The Great Trek of the Russian Mennonites to Central Asia, 1880-1884, Fred Richard Belk, 1976

The consolidation and organizational work of Menno Simons after 1536 in the Netherlands further contributed to the withdrawal of the Mennonites into separate, quietist, and isolated communities."” These Mennonites, then, were not frozen and forced into the political structure of a state church but remained entirely independent. Throughout their history there has been an uneasy truce between their church and the state. There have been many turning points that have led to persecution and many episodes of migration resulting from the shattering of the truce. But the majority have always believed in a higher authority than government on any moral mat- ter. The symbol of dissent in ages of increasing nationalism and militarism became the rejection of military service and their doctrine of Wehrlosigkeit (defenselessness) or nonresistance. The heart of the Mennonite view of the state was a thorough- going dualism, a doctrine of two separate worlds. The state and state churches belonged to the evil kingdom; the new community of regenerated believers was a part of the kingdom of Christ. The state had no supreme authority over Christ's kingdom, although ordained by God to maintain order in an evil world.'!* Mennonites came to be- lieve that the kingdom of Christ and the kingdom of this world are alien to one another and that complete separation was the only answer.'® As time went on, and Mennonites accommodated to state systems, a gradual erosion of their dualistic approach occurred.” Yet, when the Mennonites established colonies in South Russia after 1788, toleration and complete autonomy over religious and political affairs was still their primary motive for settlement. They endured so much persecution that the Russian immigration was a welcome event. 2 FROM THE VISTULA TO THE VOLGA Vistula Delta Persistent persecution throughout the sixteenth century caused many Mennonite refugees to find their way to more tolerant lands. They followed the Rhine River into Germany and on to the Nether- lands. In Spanish Flanders, where Catholicism finally prevailed, and where the Inquisition worked most perfectly, Mennonitism was practically rooted out by 1600. Many of the refugees fled to the north- ern provinces where opposition to Spanish Catholic rule was most determined. Religious toleration in these northern provinces was still a relative matter, however. Mennonites were still compelled to pay taxes to support the Reformed Church and to submit to humiliating restrictions. It was a most difficult process to initiate formal church congregations. Only in the late sixteenth century did Dutch Menno- nites become clearly defined as a brotherhood, and even then, con- gregations in northwestern Germany and as far away as Danzig had close ties with the Dutch congregations. In the mid-seventeenth cen- tury a continual stream of Mennonite refugees expanded into England, East Friesland, and also to Poland and East Prus