROM BELIEVERS CHURCH TO PARISH CHURCH 17 pl«c« Qaircbts ahnnoni te plac* place 2. Chortitza Mennonite Colony 18 HISTORY OF THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH responsibilities and reconcile these new functions with their historic Anabaptist principle of the separation of church and state. Economic conditions also played a decisive role in shaping the social and religious life of the colonies. The Mennonites established large, closed settlements in keeping with government colonial policy. This isolation made them independent of the "world" around them, but interdependent in their social and economic life. Moreover, they had been invited to Russia as model farmers, and a model farm supposedly contained 175 acres. The government regulation stipulated that the original estates were not to be subdivided by the colonies. Soon the rapid increase in population resulted in a serious shortage of available land. The situation became most acute in the Molotschna Colony with a ratio of 2,356 landless workers to 1,384 landed farmers in 1865." This division of the population into landowners and landless workers resulted in a social stratification approaching a caste system. The landless families usually lived on the outskirts of the village, and for that reason were known as Anwohner. The landless lacked voting rights in village meetings, and intermarriage between these groups was frowned upon by the wealthy class. These socio-economic problems were compounded by the absence of competent and far-sighted leadership. In an earlier period Johann Cornies (1789-1848) had given such leadership. From the time he was appointed permanent chairman of the Agricultural Improvement Society in 1817 until his premature death in 1848, Comies was the ardent champion and promoter of improved agricultural practices and better schools. Under his auspices the first secondary school was founded in Ohrloff in 1820. He laid the groundwork for an excellent school system by his insistence on teacher training and curriculum reform. He personally wrote a major pedagogical treatise entitled "General Rules Concerning Instruction and Treatment of Children." However, these efforts came to fruition too late to prevent the crises in the 50's and 60's. After 1865 a temporary solution was found in the distribution of crown lands (which the landowners had previously rented for minimal fees). Somewhat later the two oldest colonies, with a vision they had not shown before launched a long-range program of establishing "daughter colonies" for the landless and their young people. In the course of the next fifty years approximately forty new settl