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

rce (Monatsblaetter 1904, #4) is, if anything, still more gripping because of the insights it affords us into the relationship of these congregations to their more distant sister congregations, as well as presenting us with some highly important historical clarifications of 62 DUTCH-PRUSSIAN ANABAPTISTS questions which have concerned us for some ten years, such as whether or not the settlements of Gnadenfeld and Alexanderwohl in Russia or America respectively are “old-Frisian” or “old-Flemish,” “Ukowallian,” a question which is answered here on the basis of the latest evidence. Compare IX. 9.ff. We copy the passage verbatim. “The notes of Elder Wiebe’s diary also present the relationships of one congregation to another, as well as the way in which the author maintained brotherly relationships with distant fellow-believers in a most engaging manner. At first the congregations of the Flemish persuasion maintained a close relationship with one another. Their elders and ministers discharge common concerns at conferences, dispatch delegates to Berlin and arrange support for those who have suffered injury through broken dykes and floods. In 1786 Wiebe journeyed to Koenigsberg to preside at the communion service because Elder Kroecker had become quite old. Eighty-four people were present at the celebration. A few days after his return home he received word of Kroecker’s passing. Just before his death, Kroecker had movingly encouraged his co-workers to adhere to the faith of their fathers and care faithfully for his flock. . . . Questions of interest to Mennonites and other [confessional] groups give the congregation cause for concern. Thus, in 1784, a Protestant merchant [of Danzig] was to marry a Mennonite girl. She consented but did not want to lose her membership in the church. Her fiance and others, the mayor included, went to great lengths to persuade Elder Epp to be more tolerant. Epp and the congregation, however, stuck to their old [Flemish] practice and, as a consequence, the sister transfered to the Frisian congregation which allowed such an arrangement. Wiebe reported of a bitter quarrel in the very bosom of this [Frisian] congregation. A minister named Siebert declared it to be unjust to rebaptize those who wanted to join the Mennonite church and had already been baptized as children. Although he found some support for his views in his own congregation, the elders of the Ohrlofferfelde and Nichefsky congregations in the vicinity of Thom declared themselves to be in opposition, and thus the case came before the government in Berlin. [Then already this evil was present! It is the reverse of the D. von Riesen incident.] The government decreed that Siebert’s congregation could divide, that the group which was willing to pay the highest price could retain the building, but that for the rest everyone was to remain undisturbed in his group. On September 11, 1785, a Frisian minister, v. Dueren, from