Perilous Journey: The Mennonite Brethren in Russia 1860-1910, John B. Toews, 1988

ticed without faith and as a prerequisite to marriage in the church? Was baptism always a mass affair and did it always have to fall on one day? 24 It was important to stress the inner meaning of baptism, not the external form. 25 Faith, not tradition, was the true prerequisite for baptism. Old Church adherents also focused on the nature of the believers' church. Some tried to distinguish between a religious peoplehood in which most were eventually admitted to baptism and communion, and the committed believers within that group. It was not easy. One discussant complained: "We are neither Volkskirche nor a church of believers." 26 The Gnadenfeld minister Jakob Janzen was more emphatic: "We are Volkskirche and want to be that." 27 The best one could do, he argued, was to stay and work from within. In keeping with the existing structure it was perhaps even useful to dedicate children as Mennonites, then later baptize them on faith as Christians. 28 Allianz with its theology of essentials, a united social action on many fronts, a long-standing forestry service, a broad based commitment to home and foreign missions — the split persisted. Why? One is tempted to blame the Brethren, especially when sampling the documents of the early twentieth century. They insisted that only immersed believers share in their communion service; that every baptismal candidate be carefully scrutinized; that, as a rule, Old Church ministers not speak in their services; finally, there was a strong church discipline at times charac- terized by self-righteousness and legalism. Religious exactness and the occasional sense of moral superiority made the Brethren unapproachable. Such an interpretation is probably too simplistic. Thanks to a broad- ranging Mennonite institutionalism and the revivalistic 87 theology of the Allianz, the pre-WWI Russian Mennonites stood closer to one another than at any time since the split of 1860. They were certainly more tolerant of each other than their co- religionists in North America. What basic issue kept them apart? An Old Church adherent writing in 1912 possibly provides an answer. 29 Johann Janzen was extremely critical of his own group. It had, he argued, lost the concept of the believer's church and its essential component, the "pure church." Since we, as already has been said, have defected from the ideal of a pure church (einer... reinen Gemeinde), it is little wonder that we are not exacting about instituting the same.... Why do the healthy remain with the sick? We want to take them all with us — all without exceptions. This idea that all Mennonites and their children have to be brought into the church of Christ — this idea weakens us. It has transformed our churches into hybrid churches; to a degree it has alienated us from the original Mennonitism; it gives us the idea God wants Volkskirchen; it has made us forget that the Bible speaks of calling, election, chosen ones and s