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

a], in which the practice of baptism was also described as it is now being practiced in the M.B. Chxrnch. Similarly, the “church brother” Abram Matthies of Rudnerweide presented him with a tract published by the Baptists, with the vexing words: “You will probably be able to use it.” He accepted it with thanks. From this time on, there was much discussion about it and there were “difficult scenes” among the brethren, a number of whom later withdrew as a result of baptism [but only after 1862, when it was gradually made mandatory]. 4) “Since most of them did approve of building the church according to the Word of God,” one should also begin to baptize. Only they did not quite know bow to begin, because none of the brethren had been baptized in this manner, and thus the matter was delayed. On one occasion, “all those in Waldheim were together with the full blessing of the Lord,” and there, too, baptism was again discussed. Several young brethren, on the homeward journey from this meeting in Waldheim, came to the Kuruschan creek [halfway between Waldheim and Gnadenfeld, which are about 10 versts apart], and two said to each other: “Here is water” . . . And so they opened the Word of God, for almost everyone carried a Testament and Glaubensstimme hymnal with him, and after reading, singing and praying, they baptized one another on their faith by immersion, during a night of bright moonlight [on September 23, I860]. The two were the brethren named previously: Jakob Becker (elected to the ministry at the same time as Heinrich Huebert, on May 30, 1860) and Heinrich 288 THE MENNONITE BRETHREN CHURCH Bartel (ordained along with Abram Peters of Gnadenheim and Franz Klassen of Elizabethtal as the first deacons by Heinrich Huebert in the winter of 1860/61). c) Only in the winter of 1860/1861 did they correspond with the Baptist minis ter, Alf, in Poland, and simultaneously with the Mennonite brother, Peter Ewert who also lived there. The latter and another Mennonite baptized each other in 1861, after receiving an account of the secession and baptism at the Molotschna, in a letter from the Molotschna brethren. This letter was read in a large assembly of Mennonites, Lutherans and Baptists, followed by an election of ministers and baptism. “They did not want to begin anything before we had written” (Jakob Becker’s letter to Claassen, December 3, 1861), although Alf’s church was already in existence nearby, organized on the basis of the German Hamburg confession. This correspondence shows that the questions of military service and footwashing prevented complete unity between the Mennonite Brethren and the Baptists. We present the following items from that correspondence: 1) Jakob Becker to Joh ann Claassen in St. Petersburg. Rudnerweide, April 16, 1861. “. . . We received word (from Poland] . . . that some have been baptized by the Baptist Minister Alf [even before Ewert] and still remain Mennonites .... On Ch