THE MENNONITE BROTHERHOOD IN RUSSIA (1789 - 1910), P. M. Friesen, 1911

and sisters of Berdiansk, travelled to Neu-Hoffnung where we met people from Rosenfeld and Neuhoffnungstal [all villages in the late Pastor Wuest’s parish). We had a blessed time together . . . Joseph Hottmann is once more happy in spirit . . . . W. Bartel.” b) Jakob Becker’s letters. The following lines which Becker wrote to Claassen in St. Petersburg show how the exuberant movement began to degenerate in the summer of 1861 and the attitude which Jakob Becker, the assistant church leader, adopted toward the movement. (Becker, at this time, was in the position of leadership, while the real 266 THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH elder or first minister, Huebert, adopted an almost passive attitude toward the movement because, generally speaking, he was not a man of energetic character and partially because he had become discouraged by his own and the severe illness of his wife, as well as partially because he had been intimidated by the “strong” and the “free”.) "Rudnerweide, June 11, 1861. The peace of God be with you, dear brother! Greetings with Psalm 86:6. Strength and beauty are among His people. The Lord has done great things for us, for which we rejoice .... Sunday we were so lively [in Jakob Reimer’s home in Gnadenfeld] that the brethren leaped and danced, while we were near the water [where Jakob Reimer, the owner of the house, was baptized]. 74 Old Brother Strauss and several others could not endure it and went into the old grandfather’s house .... On the Tuesday evening before Pentecost, Wilhelm Bartel was with us [in Rudnerweide], and we sang outside before the door, giving thanks and shouting for joy with one another. And the world shouted back at us ... It gathered at the street fence and listened . . . . W. Bartel went out to preach the gospel to them. [Meanwhile, a deputation from the Mennonite Church is supposed to go to St. Petersburg in order to work against Claassen there] .... If he [the minister they sent to represent them] will say that we rejoice with much shouting and that we also dance, then he will speak the truth . . . but I suppose that you must have Scriptural grounds to justify the matter .... Jakob Becker.” c) Jakob Reimer of Gnadenfeld represents the other side. He, too, writes to Claassen on the same day: “Gnadenfeld, June 11, 1861. Today three men from the Old Colony— Unger, Epp and Loewen— visited me for two and one-half hours. [Cf. further Geschichte der Mennoniten Brueder Gemeinde Chortitzer Bezirks (History of the M.B. Church, District of Chortitza.)] But they are very narrow-minded and fear that the same thing will happen to us that happened to them [in the ‘Kronsweide revival,’ cf. #127], thus they warn us. . . . They have impressed me as being sincere, and it is such people that God allows to prosper .... (June 18). Brother, I do not wish to accuse anyone, nor am I regarded very highly any more by those who are too much disposed toward the unrestrained express