AT 01: Anabaptism Today: Introductory Editorial

By Stuart Murray
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 1, November 1992

Welcome to the inauguaral issue of Anabaptism Today,the magazine of a recently formed Anabaptist Network in the UK! For a number of years a small study group has met in London to explore Anabaptism and its contemporary significance. Drawn from several denominational backgrounds, members of this group have become convinced that the Anabaptist legacy is attractive and has much to teach Christians today. In December 1991 we wrote to eighty people asking whether they would welcome the formation of an Anabaptist Network and the production of a magazine. By autumn 1992, more than two hundred people had asked to join the Network, and most endorsed the idea of a magazine.

Steps toward a new magazine

Because of this level of interest, an ad hoc committee of people involved in the original study group met to make plans for a new magazine. The committee asked the following individuals to serve as an editorial board for the publication:

Eleanor and Alan Kreider - Mennonite authors who live in Manchester, where they are Theologians in Residence" at Northern Baptist College.

Nigel Wright - A Baptist minister, author, and tutor in theology at Spurgeon's College in London. He chairs the Baptist Mainstream group.

Judith Gardiner - A Mennonite specialist in church history who lives in East London and teaches at London Bible College.

Noel Moules - The Director of Workshop, a discipleship and leadership training programme. He lives in Clapham in South London.

Trisha Dale - A free-lance editor and National Secretary of Men Women and God. She is Baptist and lives in Surrey.

David Nussbaum - A director of a packaging company who holds two degrees in theology. He is from Bucks and is a non-executive director of Traidcraft.

The committee asked the following to serve as editors:

Stuart Murray, former church planter in the East End of London and member of Team Spirit (a House Church network). He recently completed a doctorate in Anabaptist hermeneutics and is now Oasis Director of Evangelism and Church Planting at Spurgeon's College in London.

Nelson Kraybill, a Mennonite minister from the United States who recently completed a doctorate in biblical studies. In 1991 he moved to London to become Programme Director of the London Mennonite Centre.

Many people in the traditions to which the editorial board belong recognize in Anabaptism a source of inspiration and instruction. For Mennonites, this means rediscovering their own historical roots. For Baptists, this means acknowledging the influence of Anabaptist ideas even if the historical connection between Anabaptism and early Baptists is unclear. For House Church people, this means discovering significant parallels with Anabaptism and learning from an earlier restoration movement.

The Anabaptist Network is already broader than these three traditions, however, and our intention is that it be as ecumenical as possible. Some people in other traditions are interested in Anabaptism as a historical movement; others are concerned about its contemporary relevance. Some are attracted by Anabaptist emphases on community, consensus and economic sharing; others value the commitment to nonviolence and enemy-loving. Some find the Anabaptist approach to Scripture refreshing; others find challenge in a radical Jesus-centred tradition. Our aim is to reflect this range of interests in magazine articles, and to draw on insights of members of the network.

A way of being church and following Jesus

We struggled over terminology for the network and the magazine. We considered "Radical Reformation" or 'believers' church", but decided in the end to stay with "Anabaptist". Of course this label was originally an insult, and Anabaptist ("re-baptizer") is an inaccurate term: Anabaptists regarded infant baptism as invalid, and thus insisted they were baptizing believers, not re-baptizing. Although using the term "Anabaptist" today could suggest our interest is mainly in a sixteenth-century movement, we have found it to be the most recognizable and helpful label. We are interested in the sixteenth-century Anabaptists, but see them as representatives of a way of being church and following Jesus that has had other expressions throughout history. We want to draw on this broader tradition and to explore what it means to follow Jesus at the end of the twentieth century.

This first issue of Anabaptism Today introduces themes that the magazine will address regularly: "The Search for Roots" locates Anabaptism in a broad "alternative church history" tradition; later issues will explore other groups from this stream of church history. "Zurich: Seedbed of Radical Change" introduces the Swiss Anabaptists; subsequent issues will contain similar articles on other sixteenth-century expressions of the Radical Reformation. "Catching the Bell Rope" considers ways in which the contemporary church is rediscovering and endorsing convictions held by Anabaptists; future articles will explore other contemporary topics. Other regular features will be book reviews and samplings of original Anabaptist documents or illustrations. We welcome letters and offers to write articles.

A stimulus to action and reflection

In addition to the magazine, the Anabaptist Network includes study groups in several parts of the UK. Already there are groups meeting in London and Sheffield, and during the winter more groups may begin. Details of these groups appear in this issue. Anabaptism Today will act as a resource for these study groups, together with other material we will suggest.

Further ahead lies development of an Anabaptist Institute to enable research into topics dealt with in this magazine. Whilst there is no facility for this at present in the UK, there is growing interest in such research. We are eager to provide resources, facilities and supervision for those who want to undertake study on Anabaptist topics. As a step towards this, we hope to set up resource centres in several parts of the UK, with books and other materials available for those who want to explore Anabaptism. At present the main resource is the London Mennonite Centre with its Metanoia Book Service, library and Cross-Currents seminars. The Anabaptist Network is independent of the Mennonite Centre but is working closely with it.

Sixteenth-century Anabaptism was largely a movement of the poor, powerless and uneducated; it was not a scholarly elite. Anabaptists had their heart in discipleship and mission rather than in doctrinal discussion or historical research. Whilst we recognize the need today for research to rediscover this legacy, we want the network to be earthed in local church life, mission and practical social concern. We hope this magazine will be a stimulus to reflection as well as action.

AT 01: Catching the Bell Rope

by Nigel G. Wright
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 1, November 1992

There are moments in history that contain an element of mystery, a sense that something innovative, creative and arguably divine is being forged. Karl Barth's rediscovery of the Bible and his consequent "Copernican revolution" in theology is one such moment. By his own confession, Barth "stumbled into the strange world of the Bible". He felt himself to be like one who climbed a bell tower, inadvertently caught hold of the bell rope and caused all around to hear the ringing of the bell.

Barth's "accidental" rediscovery of the power of the Word of God has had a prolonged impact upon the theological world. It came about during the First World War, during a period of intense political pressure and social dislocation. Barth's personal experience proved significant far beyond his own life because it came at a particular time into a world which, whether it knew it or not, was ready for it.

The English Civil War of the seventeenth century was a similar moment of innovation and creativity. In the midst of that huge social, military, economic and religious clash, new ideas came to birth. Creativity found political and institutional expression in ways which marked have the western world ever since. English society crossed thresholds in its conceptions of what is politically right and good, and could not go back. People who at other times and places merely would have gone their way in obscurity actually incarnated these changes in their lives. Revolutionary times made revolutionaries of the most unlikely people.

The days and weeks of Christ's resurrection appearances rank supreme in a Christian view of history. Here something radically new took place, difficult though it is to fathom within categories of secular history. New ideas, new language and new experiences came to birth in the white heat of that event. Followers of Jesus came to understand the world in radically new ways.

I am tempted to describe each of these moments as "revelatory". For the theologically fastidious, however, I shall reserve this language for the resurrection alone and speak of other historical events as "illuminatory". In the events cited, and others not listed, illumination took place in ways beyond ignoring. It is possible to see in each event a conjunction of revolutionary historical circumstances, human longing and activity of the Spirit of God. These were breakthroughs leading to paradigm shifts in the way a significant number of people viewed reality.

Anabaptism as a threshold moment

Both by its role in history and its impact on my own life, Anabaptism is such a paradigm shift. The more I read about it, the more I sense that the emergence of Anabaptism was yet another "magic" moment, a breaking in of illumination through the hard crust of resistant humanity.

As far as I am concerned, the pivotal event in the emergence of Anabaptism took place at Zürich on January 21, 1525.¹ The political and religious landscape of Europe was in a period of tumultuous change. A growing dissident group of Zwingli's followers had come under censure from the town council and had now met secretly at the home of Felix Mantz. Conrad Grebel and a fiery newcomer to town, Georg Blaurock, were among those present.

Suddenly the breakthrough came. Georg Blaurock requested Conrad Grebel to baptize him with true Christian baptism. Grebel did so, after which Blaurock baptized those present in the room by pouring water. This was a threshold moment. No one had dared do this since the time of the Donatists over a thousand years before. It was a proscribed act since it was regarded as re-baptism, a breach of church discipline. The church was backed by the power of the state, and could exercise discipline with real force. Re-baptism was a simple act, yet it had immense implications.

Discipleship embracing responsibility

Re-baptism had implications for the nature of the church. To baptize upon profession of faith was to imply that up till this time these people had not been true Christians. Simply being baptized as a baby into a "Christian" society was not enough. Something more was necessary for the fashioning of a true Christian, some act of discipleship that embraced responsibility. The church had to be a committed fellowship of those who freely believed and in so doing set themselves, in matters of faith, beyond the dictate of monarch or town council.

The Anabaptist view of discipleship and church also had implications for society. Anabaptists saw society in a radically different way from their contemporaries. Theirs was a protest movement operating under extreme conditions, and they did not usually produce carefully honed or systematic theology. Yet their theology did emerge through a ragged series of insights and encounters. It amounted to a rejection of the sacral state, a rejection of both the ideological use of religion by the state and the oppressive use of secular power by the church. This understanding of church and state anticipated freedoms which later became the heritage of western nations. Although it may not be possible to draw a straight line from Anabaptism to religious tolerance and freedom, it is possible to draw some sort of line.

The emergence of Anabaptism shed light upon western religious and political structures, and enabled improvement. Anabaptism marked both a return to the sources of faith in Jesus Christ and a belief in the possibility of progress in society. The first of these predominated for the Anabaptists. But the movement is evidence that where people take Jesus Christ seriously and adhere to him, their witness has power beyond expectation and imagining.

A source of renewal for church and mission

Anabaptism still has power to illuminate, and this conviction undergirds my interest in the movement. The illumination continues to concern the way of being the church and the consequences of this for Christian witness to society. Anabaptism may act, therefore, as a source of renewal for the church and its mission.

In the present era, the whole church must come to terms with the fact that its existence is a sectarian one. It does not occupy the dominating, central ground in society. It no longer provides a canopy embracing the whole of reality for substantial masses of humanity. It must come to terms with this existence as a dissenting minority which nonetheless has immense transformative potential. It is here that a return to the paradigms of Anabaptism has ecumenical significance. There is something here for the whole church to learn.

My interests lie particularly in the area of mission and the ways in which renewal of the church offers potential for renewing the wider community. Anabaptists wanted to restore the true church on biblical and supremely on christological foundations. The consequent missionary impetus manifested by the movement was in stark contrast to other Reformation traditions.

If various traditions of Christianity need to heed the Anabaptist witness, they do not need to cease being what they are. Rather, the church ecumenical might benefit from the leaven of Anabaptist thought as it relates to responsible discipleship, the believers' church, and freedom of the church from dominance by state and culture. The outcome of this is beyond immediate prediction, but not beyond creative imagination. The motive for renewed interest in

Anabaptism is not narrow sectarianism, but ecumenism in the belief that illumination is here for us all.

Fruitful impact as voluntary minority

Along the way we need to revise the language of "church" and "sect" which often predominates in these discussions. When Ernst Troeltsch developed his typology along these lines he was using the language in precise terms. However, it is too easy to use the word "sect" pejoratively. What the church needs to recognize is that a sectarian reality now confronts us all. Increasingly the church's existence will be as a voluntary minority which does not hold the centre ground in our cultures.

We may either lament this status as a fall from past glory or embrace it as the way it should have been all along, as a return to the normative mode for existence of the church. To recognize our marginalisation is not to capitulate to paganism, or to abdicate social and political responsibility, or to accommodate to the privatisation of religion - although all of these temptations lie to hand. It is rather a return to the mode of existence in which the church makes its most fruitful impact as it actively waits and prays for the kingdoms of this world to become the kingdom of our God and of his Christ.

On a more personal level, it is impossible to read of the Anabaptists without admiring both their heroism and their Christian character in adversity. As a British Baptist, I am aware of the suffering endured by my own forebears. But the tally of martyrs produced by the Anabaptists exceeds anything in my own tradition.

Some years ago I stood by the River Limmat in Zürich, not far from Zwingli's church, at the place where Felix Mantz was bound before being carried off to the middle of the river to endure the "third baptism" of martyrdom. Mantz was the first Anabaptist to die at the hands of fellow Protestants, and he did so testifying cheerfully. His mother and brothers in Christ urged him to be faithful to the last. While being bound he sang with a loud voice: In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum ("Into your hands I commit my spirit, O Lord"). Mantz was consciously echoing Stephen, the first martyr for Christ, the shedding of whose blood furthered the Christian mission no less than his life. In such a testimony there is more than intellectual force, but a quality of commitment which exemplifies the offering of the whole of life in discipleship. I felt myself to be at a place of breakthrough, and that instinct has not lessened.

Notes

I See articles on pages 12-16 and 24 of this issue of Anabaptism Today.

AT 01: The Search for Roots

by Alan Kreider
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 1, November 1992

Anabaptism Today? This may sound somewhat immodest. Anabaptism, in its generative and expansive form at least, was crushed over four centuries ago. The established churches, often for understandable reasons of responsibility and institutional survival, rejected its insights. Its leaders were killed or cowed into quiescence. Its writings remained unpublished and unread. The very word "Anabaptism" became a byword for fanaticism and tumult.

Beginning about a century ago, however, and gaining momentum in the past twenty years, there has been a growing readiness on the part of many Christians to listen to the Anabaptists. There is new interest in listening not only to the Anabaptists, but also to marginal Christians from other times and places who had parallel insights. At a time when Christianity manifestly is in trouble, at least in the Northern Hemisphere, a growing number of Christians are turning to unexpected sources for ways forward.

Christians are turning to the past, not out of nostalgia, but to reawaken subversive memories. Things have been and can be other than they are. There is no God-given inevitability about forms of Christian witness and church life that past generations have bequeathed to us. God's Spirit, who reminds us of everything Jesus taught (John 14:26), also reminds us of undomesticated forms of Christian living. Though crushed and marginalized in the past, in our time these can address us with new possibilities for thought, action and common life. Anabaptism's new influence today is an expression of this. It indicates the transforming potential of a repressed memory brought back into consciousness.

This article examines three ways Anabaptism is important: for its intrinsic significance, for its representative function as part of an alternative strand of Christianity, and for the invitation it presents to rediscover Christian origins.

Intrinsic significance

In a burst of creativity in the 1520s and 1530s, individuals and groups sprang up across western and central Europe to challenge received notions of what it means to be Christian. There were many dimensions to this challenge. After a millenium in which most Europeans were compelled to belong to locally established churches because they had been born in a "Christian" country, the Anabaptists pioneered a voluntarist model of Christianity. Christians should be those who, having counted the cost, had chosen to follow Jesus. Baptism should be given, not to everyone who was born, but to those who had experienced rebirth and were committed to the Christian way.

Faith, the Anabaptists believed, could not be compelled. They sensed that linking church to state polluted the mission of the church without strengthening the state. Theirs was a nonconformist vision of Christianity, and adherents of Anabaptism lived in alternative ways, by different standards from the bulk of the populace. For support in this, Anabaptists developed a variety of communitarian lifestyles. As communities of faith they shared their worship and their possessions, their lives and their sufferings.

The generative core of Anabaptism was its Christocentric understanding. Jesus, whom Christians worship, must also be listened to and obeyed. "Why should God manifest his will", Michael Sattler reasoned shortly before his execution in 1527, "if he did not desire that it be done?"¹ Possibly Sattler's contemporaries did not heed the teachings of Jesus because it was inconvenient, when Christian Europe was being threatened by Turkish invaders, to espouse nonviolent enemy-love. Possibly because, if people were obedient to Jesus' injunction to comprehensive truth-telling and prohibition of swearing oaths, civil courts might cease to function. Possibly because, if people insisted on sharing their possessions with the needy, the economic foundations of European society might be shaken.

These reasons for obedience to God, Anabaptists felt, were not enough. Instead, there were persuasive reasons why communities of faith should test and experiment with the teachings of Jesus and demonstrate their applicability to wider society. Jesus, the Anabaptists were convinced, is God's authoritative Word. He is the key to the rest of the scriptures. He is the source of hope for a humanity experiencing violence, oppression and despair.

Voluntarist, nonconformist, communitarian, Christocentric: these themes emerge from Anabaptist writings and court records that scholars have uncovered in recent decades. The Anabaptists, whose memory was persecuted by powerful people who write histories, now for the first time in over four centuries have been able to speak for themselves. Their voices have given new impetus and self-respect to the groups with uninterrupted Anabaptist lineage: Mennonites, Brethren in Christ, Amish and Hutterites.

Beyond these groups, however, people in other traditions are also listening to Anabaptist voices. Some, in hot disagreement, will point out "That's an Anabaptist argument!" But this put-down doesn't work as well as it used to. Less and less can people categorize an alternative point of view as Anabaptist and think that they have thereby dismissed it. An increasing number of Christians, finding that traditional Christian formulations and folkways no longer fit the world in which they live, are discovering intriguing relevance in the Anabaptists' word and way.

Alternative strands of Christianity

People who warm to Anabaptist insights quickly discover that Anabaptism is not an isolated phenomenon. Instead, it stands in a tradition of radical alternatives to conventional Christianity. Outside the dominant Christian traditions are medieval Waldensians, Lollards, the Czech Brethren, early Baptists, Quakers, Moravians, early Methodists, Christian Brethren, Pentecostals and African Independent Churches. Within the great traditions themselves (often uncomfortably) are monks and friars, missionary orders and societies, the Confessing Church and a variety of communities including Base Ecclesial Communities.

Among Catholic and establishment Protestant groups a lineal descent is often traceable. Some writers have sought to trace a similar genealogy, a kind of alternative apostolic succession, among the nonconformist groups. These attempts have not convinced most scholars; direct connections between them usually are untraceable.

Yet repeatedly the four Anabaptist themes noted above recur in these groups. They appear in differing forms and combinations, to be sure, and especially are evident in the first generation or two of a movement. In their voluntarism these groups have tended to empower the weak and (at least initially) to give new room for women to offer their gifts. In their nonconformity these groups have explored ways of living simply, and often have rejected oath-swearing and life­taking (including war and capital punishment).

Alternative approaches to life issues led many of these groups to explore new ways of being communitarian. All of these are expressions of a Christocentrism that is sometimes sophisticated and sometimes naive, but that always points to the perpetual freshness of Jesus' undomesticable teachings.

Why have these diverse movements, so widely scattered in space and time, come to similar conclusions? Perhaps it is because God's Spirit keeps reminding people of the teachings of Jesus. These people, often in groups that are unrespectable and on the edges of their societies, are ideally placed to say, "Why not? What would happen if ... ?" Then they proceed to give social expression to another sample of Jesus' gracious imprudence.

Anabaptism, by and large, was not genetically connected with these intriguingly similar groups. As some scholars have recently suggested, Anabaptism itself may have been partly a product of an early sixteenth-century monastic renewal movement. It may also have had considerable influence on the early Baptist movement as it developed in the Netherlands and England.

But genes are not the point. Anabaptism has proved significant, not as a link to other groups, but as a symbol of an alternative strand of church history and as a means of providing coherence for it. Two terms derived from Anabaptist study have been especially useful as organizational categories: "Radical Reformation" (Williams; Yoder) and "Believers' Church" (Weber; Durnbaugh).² The Anabaptists, therefore, do not stand alone. They are representatives of a tendency that is durable and recurrent.

An invitation to rediscover origins

The third importance of Anabaptism is its invitation to rediscover origins. As one recent writer put it, Anabaptism "has provided a unique point of identification for many from an evangelical heritage who are taking the call of discipleship seriously in our time". The Anabaptists would have been bemused by this sentence. Their concern was not to be a model for anyone, but to participate with others in a rediscovery of the genius of early Christianity.

Most groups mentioned above had the same concern. According to Elizabethan divine Richard Hooker, so did the Church of England: "The first state of things was best, that in the prime of Christian religion faith was soundest, the Scriptures of God were then best understood by all [people], all parts of godliness did then most abound".³

There is life in the roots. Almost any Christian tradition can experience renewal by rediscovering insights and energies that first brought it into existence. So it is not surprising when modern Methodists in search of renewal appeal to the evangelistic zeal and communitarian instincts of early Wesleyans; or when contemporary Quakers seek to rediscover the earth-shaking understandings and spiritual dynamics of George Fox and his circle of Friends; or when religious orders, following the impetus of Vatican II, seek to rediscover "the spirit of the founder" of each order;⁴ or when Mennonites seek a "recovery of the Anabaptist vision".⁵

The sixteenth-century Anabaptists' ultimate concern, similar to that of the early Quakers, Methodists, Plymouth Brethren and Anglo-Catholics, was to rediscover a pattern of faithfulness to Christ according to the pattern of the Early Church. Therefore, valuable though Anabaptist or Anglican or Pentecostal roots may be to the renewal of these traditions today, these roots especially are valuable insofar as they lead to roots that go deeper still, roots embedded in the memory of Christians of the earliest centuries.

Life-givingly dangerous memory

An indication of the power of this memory comes from a statement by the US Roman Catholic bishops: "It is clear today, perhaps more than in previous generations, that convinced Christians are a minority in nearly every country of the world ... As believers we can identify rather easily with the early Church as a company of witnesses engaged in a difficult mission. To be disciples of Jesus requires that we continually go beyond where we now are ... One must take a resolute stand against many commonly accepted axioms of the world."⁶ This statement, which the Anabaptists would have been astounded to applaud, indicates the substance of agreement that is currently emerging between Christians of many traditions.

Of course, the early church is not our ultimate place of meeting final authority; that we find in the generative events described in the New Testament. Most crucially we find our authority in the person, the life and teaching, the death and resurrection of Jesus whom we worship and follow as Messiah. It is Jesus whose memory is the most life-givingly dangerous of all memories. But the early church, across three centuries, continued in boldness and "foolishness" to live the way of Jesus. It was, according to German Catholic exegete Gerhard Lohfink, a "contrast society" which continued the "foundational reception of Jesus' praxis of the reign of God".⁷ Or, to use other language, it was the first nonconformist church.

The church, of course, later changed course. It adapted its structures and assumptions to the maintenance of dominance in a unitary Christian society, in alliance with the State. According to Anglican biblical theologian Christopher Rowland, it engaged in a "process of neutralization of the subversive ideas which threatened the status quo"⁸ Precisely for this reason the monks and Anabaptists, along with other renewal groups, arose to make their witness.

Something surprising may happen

The coming years are likely to be difficult for the human family. The current global instability is unlikely to diminish, rooted as it is in a lethal mixture of firepower and nationalism, economic immiseration of the southern hemisphere, and ecological crisis of increasing severity. Domestically Britain and the western world are experiencing a disruption of the social landscape and an unsettling normlessness.

This situation is our fault: important causes of our malaise, both global and local, are phenomena familiar to us and distinctive to the West. Particularly evident is our compulsive obeisance to Mammon (in Wendell Berry's words, our commitment to "limitless economic process based upon boundless dissatisfaction").⁹ A related symptom is our individualism, which expresses itself in what sometimes feels like a comprehensive absence of community. In this kind of world, Christians often seem as confused and complicit as anyone else. Even our acts of warship and witness can be unwitting expressions of corrosive Western cultural norms. Meanwhile, the dechristianization of our societies, unchallenged by any real alternatives, hurtles heedlessly ahead. Do we Christians have anything distinctive to contribute?

Insofar as we have something to contribute, it will not be because we are Protestant or Catholic, Anglican or "New Church". Nor will it be because we are well-informed or sophisticated in our social analysis. Rather, it will be because we have begun to orient our lives around the love and will of God as expressed in the prophetic Jesus of the gospels. Jesus, in turn, will give us a vocabulary, a life-giving narrative and a point of view that "are not of this world" (John 18:36).

None of this will be easy, theologically or spiritually, intellectually or practically. Intrinsic difficulties will be compounded by experiences or feelings of apparent irrelevance. As Jesuit spiritual writer Gerard Hughes states matter-of-factly, 'Whoever lives the gospel is marginalized".¹⁰ To people who find "public truth"¹¹ in Jesus' teaching and way, the cross will be a familiar contemporary reality. But God's Spirit - restless, creative, recreative - will not only provide untold reserves of idea and energy for faithful discipleship; the Spirit will also create community. Will we have the courage to choose as our primary identity membership in the community of believers who "critically disassociate [ourselves], in virtue of free personal decision in every case, from the current opinions and feelings of [our] social environment"?¹² What memories, which heroes and heroines, will we choose to nourish us?

In the critical period we are entering, by God's grace something surprising may well happen. The Anabaptists, after centuries of neglect, may find a voice. Along with their radical brothers and sisters in many traditions from the Early Church onwards, they may well be role models in clarifying the way forward. If that turns out to be the case, Anabaptism Today will not seem an immodest title; it will be soberly descriptive.

Notes

1 Michael Sattler, "On the Satisfaction of Christ", in John H. Yoder, ed., The Legacy of Michael Sattler (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1973), 113.

2. George H. Williams, The Radical Reformation (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1962); John H. Yoder, The Priestly Kingdom (South Bend, Indiana: Notre Dame University Press, 1984),105; Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (New York: Scribner, 1958), 144-35; Donald F. Durnbaugh, The Believer's Church: The History and Character of Radical Protestantism (New York- Macmillan, 1968).

3. Richard Hooker, The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, III, i, 10; IV, ii, 1.

4. Walter M. Abbott, ed., The Documents of Vatican Il (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1966), 463.

5. Guy F. Hershberger, ed., The Recovery of the Anabaptist Vision (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1957).

6. The Challenge of Peace (London: Catholic Truth Society/SPCK, 1983), 78-79.

7. Gerhard Lohfink, Jesus and Community: The Social Dimension of Christian Faith (London: SPCK, 1985), 149.

8. Christopher Rowland, Radical Christianity: A Reading of Recovery (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1988), 155.

9. Wendell Berry, Home Economics (San Francisco: North Point Press, 1987), 145.

10. Gerard Hughes, personal communication, 11 June 1992.

11. Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralistic Society (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1989), 50.

12. Karl Rahner, The Shape of the Church to Come (London: SPCK, 1974), 23.

AT 01: Zürich: Seedbed of Radical Change

by Nelson Kraybill
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 1, November 1992

Looking for inspiration among sixteenth-century Anabaptists is a bit like exploring your family tree: along with heroes and saints you are certain to find some dubious characters you would rather not claim as relatives. Dubious characters, in fact, often play a prominent role when modern historians explain the place of Anabaptism in the Reformation. We hear of so-called Anabaptist revolutionaries who agitated mobs in the 1525 Peasants' War in Germany, ^l or millenialist visionaries at the city of Munster who practised polygamy and sought to inaugurate the "New Jerusalem" by force (1534-35). Contemporary opponents of such enthusiasts condemned them as "Anabaptists", and for centuries that was a term of opprobrium no self-respecting religious group wanted to own.

Rehabilitating the Anabaptist label

In the twentieth century a variety of scholars and church leaders have sought to rehabilitate the word "Anabaptism", insisting it is a useful term to describe a creative nonconformist branch of the Reformation.² Modern efforts to reclaim Anabaptism as a valid tradition often highlight two early milestones of the movement: the first re-baptism of believers by radical reformers associated with Ulrich Zwingli at Zürich in 1525 and the Schleitheim Articles of 1527 (a brief Anabaptist statement of ecclesiological distinctives that helped shape the tradition for generations). Eager to find the good in sixteenth-century Anabaptism, some modern scholars point to these two expressions as normative for the early movement. The same interpreters dismiss millenarian or violent expressions of Anabaptism as aberrations.³

An accurate picture of early Anabaptism must reflect complexities and abiguities of the movement. Recent interpreters of the Reformation era tend to emphasize that Anabaptism sprang from multiple roots and exhibited a wide variety of expressions.⁴ Instead of pointing to only one fountainhead of "authentic" early Anabaptism, historians now are likely to identify a range of radical reformers as belonging to a broad movement. The wider scope of Anabaptist studies now encompasses both pacifists and violent revolutionaries,⁵ free church and territorial church advocates.⁶ Historians now note that some early Anabaptists (especially the rebels at Munster) centred their faith and practice on Old Testament models, while others (such as the Zürich circle) were strongly Christocentric.

With such a broad spectrum of theological species early in the movement, it is impossible to state the Anabaptist view on almost any topic. Nor is it possible to tell the Anabaptist story. Because the early movement was often illegal and operated on a grassroots level, it did not develop a stable institutional or geographic base. In the heat of persecution, or in the fever of apocalyptic expectation, early leaders did not develop a comprehensive or systematic theology. Rather than finding one "original" expression of Anabaptism in the sixteenth century, the historian finds a plethora of radical movements that opponents all lumped together under the label "Anabaptist". However, like a genealogist investigating hundreds of ancestors, we can identify those parts of the movement that exhibited healthy genes and produced succeeding generations of a vital Christian movement. We can examine individuals or theological streams that might inspire and instruct us today, without claiming every individual in the story as a hero or role model.

A change in the concept of church

By either measure - inspiration value or enduring legacy - the group of Anabaptists that emerged at Zürich in 1525 deserves careful attention. Frustrated with the slow pace and limited scope of Protestant reform at Zürich, these radical reformers parted ways with their mentor Zwingli, leader of Protestant reform in the city. Baptism was the issue that "broke the camel's back". When the radicals at Zürich re-baptized each other they broke not only with Zwingli, but with a concept and definition of church that had dominated Europe for centuries.

In addition to being a reformer and priest at the Zürich cathedral (Grossmunster), Zwingli was a classics scholar and articulate theologian. Around him gathered a circle of young intellectuals and students with whom he read classical literature, discussed theology and studied the New Testament. Among this circle were Conrad Grebel (theology student from an upper class Zürich family)⁷ and Felix Mantz (Hebrew scholar and illegitimate son of a chief canon of the Zürich cathedral).

Zwingli and his followers began to question whether there was a biblical basis for certain long-standing practices of the Christian church in Europe. Practices in question included celibacy for clergy, indulgences, use of images and fasting during Lent. Zwingli persuaded the Zürich City Council to authorize significant reform in several of these areas, but would not make changes in the church without Council approval. Like all major Catholic and Protestant leaders of his day, Zwingli believed the welfare of society depended on church and state working together in close harmony (a model of church-state relations that goes hack to the fourth century and the Roman Emperor Constantine). At a series of public disputations, Zwingli and his followers presented the case for radical change in the church. Much as Luther emphasized sola scriptura in his reform at Wittenberg, Zwingli and his followers argued from the Bible in pressing for change at Zürich

Faced with a choice

In 1524 differences regarding baptism arose between Zwingli and some of his followers. Despite his earlier reservations about it, Zwingli held to the centuries-old tradition of baptizing infants; Grebel, Mantz and others declared the New Testament taught that only believers should receive baptism upon profession of faith. Zürich city council held a public disputation on the question in January of 1525. In the end, the city council decreed infant baptism was mandatory for all children in Zürich. Such a decision was understandable for people who accepted the Constantinian model of a Christian society. Allowing members of society to make their own decisions about faith might significantly have weakened the social and political influence of a state-sponsored church.

Zwingli's radical associates now faced a choice: should they accept the decision of city council and keep their reform effort legal, or should they follow what they understood to be scriptural teaching on believer's baptism? More was at stake than just baptism; these reformers were on the verge of restoring a voluntary church, free from government control. Apart from sporadic or marginal movements,⁸ such a free church had not existed in Europe for more than a thousand years.

When the city council decided in favour of infant baptism, they also prohibited Zwingli's radical followers from meeting again to discuss the matter further. On the very day the council issued that decree, however, a group of them met in Zürich at the home of Felix Mantz. After earnest conversation and prayer, a former priest named George Blaurock knelt and requested baptism. With no "appointed servant of the Word" present to administer the rite, Conrad Grebel stepped forward and poured water. All present received believers' baptism before the evening was over, making that meeting in a private home the first believers' church gathering of the modern era.⁹

Participants in this circle (soon known as the "Swiss Brethren") were now outlaws, and scattered to the countryside. Near Zürich the first Anabaptist congregation came into being when virtually all the inhabitants of the village of Zollikon received believer's baptism. Radical priests at the villages of Zollikon and Witikon had been in contact with the Zürich circle earlier, and already in 1524 had ceased to baptize infants. Following in the wake of Zollikon and Witikon, Anabaptist congregations sprang up in many Swiss villages and rural areas.

Rapid spread of a grassroots movement

Anabaptism spread quickly throughout central and northern Europe, fueled by the fervour of its proponents and by a combination of theological and sociological tensions. Grebel and certain other Anabaptists denounced payment of the hefty church tithes, an idea attractive to the impoverished peasantry. Some rural districts of Switzerland were eager to escape heavy-handed political control from urban areas, and Anabaptism provided theological justification.

Anticlericalism was already widespread, preparing the way for an Anabaptist concept of the "priesthood of all believers". In Germany, quite independently of the Zürich circle, the discontent of peasants erupted into full-fledged revolt. Thomas Muntzer, with his "Anabaptist" theology, fanned the fires of insurrection. Catholics and Protestants alike responded to the widespread discontent by imprisoning or executing thousands of Anabaptists of many persuasions, including pacifists from the Swiss Brethren circles. Zwingli himself gave approval for the drowning of Felix Mantz in 1527.

In our pluralistic Western society it seems strange that the simple act of rebaptism was once a capital offence. The authorities were correct, however, that Anabaptism (including the nonviolent strain) was a revolution that turned medieval society on its head. By gathering in a private home to baptize each other, Zürich Anabaptists signaled their conviction that New Testament teaching takes precedence over the demands of any ecclesiastical or civil authorities. By making baptism an adult choice, Anabaptists redefined church and reshaped the congregation on a New Testament model. Radicals at Zürich thus challenged the dominant idea that every individual in a given geographic area should join, at infancy, the religious faith of the ruler. Harbingers of the modern idea of religious freedom, Zürich Anabaptists set out to found a "believers' church" made entirely of individuals who voluntarily acknowledge Jesus as Lord and request baptism.

Schleitheim and the enduring legacy

Christian groups today that trace their spiritual heritage back to the Swiss Brethren at Zürich include Hutterian Brethren, Amish and Mennonites. An early document that had an impact on all three movements is the Schleitheim Confession (1527). This brief statement of Anabaptist distinctives describes a church in which believers experience conversion and voluntarily join a disciplined faith community. It envisages a church of individuals committed to nonviolent love (even of enemies) and mutual aid. It calls on church members to be accountable to each other under the Holy Spirit and the Bible. The Swiss Brethren (and generations of followers in Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands, America and elsewhere) believed Christians can and should follow the example of Jesus, living out practical directives of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7).

These classic elements of Swiss Anabaptism - conversion, imitation of Christ, nonviolence and community - constitute the core of an Anabaptist movement that has endured for centuries. Because Christians from many traditions seek to be faithful in these areas, insights and experience of early Swiss Anabaptism provide fertile ground for study and ecumenical dialogue.

Notes

1. The most famous being Thomas Muntzer. Though technically not an Anabaptist (he never re-baptized anyone), opponents of sixteenth-century radical reform movements used Muntzer's s reputation to besmirch the entire Anabaptist movement.

2. See, e.g., Rufus M. Jones, Studies in Mystical Religion (London, 1909), 369. Cited by Mennonite historian Harold S. Bender in his presidential address to the American Society of Church History in 1943. Church History in (1944:3-14) and Mennonite Quarterly Review 18 (1944:67-88). Bender's address (and related scholarship) was seminal to a generation of Anabaptist research.

3. See, for example, Fritz Blanke, "Anabaptism and the Reformation," in Guy F. Hershberger,

ed., The Recovery of the Anabaptist Vision (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1957), 57­68.

4. For a recent treatment of diversity among early Anabaptists, see J. Denny Weaver, Becoming Anabaptist.- The Origin and Significance of Sixteenth-Century Anabaptism (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1987), and James M. Stayer et al, "From Monogenesis to Polygenesis: The Historical Discussion of Anabaptist Origins", Mennonite Quarterly Review 49 (1975:83-12 1).

5. See James M. Stayer, Anabaptists and the Sword (Lawrence, Kansas: Coronado Press, 1972).

6. For discussion of the territorial church strain of Anabaptism, see Charles Nienkirchen, "Reviewing the Case for a Non-Separatist Ecclesiology in Early Swiss Anabaptism," Mennonite Quarterly Review 56 (1982:2274 1), and Arnold Snyder, "Me Monastic Origins of Swiss Anabaptist Sectarianism", Mennonite Quarterly Review 57 (1983:5-26).

7. Grebel's extant letters provide vivid insight into development of the Anabaptist enclave at Zürich. See Leland Harder, ed., The Sources of Swiss Anabaptism: The Grebel Letters and Related Documents (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1985).

8. Two prominent examples are the Waldenses and Hussites.

9. For an early account of this gathering, see The Chronicle of the Hutterian Brethren (Robertsbridge: Plough Publishing House, 1987), vol. l, 43-47.

AT 02: Clearing Away the Vestiges

by David Nussbaum
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 2, February 1993

In the wake of emperor Constantine's embrace of Christianity in the fourth century, practices and theology developed to support a close relationship between church and state. Patterns of behaviour and belief that grew out of the Constantinian epoch became embedded in the fabric of Western society, and some are still with us today.

These practices may seem little more than anachronistic irrelevances, harmless or romantic relics of a former age. Yet proposals to change such practices, or to do away with them, provoke vigorous objections. Could it be that we have not yet freed ourselves from the Constantinian mould? Perhaps it is time for the church to say that it no longer wants the state to support any ecclesiastical privilege.

Vestiges of Christendom are most obvious in established churches, but often appear in other denominations as well. These vestiges include:

1. Too much in a name

Constantinian assumptions stand behind familiar names such as "The Church of England", "The Church in Wales", or "The Church of Scotland". All western countries now have many denominations. Today most Anglicans, for example, would accept that their church in fact is a church of England, one of many.

2. Loss of prophetic voice

An established church's role is often seen (at least by the establishment) to be one of providing stability and continuity, rather than challenging accepted practices or charting new directions. Keeping pax is more important than making shalom. An established church which accepts such a limitation can be reduced to providing religious sanction for the social consensus. This can muzzle prophetic ministry in the church, and can lead to Bible interpretation that questions but does not really challenge the status quo. This orientation also may characterize denominations other than established churches. Indeed, in recent years some members of established churches have been more outspoken than most free church members in challenging prevailing attitudes, values and practices.

3. Comfortable wealth

According to some estimates, the Anglican Church in England is the second largest landowner in the country, next to the monarch. Its economic interests thus are aligned with the preservation of the capital value of land and the maximisation of rents from property. At least in rural areas, church buildings dominate the horizon, symbolizing power, stability and social position - as well as the importance of worship to our ancestors. The maintenance and restoration of church buildings by appeal to public support can imply that these buildings essentially belong to the national heritage rather than to the people of God.

4. The parish system

A parish system allocates every person in a given area to a particular denomination, taking little account of other churches functioning in the same territory. At one level such a system is a sensible geographical arrangement. Yet it reinforces the notion of the church, not as a pilgrim people, but as a settled structure responsible for every member of society.

5. Infant baptism theology

Widespread infant baptism makes church and society practically coterminous. Theology associated with baptism of infants sometimes has sought involuntary incorporation of all members of society into the church. Indeed, a service of baptism for those no longer infants was only added to the Anglican Prayer Book in 1662. The preface to that edition states:

. . . it was thought convenient, that [there] should be added ... an Office for the Baptism of such as are of Riper Years: which, although not so necessary when the former Book was compiled, yet by the growth of Anabaptism, through the licentiousness of the late times crept in amongst us, is now become necessary, and may be always useful for the baptizing of Natives in our Plantations, and others converted to the Faith.

Theology underlying this text is an ideal in which society and church are coterminous. Are "our Plantations" those of the church or of the nation? Theological arguments for infant baptism may be different in today's debate, but earlier ideals have been allowed to stand in the background and may continue to infuse assumptions and preferences.

6. Lack of church discipline

Few churches today understand or practice church discipline. This failure in the face of New Testament teaching to the contrary is, in part, the fruit of a Constantinian mindset. As the 1662 Anglican Book of Common Prayer (in "A Commination") said, "in the Primitive Church there was a godly discipline ... [but] until the said discipline may be restored again (which is much to be wished,) ..." Few contemporary church publications include material for use in relation to church discipline. The wishes of the 1662 authors remain, it would seem, largely unfulfilled.

7. Triumphalism

Persecution of dissenters, either by the church or by the state, is a feature of Constantinianism. There is a long history of established churches persecuting those outside them. Only rarely has a former persecuting church publicly disassociated itself from this part of its history and from the theology that allowed persecution.

In the present more liberal climate most established churches quietly lay aside the theology of persecution. It is striking how some of the newer churches have slipped into a triumphalist mentality. Reconstructionism is a recent example of a theory of the role of the church which has a discernable persecuting mentality. Use and abuse of the Old Testament by proponents of such theories is all too familiar to those who know the history of established churches.

8. "Moral majority" thinking

It is encouraging to see many churches in the UK discovering or recovering interest in social affairs. But it is a mark of Constantinianism to seek special treatment for the church or for Christianity. People making such an appeal may point to the "Christian heritage" of the nation, or to the universal applicability of God's norms for humanity, or to polls which ascribe belief in "God" to over seventy percent of the population. Seeking privilege or patronage for Christians and their faith does not accord with the role of the church envisaged by Jesus.

9. Limits on evangelism

Some people today regard evangelism amongst adherents of other faiths as racism or imperialism. Others, notably certain evangelicals, support dis­advantaging religious traditions other than Christianity. They may do this, for example, by objecting to non-Christian religions such as Islam being taught in state schools. This tendency to identify race or nationality with religious affiliation is infected with Constantinianism. Being a Christian need have nothing to do with racial or national identity.

10. A skewed church history

Already in 1956 Gunter Jacob, a Lutheran church leader in Germany, said, "Aware spirits characterize the situation of Christianity in contemporary Europe by the fact that the end of the Constantinian epoch has arrived."¹ Yet in much popular and even scholarly material, Constantinianism is accepted as normal, and those who through the ages objected to it still receive pejorative treatment from historians. What does church history look like from the underside, from the viewpoint of those who took no patronage or privilege from the state?

11. Church appointments by the state

At least officially, the state often appoints leaders of established churches. This contrasts sharply with the injunction in 1 Corinthians 6 not to involve state authorities in church affairs. Of course if the state too is "Christian", and in some sense within the church, the problem seems not to arise - but that only illustrates the Constantinian reality that remains. For example, in England the Prime Minister has a critical role in appointing the the most senior bishop, the Archbishop of Canterbury.

12. Lack of alternative models for church and state

If churches today truly are moving away from Constantinianism, rather than merely going along with its decline, they should develop new teaching on the relationship between church and state. Lack of coherent alternative models indicates we are not yet in a fully post-Constantinian epoch.

Interim conclusion

Difficulties confront us as we reflect on these vestiges of Constantinianism in the life of church and society. Alternative models for the church-state relationship, such as those developed by Anabaptists, often emerged from a very different and non-democratic context. To what extent are these relevant to our society? One modern Mennonite declares

It is at best questionable whether a definition of the separation of church and state worked out under an autocratic system of government can be made normative for a democratic system in which, theoretically at least, the government is the people and thus inevitably includes every Christian citizen.²

Many free churches are, in a sense, accidentally non-established. They did not become free by choice, and lack a coherent and radical critique of church-state relationships.

This article focused on vestiges of Constantinianism within the church. Part two of the series, Vestiges in Society examines vestiges left in the thinking and practices of larger society, and will make some modest proposals for a way forward.

Notes

1. Cited by Franklin Hamlin Littell, The Anabaptist View of the Church: A Study in the Origins of Sectarian Protestantism, second edition (Boston: Starr King Press, 1958), 56.

2. Erland Waltner, "The Anabaptist Concept of the Church", Mennonite Quarterly Review 25 (1951: 5-16), 15

AT 02: The Gospel of Peace: An interview with Noel Moules

Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 2, February 1993Noel Moules is Programme Director of Workshop, a Christian Discipleship and Leadership Training programme in which more than sixteen hundred people from many denominations have participated He is a member of the Editorial Board for Anabaptism Today and in this interview he reflects on his commitments to shalom (A Hebrew word often translated "peace").

You always answer the telephone by saying "Shalom, this is Noel " What response do you get to that greeting?

Quite often there's a kind of pause, but most people are too polite to say anything. I suppose some think, "Oh no, it's Noel's gone native! Now he's got some sort of Hebrew greeting!" I use shalom as a greeting because it is a declaration of the Kingdom of God. In Luke 10:5-6 Jesus tells his disciples to proclaim the greeting of peace in their travel and witness; where the greeting of peace is received by people of peace, there peace remains.

What does shalom mean to you?

There's a wonderful rabbinic story that says when God had created all the blessings for humankind he looked around for a pot or vessel in which to put them. When he couldn't find a vessel, he created shalom. We often use "peace" to translate "shalom", but the word "wholeness" is much better. The trouble with "peace" is that it sounds passive. That's why I won't call myself a pacifist. What I do call myself is a shalom activist. Shalom is packed with dynamism; it's not simply everything in quiet harmony. Shalom is the overarching biblical vision. It isn't on God's agenda, it is God's agenda, and the New Testament emphasizes this by saying we shall "proclaim the gospel of peace" (Eph. 6:15). I'm amazed that a peace message is completely absent among many Christians.

Did particular life experiences make you reflect on peace and violence?

My father was a missionary, but also a major in the British army. Before joining up in the second World War he prayed and fasted for three days and nights. France fell, dad knew he would be called up, and felt an obligation to defend his country. Dad gave his life to God, fought in the North African desert, and God saved him. He was not militaristic, but had a "good Christian" attitude about the military and doing your duty. Yet I had growing questions about whether this is how Christians should act. In college my friends said "yes, we'd all like to be peaceful, but of course it doesn't really work."

After years of struggle, the event that really sealed my peace conviction was the Malvinas/Falklands war. I knew there were thousands of my Christian brothers and sisters in Argentina, yet we were at war with them. As a believer I am one body even with people that are in the Argentinian army. Two scriptures were key for me: "our citizenship is in heaven" (Phil. 3:20) and "my kingdom is not of this world, if it were, my servants would fight" (John 18:36).

When I was in college in the mid-1960s I did a research project on the biblical idea of the kingdom of God. I remember pondering the warning of Jesus that we should beware of people who say "Look! Here is the Messiah!" (Matt. 24:23). Jesus was saying "be careful, you can be deluded." I believe shalom is the essential quality by which we can recognize the Messiah and the Kingdom. Shalom is the overarching value of the kingdom, out of which spring justice, peace, righteousness, joy, love, grace, forgiveness.

Does your peace conviction require you to make selective use of scripture? What about all the passages that seem to endorse violence?

Of course you can make the Bible say anything you want. But the Bible is a written record of God's revelation, God's word. The most clear manifestation of his word is the person of Jesus, and I believe the Bible only makes full sense when you read it in the light of the person and words of Jesus. "Blessed are the peacemakers, they are called children of God." In the Hebrew scriptures we see that God gave his people the land of Israel. Yet Israel was still simply one nation among others, and in that role she fought. Israel was trying to establish a political kingdom. The church, although it makes an impact on politics, is universal. You cannot make a parallel between Israel and the church. God has a special role for us, and we act in a totally different way.

How does a commitment to peace affect evangelism?

Many people seem to have a negative motivation for evangelism, and primarily talk about sin, rebellion and judgement. Of course these are all valid dimensions of the truth. But to me the primary motivation for evangelism is that it is good news. In the gospels we see Jesus clustered about on all sides by prostitutes, tax collectors, people who'd given up on religion, and the ne'er-do-wells of society. There was something about Jesus' presence that attracted people. I'm

sure that a prostitute in the presence of Jesus was in no doubt about her sin. Yet there was something about the wholeness of Jesus which attracted her. The same was true for tax collectors, who led duplicitous lives. But the first response of Zacchaeus, when he had a meal with Jesus, was to start giving his money away. Jesus didn't take him on a guilt trip. Zacchaeus knew his need, and Jesus brought a joyful message of truth and hope. When repentance happened, it was evident in the fruit of a changed life. The message of shalom, the gospel of peace, comes in this very positive way. We shine a light in the darkness to reveal it for what it is, rather than shouting into the darkness about darkness.

Why do you identify yourself as an Anabaptist?

Anabaptists had a central focus on Jesus. Being a Christian was seen in terms of being a disciple of Jesus; Jesus was the model of how God wants us to be. The important thing for most Christians is that Jesus died and rose from the dead so that when I die I also will rise from the dead if I believe in him. But what about the incarnation? In Jesus God has become a human being, showing us what being human actually is. God is saying that through Jesus' death and resur- rection, and through the events of Pentecost, you can live like this too.

How has the modern church come to separate peace from the gospel?

Since the Reformation there has been too much focus on conversion meaning simply that you believe the right things. Leaders of the mainstream Reformation put emphasis primarily on doctrine, propositional truth and spiritual transaction. They talked about people having their ultimate destiny in heaven, and peace became personalized or spiritualized. The Anabaptists, in contrast, had a central focus on the life and teaching of Jesus.

Even as we speak, Allied bombs are dropping on Iraq again. In practical terms, what does a peacemaking Christian do?

There are no simple answers, and a conflict like Iraq makes us realize there is much work to be done. For all that Saddam Hussein is a ruthless and cruel man, and his people would be better off with a more righteous leader, the West has acted in arrogance. We sold him the armaments and technology, with no thought of the consequences. Then when he stepped out of line we used our weapons of mass destruction to destroy his. We've sown seeds for all sorts of bitterness.

In terms of practical strategy, let me go back to the Malvinas/Falklands conflict. If the British government and the Argentinian government both knew that they could not count on a single person who named themselves Christian to give any support to a foreign policy that employed militarism, surely they would think twice about how they handled international conflict. If it was known that Christians don't fight, that Christians are people opposed to violence, we could have a very big impact on a grass roots level. The present conflict in the Balkans is another case where there are Christians on both sides. Couldn't their churches - who obviously have some impact on government - become a major vehicle for dialogue and reconciliation? Couldn't Christians in this country be supporting them to do so?

Some Christians argue that we should avoid politics and concentrate on the essential spiritual message of the gospel.

If you do that you are trying to fragment life, and you have the classic dualism between the spiritual and the political. The whole thing about shalom is that it's all-embracing. Politics is to do with people, and people are those whom God is concerned about. There can be no shalom where there is no justice and righteousness. I identify in common cause with many people in the "secular" peace movement, and abolition of nuclear weapons I believe is something close to the heart of God. But I know that ultimately their dream can only be fulfilled in Jesus.

What kind of response to your peace testimony do you get _from other Christians?

A lot of Christians - evangelical, charismatic, mainline - think I'm an oddball, or just quaint. I get the warmest response from younger Christians, people who have lots of fragments of teaching from church, who are trying to get a handle on it all and bring it together. Suddenly they see shalom, and it integrates everything. Older Christians are more likely to say peace might be a part of the gospel, but it's not the whole.

What does shalom mean for the structure of the church and the use of power within the faith community?

There are a number of possible church structures within the New Testament, not just one model. To me the absolutes are a vision of the kingdom of God and values that reflect that vision. Local church should be a spontaneous expression of the people and gifts that are there at that time. Obviously there's a need for leadership, but it should be plural and winsome. It should reflect the qualities of evangelism, teaching, caring, mission, church planting, and prophecy. All these should flow both through recognized leaders and through the body as a whole.

What is the relationship between salvation and peace?

I believe God's ultimate destiny for all things is to embrace and saturate with shalom, to unite all things. What is happening in Jesus is that God is breaking into this age ahead of time, bringing the shalom of the age to come into the present and the now. Jesus calls us to become messianic people through the power of the Holy Spirit. We live out in practical terms the reality of the age to come. To me, Christian ethics doesn't make sense without eschatology, without a clear focus on where God is taking the world and humanity. You can only live out the Sermon on the Mount, for example, if you have the power of God and you know where you're going.

Conversion means coming under God's rule. We realize that our rebellion and its consequences have been dealt with through Jesus' death, and that our destiny is to be part of a cosmic wholeness. It's a tragedy that we've spiritualized our destiny, when it should be an integration of the spiritual and physical. Jesus himself was the shalom person, the physical and the divine integrated into one. He models what the new heaven and new earth are going to be. All creation is groaning, it will be set free, and Jesus calls us to be heralds of that truth.

AT 02: The Lord's Supper

by Eleanor Kreider
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 2, February 1993

Stripping away church traditions, sixteenth-century Anabaptists looked to the Bible for both content and pattern in worship. The article that follows is the first in a series that will examine how Anabaptists understood and practiced four worship rites: 7he Lord's supper, baptism, foot washing, and the ban. Many Christians today share with Anabaptists the conviction that Jesus and the scriptures provide authority, inspiration and models for worship.

When early Anabaptist communities observed the Lord's Supper worship was informal. Written texts were not necessary. But a rite by Balthasar Hubmaier, a reformer active in South Germany and Moravia, is an interesting exception. Shortly before his trial and execution at Vienna in 1528, Hubmaier wrote "A Form for the Supper of Christ".¹ Besides giving simple instructions for administering the service, Hubmaier stressed worthy partaking, made exhortations to love and unity, and offered a meditation for personal examination. His final emphasis was on "bearing fruit worthy of baptism and the Supper of Christ".

Hubmaier's' Order of Service

Preparation. Choose "a suitable time and place ... so that one does not come early and another late", said Hubmaier, so everyone will be present to hear the "evangelical teaching". Prepare a table laid with ordinary bread and wine, using "cups of silver, wood or pewter - it makes no difference". Participants should be "respectably dressed" and "sit together in an orderly way without light talk and contention".

Confession of sin. All, leader included, should fall on their knees to beg God's mercy with the words, "Father, we have sinned against heaven and against you. We are not worthy to be called your children" (Luke 15:21). "Speak a word of consolation and our souls will be made whole. God be gracious to us sinners." At this point Hubmaier alluded to the story of Zacchaeus in Luke 19.

Sermon. Next the "servant of the Word" was to "sit down with the people and open his mouth, explaining the scriptures concerning Christ". (Was this to contrast preaching from a pulpit, or to indicate that everyone got up from their knees and sat together?) Hubmaier suggested the Emmaus story as a pattern for explaining Jesus and his mission. He concluded with a beautiful prayer:

Stay with us, O Christ! It is toward evening and the day is now far spent. Abide with us, O Jesus, abide with us. For where you are not, there everything is darkness, night, and shadow. But you are the true Sun, light, and shining brightness (John 8:12). Those for whom you light the way, they cannot go astray.

Hubmaier suggested further appropriate texts and themes for a homily, including a passage from the apocryphal book of Sirach. The preacher should have great freedom to choose the texts, but the purpose was "that the death of Christ ... is proclaimed".

Response. Following the sermon members should have the "opportunity and authority" to ask questions; not "unprofitable or argumentative chatter ... but concerning proper, necessary items having to do with Christian faith and brotherly love". On the authority of 1 Corinthians 14, anyone "to whom something is revealed should teach" and others should listen.

Self-examination. Hubmaier next suggested a four-point self-examination based on numerous Bible texts. They all point to "the-true fellowship of saints", "fraternal love", and to the worthiness of believers who have conformed inwardly to the love of God. This love, however, must be "fulfilled in deeds, as Scripture everywhere teaches us". Hubmaier summed up: "God requires of us the will, the word, and the works of love, and he will not let himself be paid off or dismissed with words".

Silence. A period of common silence was to follow, to allow for meditation on the suffering of Christ. Then all were to say the Lord's Prayer "publicly, reverently, with hearts desirous of grace".

Pledge of Love. The leader then invited people to stand and repeat "with heart and mouth" the Pledge of Love. This was a necessary prelude to sharing bread and wine at the Lord's Table:

Brothers and sisters, if you will to love God before, in, and above all things, in the power of his holy and living Word, serve him alone, Deut. 5; 6; Exod. 20, honour and adore him and henceforth sanctify his name, subject your carnal and sinful will to his divine will which he has worked in you by his living Word, in life and death, then let each say individually: "I will".

If you will love your neighbour and serve him with deeds of brotherly love, Matt 25; Eph 6; Col 3; Rom 13:1; 1 Pet 2:13f., lay down and shed for him your life and blood, be obedient to father, mother and all authorities according to the will of God, and this in the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, who laid down and shed his flesh and blood for us, then let each say individually: "I will".

If you will practise fraternal admonition toward your brethren and sisters, Matt 18:15ff.; Luke 6; Matt 5:44; Rom 12:10, make peace and unity among them, and reconcile yourselves with all those whom you have offended, abandon all envy, hate, and evil will toward everyone, willingly cease all action and behaviour which causes harm, disadvantage, or offense to your neighbour, if you will also love your enemies and do good to them, and exclude according to the Rule of Christ, Matt 18, all those who refuse to do so, then let each say individually: "I will".

If you desire publicly to confirm before the church this pledge of love which you have now made, through the Lord's Supper of Christ, by eating bread and drinking wine, and to testify to it in the power of the living memorial of the suffering and death of Jesus Christ our Lord, then let each say individually: "I desire it in the power of God".

So eat and drink with one another in the name of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. May God himself accord to all of us the power and the strength that we may worthily carry it out and bring it to its saving conclusion according to his divine will. May the Lord impart his grace. Amen.

Thanksgiving and distribution. The prayer of thanksgiving was short and simple, filled with biblical allusions. The leader was to take, break, and serve the bread at the same time as saying the words of institution from 1 Corinthians 11. After the bread, he took the cup, said the further words of institution, and served it around. After all had finished, he was to say "As often as you eat the bread and drink ... you proclaim the death of the Lord ..." People remained standing throughout.

Conclusion. Finally, the people sat down to hear the leader's summary of the entire service. The congregation ate and drank at the Lord's Table, he said, to remember Christ's suffering and death, to receive forgiveness of sins, to have fellowship with one another, to acknowledge unity in Christ's body, to "become properly conformed to our Head" and to follow after him. The leader enjoined them "to love one another, do good, give counsel, be helpful to one another, each offering up his flesh and blood for the other". They were to live honourably, giving no provocation to anyone so that no one outside the church might have reason to blaspheme Christ or the church.

Characteristic Anabaptist emphases in Hubmaier's "form"

Hubmaier wanted to renew worship strictly along biblical lines. He particularly looked to scripture for direction for the practical arrangements and domestic ethos of this service. He asked for a simple table laid with ordinary plates and cups, with ordinary food. He, did not draw on the idea of festiveness at a Passover meal, but chose instead to counter the display of silver vessels and ceremonial complication as celebrated in medieval Catholic Mass.

The whole congregation must be present to do honour to Christ. To straggle in to the meeting, missing both word and fellowship, was worse than mere bad form. In this Hubmaier countered the degraded practice in contemporary Catholic church, in which folk (when they did attend Mass) often came late and left early. Anabaptists in worship were not an audience at a spectacle. The whole congregation together celebrated the Supper. The service could proceed only when all had arrived.

Mention of Zacchaeus in the opening prayer of confession signified the interdependence of receiving forgiveness and forgiving others. By making reparation, forgiving actual debt, and so receiving forgiveness himself, Zacchaeus dramatised what Jesus so often taught.

The leader's words of comfort ("May ... God have mercy ... and forgive us") are inclusive and plural. He did not say "May God have mercy and forgive you". An Anabaptist leader approached God's mercy and forgiveness from within the congregation, along with the people. He did not pronounce absolution from a higher status. Presumably the leader continued kneeling with the people during this entire opening section.

To fall on the knees for an opening prayer, as Hubmaier suggested, was a distinctive practice. It is not clear why Anabaptists did this. From early centuries, most Christian worshippers had stood to pray. In the Middle Ages, Catholic Christians were supposed to pay attention when the "sanctus bell" rang, to look up and adore as the priest raised the consecrated bread. But by the sixteenth century Catholics knelt during consecration of the bread and wine, precisely so they could not look at such holy and mysterious things. Priestly genuflections during the Mass had recently been introduced. By kneeling, Catholics expressed increasing awe and reverence for the sacramental elements. Were the Anabaptists, by kneeling at the start of their services, dedicating their entire observance of the Lord's Supper to God?

Kneeling was not the only innovative posture for worship. So also was sitting. The Anabaptists, who mostly met in homes to worship, sat around a room together. Since medieval church buildings had no pews, people stood throughout most of the Mass, though some carried short crutches like modern shooting-sticks to lean on. When the priest got to the most solemn parts, everybody knelt down on the floor. Anabaptists, meeting domestically and face to face, developed their own body language for worship. In Hubmaier's "Form" they knelt for opening prayers, and stood for communion itself.

The domestic informality and openness to group participation of Hubmaier's suggested sermon and discussion apparently was patterned on 1 Corinthians 14. Various people, inspired by the Spirit, spoke their insights. The "servant of the Word" chose texts and initially explained their meanings, but others were free to query, correct, and augment.

The liturgy of self-examination involved extensive reading of Bible texts and thorough reflection on one's inner motivation. This inner movement was paired with the later Pledge of Love, which emphasized the serious commitment to active, responsible, love within the church. These two movements - examination of the inner self and loving commitment to the church - bracketed a solemn period of silent meditation on Jesus' own self-giving love. The Lord's Prayer then served to give a succinct summary of Jesus' message, together with his invitation to familial relationship with Abba, and the reverent receiving of gifts that sustain human life - food and forgiveness alike.

The Pledge of Love was a formal rite in which all who wished to partake of the bread and wine were invited to stand and give formal promises of love toward God, neighbour, enemy, and members of the church. Each of three questions was answered individually with the words, "I will". After this response each person was asked to confirm their desire to prove the Pledge by eating and drinking at the Lord's Table.

Following Thanksgiving and simple distribution of bread and wine, Hubmaier's congregation sat down again to hear an exhortation to holy discipleship. Remembering Christ's suffering, receiving forgiveness of sins, enjoying fellowship and unity with one another, the people were now to become conformed to Christ in life. They were to live worthy of their baptismal vows. To follow Christ in life - this is a most characteristic Anabaptist emphasis, and surely appropriate as a conclusion to the communion service. The leader spoke:

I pray and exhort you, as table companions of Christ Jesus,

that you lead a Christian walk before God and before all [people].

Remember your baptismal commitment and your Pledge of Love.

Bear fruit worthy of your baptism and of the Supper of Christ.

I commend you to God.

May each of you say, "Praise, praise, praise to the Lord eternally!"

Arise and go forth in the peace of Christ Jesus.

The grace of God be with us all. Amen.

Hubmaier's form can challenge us: 1) to consider a domestic setting for communion by remembering Jesus at table; 2) to include justice-making reparation as an element of confession; 3) to support the sermon by members' Spirit-inspired responses, and 4) to embody a Pledge of Love in corporate life.

Notes

1. H. Wayne Pipkin and John H. Yoder, eds., Balthasar Hubmaier: Theologian of Anabaptism. (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1989), 393-408.

AT 03: Fear of "Anabaptists" in Sixteenth-Century England

by Meic Pearse
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 3, June 1993

“Papists", wrote English Protestant Nicholas Lesse in 1550, "although they were right nought for the soul, yet were they good and profitable for the body for civil commonwealths, for the maintenance of civil justice, and all good politic orders. But as for these [Anabaptists] they are neither good for the body nor for the soul: yea, they are most mortal enemies and cruel murderers to both."'

Lesse spoke for a good many. It was almost as if he, a "magisterial" Protestant supporting a compulsory state church, found Roman Catholics (the supposed arch-enemy) a good deal less frightening than Anabaptists, whom he called a "corrupt sort of heretics". Lesse is perfectly frank that the reasons for his preference are political. Both Catholicism and Protestantism maintained "civil commonwealths" and sound political order. Anabaptism led to disorder.

In 1553 Lesse's reformation was cut short by the death of Edward VI and the accession of Edward's Catholic sister Mary. But in 1558 she too died, and by 1561 Jean Veron—a French reformer who had come to England in Edward's time, gone into exile during Mary's reign and returned under Elizabeth—published three tracts on a similar theme. He depicted radicals such as John Champneys, against whom he specifically was writing, as typically lower class: "these men sitting upon their ale benches", distributing their pernicious books "in hugger mugger".

Anabaptist influence hard to define

It is not at all easy to prove how much actual Anabaptism, in the full-blown continental sense, influenced English radicals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. A majority of those who fell into the hands of the authorities for Anabaptism were foreigners, often Dutch. Most of the few native-born English who were consciously committed Anabaptists pass as shadows across the historian's field of vision.

This difficulty has not prevented many historians from claiming to discern precise features of an Anabaptist presence in these shadows. To be sure, the epithet "anabaptist" was freely bandied about to describe Protestant radicals generally. The term, however, was intended as an insult. It was shot through with suggestions of the fanaticism at Münster, that German city which in 1534 had been taken over as a New Jerusalem by Jan Matthijs and Jan van Leiden. The episode ended in horror and disaster, and surviving leaders were tortured to death publicly by vengeful forces of the Catholic Bishop.

It is safe to say that Münster often was at the forefront of the mind of any conservative who used the expression "anabaptist" during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The term implied that the persons so described had placed themselves outside the company of reasonable people. Often it applied to anyone who was more radical than the person speaking happened to like.

Vague and polemical language

Presumably it was this polemical and theologically imprecise use of language that caused John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester in the reign of Edward VI, to claim that Kent and Essex were "troubled with the frenzy of the anabaptists more than any other part of the kingdom".³ Earlier he wrote that "anabaptists" flocked to his preaching and "give me much trouble".⁴ Lord Riche also used the term loosely when he mentioned a certain "loan of Kent and the Anabaptists",⁵ despite Joan Bocher's apparent silence on baptismal questions. The fact that the term "Anabaptist" was used in such a vague way to denote radicalism generally should evoke caution about taking such descriptions as accurate theological definitions. Any and every radical opinion could be labeled "anabaptist", and every radical was anxious to deny the charge.

Roman Catholics argued that Protestantism would lead to anabaptist anarchy, principally because vernacular Bibles in the hands of ordinary people would result in endless private interpretations. This prediction, in the long term, was accurate. In the short term, however, Protestant reformers were anxious to disprove such allegations and to keep the spectre of Münster at bay by taking a firm line with Anabaptists. They argued that Catholics, not Protestants, had affinities with Anabaptism since both denied the power of civil government. Catholics appeared to do so by locating authority for church affairs in the Bishop of Rome rather than in the national government of a country. Anabaptists seemed to deny the power of civil government by declaring that religion could not be enforced at all. Both positions were treasonous to the king and in contravention of Romans 13, which commands obedience to the governing authorities in all things.

On guard against heresy

In retrospect, the governing authorities never appeared to lose control of the situation. That, however, did not stop a number of them panicking at the time. In 1550 Martin Micron, a Dutch founder of the foreigners' church in London, wrote that "it is a matter of the first importance that the word of God should be preached here in German [a term which then included Dutch], to guard against the heresies which are introduced by our countrymen. There are Arians, Marcionists, Libertines, Danists and the like monstrosities, in great numbers. A few days since, namely, on the 2nd of May, a certain woman was burnt alive for denying the incarnation of Christ."⁶

The "certain woman" was Joan Bocher, also known as Joan of Kent, and the offence for which she was burnt was her adherence to a controversial doctrine concerning the person of Christ. She had been active amongst the Lollards (followers of the fourteenth-century reformer John Wycliffe) since at least the late 1520s, when she recanted after being prosecuted. Later she moved to Kent, and was arrested again in the early 1540s for breaking traditional fast rules during Lent. On that occasion some officials within the hierarchy in Canterbury, probably with the connivance of Archbishop Cranmer, managed to get her released. But in 1549 she was arrested again on the more serious charge of teaching that Christ did not take flesh of the Virgin Mary, but brought his humanity with him from heaven.

Her enemies, with some exaggeration, said this doctrine amounted to denial of the incarnation. The doctrine had been popularised amongst Dutch Anabaptists by Melchior Hofmann, and for this reason is often referred to as Melchiorite Christology.⁷ Although isolated instances of this belief existed in England and Holland before the Reformation, growth of Dutch Anabaptism made it commonplace. Even Menno Simons, the great Anabaptist leader from whom Mennonites take their name, held the doctrine for which Joan Bocher was condemned.⁸

Refugees with "damnable opinions"

In the wake of the Münster fiasco, increasingly vicious persecution of Anabaptists of all types in the Netherlands caused many of them to flee to England from the mid-1530s onwards. About twenty were arrested in London, of whom perhaps a dozen were burned in 1535. Not long before, in 1532, six Englishmen and two Flemish Anabaptists, who met at the house of one John Raulinges in London, were discovered importing and distributing "books of the Anabaptists' confession".⁹ At least one Englishman and one Fleming in this group were found to hold "strange" and "damnable opinions concerning Christ's humanity". This was almost certainly Melchiorite Christology.

In November of 1532 three Dutch Anabaptists were burned at Colchester, including the twenty-two year old Peter Franke, whose life and steadfast death inspired the conversion of a number of citizens. Significantly, he believed that "Christ and God took not manhood of the Virgin Mary".¹⁰ By the time Joan Bocher was arrested for the same opinion in 1549, Bishop Hooper was worrying that "this ungodly opinion is gotten into the hearts of many in England".¹¹ His fears did not stop refugees infiltrating into England; two years later Sir Thomas Chamberlain lamented concerning the Anabaptists of Ghent that "too many run into England".¹² Michael Thombe, a butcher of Dutch descent, was arrested at the same time as Joan Bocher for his belief that "Christ took no flesh of our lady", and also for holding that "baptism of infants is unprofitable because it goeth without faith". ¹³

Sparse Evidence of "English Anabaptism"

Whatever fright the dreaded Anabaptism may have caused in England, it was never able to gain a firm foothold amongst the indigenous population. Later English Separatists, and English Baptists of the seventeenth century, were not descendants of continental Anabaptism. The genuine English fellow-travellers of the Dutch and German movements appeared in the sixteenth century and they, sadly, were persecuted virtually out of existence.

Some scholars would wish to qualify this judgement, or even reject it. Irvin B. Horst appears to have persuaded many that Anabaptism was indeed a fairly widespread movement in England.l¹⁴ This is unfortunate, since the overwhelming majority of Horst's "anabaptists" were only such in the sixteenth-century pejorative sense of being a little too radical for somebody's taste. Many were foreigners (mostly Dutch) living in England. The rest were isolated individuals whose activities indicate close links with those foreigners, or whose beliefs otherwise suggest possible genuine Anabaptism.

James Coggins recently has highlighted the links between early seventeenth-century General Baptists and Dutch Waterlander Mennonites.¹⁵ Such links and influences are undeniable, and were admittedly extensive. Nevertheless, the English group was an outgrowth of earlier Separatism, which in turn was an outgrowth of the Elizabethan Puritan movement. Although the English General Baptists had much in common with the Mennonites, to the point of trying to negotiate unity with them, those discussions broke down over key issues on which the English differed from their Dutch counterparts. The Baptists were not committed to pacifism, and differed from the Mennonites in being willing to take oaths and serve as magistrates. Indeed, General Baptists were to play a significant part in the parliamentarian armies of the English Civil Wars in the 1640s and 1650s.

It one is to speak meaningfully of "English Anabaptism" in the sixteenth century, one must produce evidence of actual congregations of English people who practised believer's baptism and separation from the world, and who believed in the separation of church and state in religious toleration. Alas, no English groups can be shown to meet these criteria. Robert Cooche, an isolated and eccentric courtier of the 1540s to 1570s, held Anabaptist views, but he was a singer in the royal chapel! An English carpenter whose name has come down to us only as "S. B." was imprisoned in 1575 for his Anabaptist views. Yet he was a hanger-on of a Dutch group in London, and even he referred to the Anabaptists as "they" rather than ^“we"!¹⁶ These are the most conclusive examples of indigenous Anabaptism that we have!

In seeking for the English counterparts of the Mennonites, Hutterites, or Swiss Brethren, the historian is reduced to examining isolated groups and individuals. In most cases evidence for the careers and ideas of these is fragmentary. As with Joan Bocher, much of the evidence is in the form of court records and articles against those who were caught. Most of those who evaded the persecutors have eluded us as well! Where Anabaptism was present in strength, as in Flanders, Holland, southern Germany, Switzerland and Moravia, there is no lack of evidence for the fact. Scanty evidence concerning Anabaptism in England does not allow us to make up imaginary movements where these cannot be shown to have existed.

Whatever influence continental Anabaptism may have had on English radicals, it does not seem to have extended to the actual practice of believer's baptism itself. John Bale, the Edwardian Bishop of Ossory, noted that "I never heard it, that ever any man within the realm, went about the reiteration of baptism actually, at any time. What though I heard of rnany, which were of the same seditious opinion, and of some strangers [i.e., foreigners] which were also executed there for it."¹⁷

Only those historians who succeed in unearthing activities that eluded the notice of such contemporaries can hope to overturn this judgement and speak in any meaningful sense of "English Anabaptism". Bale noted, perhaps with unconscious irony, that anyone known to have received such a baptism could not have escaped death "under king Henry, nor yet under king Edward, for they both hated that sect."¹⁸

Established, compulsory religion, whether Protestant or Catholic, had been a mainstay of social order in Europe for a millennium. The autonomy of the individual and the voluntary nature of Anabaptism were generally considered fatal to royal or hierarchic power. If people could choose their religion for themselves, then the very code by which they lived was not amenable to government control. For almost everyone in the early modern period this was tantamount to preaching anarchy. Bale's comment that Henry VIII and Edward VI "hated that sect" that preached such doctrines is equivalent to an observation that two particular farmyard turkeys are not, on the whole, admirers of the institution of Christmas!

Notes

1. From the preface to Augustine, A worke of the predestination of saints, trans. Nicholas Less (London, I550), Aiii^V-Aiiii^r.

2. J. Veron, An Apolog ye or defence of the doctryne of Predestination (London, 1561), Bviii^V.

3. Hooper later was burned as a Protestant under Queen Mary. This quote comes from his letter to Heinrich Bullinger, the reformer of Zurich. H. Robinson, ed., Original Letters Relative to the English Reformation, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Parker Society, 1846-47), 65.

4. 0riginal Letters, vol. 1, 87.

5. J. Philpot, Examinations and Writings (Cambridge: Parker Society, 1842), 55.

6. Original Letters, vol. 2, 560.

7. The other term applied to this doctrine is "monophysite", since it amounts to teaching that Christ had only one, divine "phusis" (nature) and did not share in human nature.

8. Martin Micron debated the subject with Menno Simons in 1554 at Wismar Germany. See "Reply to Martin Micron" in John C. Wenger, ed., The Complete Writings of Menno Simons (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1956), 835-913.

9. J. S. Brewer, J. Gairdner, and R. H. Brodie, eds., Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII, vol. 18 (Vaduz, 1965), Addenda 1, 281.

10. J. Bale, A Mysterye of inyquyte (Geneva, 1545), Hviv - Hviir.

11. J. Hooper, A Lesson of the Incarnation of Christe (London, 1549), Aijv. 12Calendar of State Papers, Foreign, vol. 1 (London, 1861-1950), 122.

13. Register Cranmer, fol. 74r.

14. Irvin B. Horst, The Radical Brethren: Anabaptism and the English Reformation to 1558 (Nieuwkoop: B. De Graaf, 1972).

15. James Coggins,John Smyth's Congregation: English Separatism, Mennonite Influence and the Elect Nation (Scottdale, Pennsylvania: Herald Press, 1991).

16. The Second Parte of a Register, vol. 1, 546.

17. J. Bale, A Declaration of Edmonde Boners articles (London, 1561), Si^r.

18. Ibid.

AT 03: Vestiges in Society

by David Nussbaum
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 3, June 1993

In the wake of Constantine's embrace of Christianity in the fourth century, practices and theology developed to support a close relationship between church and state. In the Clearing Away the Vestiges (February 1993) David Nussbaum examined vestiges of this ancient relationship that still linger in the church today. In this article he explores Constantinian vestiges that persist in wider society.

Significant shifts are taking place in the world-view of the contemporary church in Britain and in the church-view of contemporary society. By some estimations, ours is rapidly becoming a secular culture. We could applaud these trends as allowing a more authentic biblical Christianity. Alternatively, we could bewail the loss of Christendom as a movement away from a Christian ethos which society should preserve.

Many nonchristians oppose any disestablishment of the church. They prefer the church to retain its historic position as a bastion of the status quo: having a chaplaincy function in society, giving out pious platitudes and providing a religious flavour to Christmas. Absence of such a church, some fear, might destabilize society. Other nonchristians welcome the trend toward secularisation as a route which ultimately will see the church become irrelevant.

Yet the existence of a considerable residue of Constantinian thinking and practice indicates that rumours of the death of Christendom may be somewhat premature. The Constantinian residue in wider society presents the church with an opportunity to take the initiative and do the unexpected, by seeming to campaign against its own interests. It may be unlikely that society will push quickly ahead on its own; perhaps the church will need to clear away these remains of Christendom rather than clinging to them for (false) security in a time of change. Vestiges of Christendom in British society include:

1. Bishops in the House of Lords

This part of the legislature reserves places for senior representatives of one particular church. If the state wants religious groups to participate in the government, perhaps representatives from many faiths and other world views could be included in a "second chamber" rather than restricting religious representation to one church.

2. Prayers in the House of Commons

Daily proceedings in the House of Commons begin with prayers. Does this suggest that all its proceedings have divine sanction or inspiration? Maybe not, since these prayers are not televised like the rest of the proceedings. It is appropriate to pray about politics, but should prayers of one religious group be part of the legislature's procedure?

3. Chaplains in the armed forces

The state often is anxious to gain religious sanction for its coercive activities. Christians working amongst members of the armed forces is one thing; having Christians work in an official religious capacity as ranked members of the armed forces is another. This allows the state to give privileged access only on its own terms. There are few examples of chaplains to the armed forces advising members of the military not to participate in actions they were told to take because such actions were wrong.

4. Inscriptions on coins

Money goes to, or perhaps comes from, the heart of the state--and the state may claim divine sanction for its finances. In the USA, where church and state are supposedly separate, coins bear the slogan "In God we trust". Every coin in England bears at least the letters "D. G. REG. F. D.", which some older coins spell out more fully: "Dei Gratia Regina [Rex] Fidei Defensor" ("By the Grace of God Queen [King] Defender of the Faith"). The inscription implies that the monarch has divine sanction and defends the (correct) religious faith. Which faith is not clear: the pope gave the title "Defender of the Faith" to Henry VIII before the schism which created "the" Church of England.

5. The national anthem

The British national anthem begins, "God save our gracious Queen . . ." There is no need for a national anthem to invoke deity at all. Still less is it necessary for the invocation of deity to be directed towards the salvation, longevity and supremacy of the monarch. A now less familiar verse invokes deity in a notably bellicose fashion:

O Lord our God, arise,
Scatter our enemies,
And make them fall;
Confourd their plitics,
Frustrute their knavish tricks;
On Thee our hopes we fix;
God save us all.

6. The coronation service

In England, the accession of a monarch takes place in a church building, with the most senior bishop of the established church officiating. Why should this be? There is even a special liturgy "for use in all churches and chapels within this realm, every year, upon the anniversary of the day of the accession of the reigning sovereign".

7. Use of the oath

Since it often is impossible to know whether witnesses are telling the truth in court, it is attractive to the state to instill fear that God somehow will "get" those who lie. There is a strange irony here. The court asks witnesses to place their hand on the Bible--in which it is written, "do not swear" (Matt. 5:34-37)--and then to say, "I swear . . ." Jesus told his followers simply to tell the truth. The state can impress upon witnesses the seriousness of their testimony without invoking the threat of the Almighty, even supposing he was minded to help the state.

8. Blasphemy laws

In Britain laws against blasphemy protect the Christian religion, but not other religions or nonreligious world views. Perhaps this is a reciprocal arrangement: the law protects the God of the Christians against things being said against him, and in return God punishes those who commit perjury in the state's courts.

9. Compulsory Christianity in state schools

Until the introduction of the national curriculum recently, the only compulsory subject in state schools was religious education. This focused particularly on the Christian religion. Some sort of communal worship still is required. Why should the state protect especially the Christian faith? Sometimes the effect seems to be like a vaccination: just enough of a sanitised version to protect the child against ever catching the real thing.

10. Charitable status

Church property benefits from tax exemptions. The most advantageous of these arise from having charitable status, which exempts from tax any income derived from church property and any gain when it is sold. Specially reduced rates of local taxation also support ecclesiastical privilege. While it maybe appropriate for churches to enjoy the benefits of charitable status, there is no need for religious activities as such to be regarded as charitable.

11. Remembrance Day

A nation can remember and even honour those who died in wars, without doing so in the form of a Christian or even religious ceremony. There can be something disturbing about a Christian event which marks the deaths of many who died in the course of killing other Christians. For Christians, loyalty to the body of Christ is primary, coming before loyalty to nation. Perhaps the church could organize an alternative event which remembers especially all those killed by Christians, particularly those who were themselves Christians.

12. Sunday

It is convenient for the church that the state has imposed on society special laws for the day on which Christians usually want to worship. Other days of the week might merit special consideration: Saturday has biblical backing as a day of rest, and Friday might suit Muslims. The church could make it clear that if it advocates Sunday as a special day, this is merely for pragmatic reasons, not because Christians believe there is any reason society should treat Sunday as special.

13. Christmas and Easter

The state fixes general holidays around certain Christian festivals. This is convenient for the church, since it focuses public attention on Christian stories. But Would Christians object if the state changed bank holidays from Christian dates to dates of nationally notable events? When I was a boy, those of us who wished to were allowed to miss school in order to attend church on Ascension Day (a Thursday). It seemed a fine excuse! Should Christians be reluctant to work on Good Friday?

Some modest proposals

In working with the ecclesiastical vestiges of Christendom, which are usually internal, the church itself can make changes. If vestiges persist, theology which supported them will be preserved. If the church is to present an authentic witness to society, it must detach itself from those parts of its life whose source is in society rather than in the revelation of God in Jesus Christ.

Addressing the residue of Christendom in wider society might be more difficult. What impact would it have on the church's witness if it campaigned against use of the oath? Against blasphemy laws which protect only Christianity? Against privileged place for Christianity in state schools? If the church wants to promote a general day of rest each week, why not Saturday?

Are Christendom and persecution the only alternatives for the relationship between church and state? What other models should we pursue? How much toleration should a truly Christian church expect? How do we promote people's freedom to choose, whilst encouraging them to accept the Christian message'? Rather than seeking to maintain the privileges afforded to Christianity in society, the church should promote the free status of all religions and non-religions. We could do so because we are confident that the message of Jesus will flourish: not by legal might, nor by the power of the state, but through the activity of the Holy Spirit of God.

AT 04: A Day with the Hutterian Brethren

by Nelson Kraybill
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 4, October 1993

"We dont' whack people on the head with Bibles," David Hibbs chuckled as he poured a second round of coffee and pondered the Hutterian concept of mission. "But we do want to he a city on a hill rather than a village in the valley. It's people seeking God who end up coming to us. Our mission is to care for the whole person, in community."

A "village in the valley" is quite literally what you find if you visit the Darvell Bruderhof (Hutterian) community at Robertsbridge in East Sussex. Some three hundred men, women and children constitute this largest group of Anabaptists in the UK. Stuart Murray and I spent a day there in September 1993, and enjoyed coffee in the home of David and Fiona Hibbs after a tour of the grounds. Whilst many members of the Darvell community trace their roots back through North or South America to Germany, the Hibbs are English and joined the Bruderhof four years ago.

"We found something really worth following", Fiona said. "We wanted to live with people who were obedient to Jesus." Having participated in several conventional and charismatic churches, with mixed experience, David and Fiona first visited the Bruderhof when they saw the sign while passing through Robertsbridge. They were impressed by the warm hospitality they experienced and the deep commitment of community members. After several periods of residence as guests, they asked to move into the community with their two children on a more permanent basis.

A life-long commitment to community

Quite against the counsel of Bruderhof members, the Hibbs sold their house to make a clean break with their past life. It is understood, of course, that Hutterians relinquish personal possessions and share all goods in common. But membership in the community is a life-long, total commitment - and sometimes newcomers, in a burst of enthusiasm, want to join prematurely. "They were right about us not selling the house so quickly," David Hibbs said ruefully. "Nine weeks after we arrived here we had to leave! We were still too concerned with materialism and power." Eventually the Hibbs returned, found their place in this deferential community, and now interpret the Bruderhof to others through hospitality and public relations.

There's a lot to interpret. Why would three hundred Christians live in what looks like monastic isolation in the quiet countryside? Why the uniformity of dress (men: beards, braces and black trousers; women: conservative, dark dresses and polkadot head scarves)? Why do they educate their own children until the age of fourteen? Why do they eat most meals en masse, and how do family units function when all money and possessions are shared in common? How do women feel about living in a community where men hold virtually all key positions of spiritual and administrative leadership'?

David Johnson, one of four ministers ("servants of the Word") for the community, fielded our questions with the soft-spoken conviction of a man who has thought things through. "The Bible is the centre of everything we believe", he explained, "and church happens whenever Christ is present among people who are willing to obey." David Johnson took us into the community meeting room, a spacious and simple hall with several hundred chairs in concentric circles. A table on one side marks where leaders and their wives sit. Above the table hangs an oil lamp that burns continuously as a reminder of God's presence. "The Holy Spirit is the 'wild card' in our worship and group decision-making," David Johnson explained. "We like to go into worship or meetings with some plans, but we always want to be flexible so we can respond to what God might be saying."

To follow Jesus "unconditionally"

It was this sort of openness to Spirit-led group process that inspired formation of a Bruderhof ("Society of Brothers") in Germany in 1920. Three young Christians (Eberhard Arnold, Emmy von Hollander (later Amold), and Else von Hollander) founded an independent community with the intention of following Jesus "unconditionally". Only later, after the group expanded, did they make common cause with centuries-old Hutterian communities that had emigrated to the United States from Russia in the nineteenth century. Thus there came to be "old Hutterian" communities in America that trace their lineage back to the Anabaptist Jacob Hutter (died 1536), and "new Hutterian" groups with twentieth-century roots in Germany.

The Darvell community belongs in the "new" category, but its members identity with the saga of Hutterian witness and suffering that goes back to the sixteenth century. A long time-line wraps around a classroom in their well-ordered primary school at Robertsbridge. Pre-Reformation heroes of nonconformist witness appear first on the sweep of history, including Waldo, Wyclif, and Huss. The chart becomes dense with data starting at the

Reformation. A prominent figure, of course, is Hutter, who took up leadership of a persecuted Anabaptist group in the Tyrol in 1529 and urged his flock to follow literally the communitarian model of church found in Acts 2 and 4.

A sampling at almost any point along the time line reflects the long sojourn that ensued:

• 1640s: Only 1000 Hutterites left (persecution and hardship)

• 1700: Severe persecution; Last Bruderhof gives up community of goods

• 1750: Increased persecution. Book raids, children taken, houses sealed

• 1820s: Internal conflicts/divisions led to steady decline of community life

• 1860: Renewal and re-establishment of community of goods

• World War 1: Communities move from United States to Canada

• 1990s: Community founded in Nigeria

The modern sojourn of "new" Hutterites

The struggle for identity and survival that pervades much of Hutterian history also is characteristic of new Hutterites in twentieth-century Europe. The Bruderhof in Germany, with its peace witness and radical commitment to Jesus, was bound to come into conflict with a Nazi government. Ousted from Germany in 1937, the group moved to southern England. When war broke out, however, social and political pressures militated against the German-speaking community. After a period of hardship and struggle in an isolated region of Paraguay, the Bruderhof eventually settled in the United States. Today there are nine communities of new Hutterites (six in the United States and one each in England, Germany and Nigeria). The Darvell community at Robertsbridge was founded in 1971, when a group of Hutterians moved to England and purchased a manor house and adjacent buildings that had served as a tuberculosis hospital. Today the group owns eighty acres of pasture and fields.

Darvell has a living arrangement that is typical of most Bruderhof communities: nuclear families each have private living space in which they eat daily breakfast and two evening meals a week; each home also has its own family time in the middle the day and before the evening meal. Beyond these designated family times most of daily life is communal. Small children receive care in the "baby house"; children to the age of fourteen attend the Bruderhof school where teachers come from within the community. Older children attend local secondary schools, after which most go on to some further education. The group does not baptize children, and usually not adolescents. Membership is an adult decision to be made after the candidate has had opportunity to leave the Bruderhof and experience life elsewhere.

Each Bruderhof is financially self-sufficient, and members of all ages have daily tasks. At Darvell the economic engine is a medium-sized industry producing wooden toys and equipment for the handicapped. There is no hesitation about using modern technology: a craftsman in the shop deftly entered instructions into a computerized router that produces intricate wooden parts with speed and precision.

Community life is difficult

"Touch only your own pot!" warns a sign in the children's pottery shop at the Bruderhof school, a reminder that communal life has its hazards. As David Johnson took us on a walking tour of the scenic grounds, we came across an abandoned bicycle lying in wet grass. "This is the problem with living in community," he said. "If it's not mine, why take care of it? We have to work on stewardship."

Tranquility and peace are genuine at Darvell, and the community appears to function smoothly. Members insist, however, that such harmony comes through a lot of effort and conflict. "Communities in general have a very short half-life," David Johnson observed. Fifty years is a long time for any community to survive, he said, and many Christian communities disperse after just a few years. Fiona Hihbs agreed that relationships require constant attention: "Imagine the conflict that happens just in one family. We are three hundred people trying to live like a family!" She noted that usually it is not underlying theological or doctrinal issues that lead to conflict; it is trivial disagreements, personality differences, or debates over little privileges that can destroy communal life.

To prevent any individual or small group from dominating the Bruderhof, there is a strong emphasis on mutual accountability and group process. On the morning Stuart and I arrived at the community, an elderly member told us "the brotherhood" was deciding that day whether he and his wife should go to assist a Bruderhof in America. This is not a decision the couple could or would have made by themselves, even though they were free to express their preference. By noon "the brotherhood" had decided, and our friends were leaving for America the next day. They seemed happy with the decision.

It is this measure of submission to group process that startles a visitor. Members do what the group decides, whether that involves a work assignment, living arrangements or role in the community. The demeanour of members is one of deference and cheerful self-depreciation. David Hibbs smiled as he borrowed an image from the wood shop to describe Bruderhof members: "We're the offcuts of society, the little bits that are left over". Those "offcuts" now function as an organic whole, with worship and Bible teaching at the centre. There is no frenetic activity, but the place is busy and everybody has a task. Children hike to a hillside at mid-afternoon, sickles in hand, to cut weeds; women prepare the noon meal and men wash up afterwards; the wood shop is efficiently organized with ideas borrowed from the Japanese.

Mealtime nourishes both body and mind. Members gather quietly in the spacious dining hall and sit together in family or household units. Announcements, a welcome to visitors, and blessing on the food come by way of public address system. Serving dishes arrive at each table from the kitchen (hearty potatoes and meat on this occasion). This was the week Israel signed a treaty with the PLO, and a professor from Hebrew University in Israel was visiting. The noon reading that day was a ten-minute survey of the history of the city of Jerusalem (from king David to the present), and all ages listened attentively as we ate.

Working down on the ladder

"Our whole life is church", explained one member. "We're all brothers. There is a ladder of power here, but you work down on it. We must become powerless, so God can use us." God's presence usually is felt in group silence or in the process of discussion and discernment; "charismatic" gifts of prophecy, tongues and instant healing normally play no part in Bruderhof life. Such gifts can lead to spiritual pride or individualism, and may distract members from more difficult and urgent matters of discipleship and obedience.

Ask members of the Bruderhof if they are "saved", and they likely will change the terminology to say "I try to follow Jesus". Among Hutterians there is a gentle disdain for theological discussion that is academic or theoretical. "We don't even want to do Bible study unless there's a commitment to act on what we learn", a leader explained. This straightforward determination to do what the Bible says explains why women wear head coverings (1 Cor. 11), why only men hold positions of leadership in the church (1 Cor. 14), why members wear unique attire as a symbol of submission to the community and nonconformity to the world (Rom. 12).

Other Christians favour a more nuanced interpretation of scripture that might, for example, encourage women to preach because certain bible passages infer that women taught and took leadership in the early church. This strikes Hutterians as little more than fancy footwork to avoid the plain message of the Bible. Bruderhof members are quick to emphasize that there are true Christians in many churches outside their own, but they also have a conviction that apostasy is rampant in the larger church.

A living model of Kingdom values

How do Hutterites do mission when the entire "saltshaker" is at one spot? That is a slightly sensitive question, and members have heard it before. "A few weeks ago we had an Open Day here," David Johnson said, "and seven hundred people came and visited. That's mission." In addition to such structured contacts with the immediate neighbourhood, hundreds of people visit the community each year from far and wide. Very few are able or willing to make the life-long commitment that membership requires. But sometimes visitors end up becoming members, and the Bruderhof serves as a living model of people who seriously intend to embody Kingdom values.

In the centre of the Darvell community rests a large container being tilled with clothes, equipment, food and medicine for a new Hutterian community taking shape in Nigeria. Several years ago an indigenous group of Nigerians began to live in community with all things in common. Thinking at first they alone had rediscovered a New Testament model of church, they eventually made contact with Hutterians in the America and England. Now several Bruderhof communities have pooled resources to help the Nigerian group build and plan, and people from Darvell are in Africa today. This new focus for ministry has energised the Bruderhof and brought a new cross-cultural dimension to their identity.

Stuart Murray and I left Robertsbridge on separate trains, symbolic perhaps of the more individualistic lives we lead. The rails took us from a quiet, rural community to the chaotic maze of London, where members of our churches scatter far and wide each week. We carried with us the warmth of love and hospitality that members of the Bruderhof had extended all day.

The Anabaptist congregation to which I belong has different ways of putting into practice our convictions about property, male-female roles, and accountability. But sisters and brothers at the Bruderhof inspired me to take discipleship more seriously and to think anew of practical ways to make community an integral part of church. Their radical economic sharing is a reminder that material goods belong to God and the Kingdom rather than to me. Their humility reminded me that Jesus' way of powerlessness is a far cry from the status-seeking of a world that is too much with us. Above all, their holistic ministry highlighted the importance of bringing every area of personal and corporate life under the gracious Lordship of Jesus Christ.

To find out more about the Hutterites, the Hutterian Brethren, and the Bruderhof communities, see the Amish, Hutterites, and Conservative Groups page in our Anabaptist links.

AT 05: A Vision of Multi-voiced Worship

by Eleanor Kreider
Originally published in Anabptism Today, Issue 5, February 1994

Imagine a sixteenth-century Anabaptist visiting one of our churches today. She might agree with many of our views and practices—but perhaps would notice a tendency toward one voice, or very few voices, dominating worship. Would she observe expectant, active listening for the Spirit's word to the congregation? Would she see that the church in a disciplined and concerted manner "proves all things" so that love and maturity flourish? Might she ask in what ways the congregation and preacher interact in understanding a text and its effect on our lives?

Early Anabaptists understood worship and teaching in the congregation to be a multi-voiced and dialogical activity. We see this perspective clearly in an untitled and unattributed tract of about forty pages, probably written in Switzerland in the 1530s.¹ In tones both defensive and aggressive, the anonymous Anabaptist author answered a question commonly put to the radical reformers: Why don't you Anabaptists attend the (state) churches?

Freedom to exercise spiritual gifts

The Anabaptist's first reason for abandoning worship in the Reformed churches is that they do not observe "the Christian order as taught in the word of God in 1 Cor 14." According to that text, if something for edifying is revealed to believers during worship, Christian love compels "that they should and may speak of it"-after which they should again he silent. The author of the tract underlines Paul's emphasis upon the desirability of the spiritual gifts, particularly the gift of prophecy, for the building up of the church.

In the Zurich state church, the tract argues, preachers "presume they need yield to no one ... and especially (yield) not to us". In keeping with a tradition over a thousand years old, preachers kept a tight hold on their pulpits and allowed no informal contributions from the congregations. But the apostle Paul had commanded that no one should forbid speaking in tongues which serves to edify the congregation (1 Corinthians 14.39). "How much less authority", our Anabaptist argues, "has anyone to forbid prophesying, teaching, interpreting or admonishing?"

The author passionately clinches his argument:

"When someone comes to church and constantly hears only one person speaking, and all the listeners are silent, neither speaking nor prophesying, who can ... regard it to be a spiritual congregation? Or confess according to 1 Corinthians 14 that God is dwelling in them through his Holy Spirit with his gifts, impelling them one after the other to speak and prophesy?"

All sixteenth-century Reformers insisted that, in keeping with their motto of sola scriptura, they were returning to scripture alone for the renewal of worship forms. But to Anabaptists, 1 Corinthians 14 spoke of a different kind of worship than they found in the Reformers' churches. In their assemblies they longed to emulate Paul's vision of a Spirit-gifted congregation praying and worshipping in a manner that was free but orderly.

Our tract emphasises that participation in worship must be open to all members as they are inspired by the Spirit. The "congregation is a temple of the Holy Spirit, where the gifts of inner operation of the Spirit in each one (note, in each one) serve the common good... Everyone of you (note, every one) has a psalm, a doctrine, a revelation, an interpretation." This, with all its attendant risks, was a long way from worship in the Reformed church, where the Spirit was only allowed to speak through the mouth of one person.

Hazards of single-voice worship

The author of the tract pursues a serious implication for worship which is dominated by one human voice. "All judgement is bound to the preacher and to his teaching, whether it he good or evil." The state church preachers "at first taught that they do not wish to set any judge over God's word ... and that there is no authority over the word but God alone". But to our author it was clear that the preachers were not openly accountable for their teaching. Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 14 required that "an error of the minister must he treated openly before the congregation which has heard it, and not privately with the preacher". With single-voice worship, "the congregation is deprived of all right of judgment concerning matters of the soul, bound exclusively to the preachers and their understanding."

Some state church preachers taught that the true meaning of "everyone has a psalm, doctrine, etc" and "you may all prophesy, one by one" empowered the elected ministers, and not members of the congregation, to speak. But surely, our author contends, if Paul meant only specified prophets to prophesy, he would have said so. In fact, Paul said "you may all prophesy." All the members of Christ, the whole congregation, should be ready to speak when the Spirit inspires.

To sum up, our author's first reason of the nine outlined in this tract² for refusing to worship in the state church comprises a double critique. Worship dominated by one voice blocks the Spirit's freedom to edify the church through the variety of gifts. In addition, the powerful single voice is beyond the discernment and correction within the congregation. Our author concludes, "The church of Christ should together `prove all things and hold fast to that which is good'. 1 Thess 5."

Multi-gifted worship today

The sixteenth-century Anabaptist critique of single-voice worship raises questions of how Christians today can be most faithful to a New Testament model of corporate life. Congregational worship dominated "from the front" is to be found both in churches led by a single pastor and in those led by music/worship groups. Both types must address the question of balancing responsibilities of designated leadership with the necessities of developing the gifts of all the members.

Some churches with a single pastor allow or expect that one person to do all the up-front ministry, to "take the service". What is the biblical or theological rationale for this pattern? There is no evidence in the earliest Christian communities of formal, single-voiced, up-front worship leading. Theologically, this practice tuns head-on into the Pauline doctrine of the body of Christ; practically, it contradicts what we know of the reality of worship in the Corinthian church. Paul needed to encourage order there, it is true, but he assumes an active, multi-gifted worshipping congregation.

Following Paul's example with the Corinthian church, leaders in our churches will continually seek out, train, enable, and make space for the Spirit gifts to emerge in worship. Mature leaders can take their own place in worship leading and at the same time train up others to assist. They can deliberately allow open places in the worship service for members to contribute ex tempore. Congregations can make clear to their leaders that they expect this approach. If the same voice dominates week after week, the congregation is either renouncing its responsibility or its gifts are being stifled.

Surprisingly, even churches with multiple worship leadership can suffer a sense of being boxed in or dominated from the front. One particular problem is with music groups, often called "worship groups". A narrow and simplistic equation of singing songs and "worship" can result. Slickness and professionalization of worship music sometimes sidelines and discourages the very ones who should be included and encouraged. Love is the measure, and that means encouraging every member's growth, including young musicians—as well as the poets, dramatists, visual artists, pray-ers and readers among us. Openness, inclusiveness, as well as seriousness of purpose and discipline should characterise worship groups. Otherwise they will become what Paul deplores in I Corinthians 13: noisy gongs and clanging cymbals.

Another well-intentioned approach is to operate on "democratic" principles: let everyone have a go at everything; put up a rota for people to sign; everyone should do their share of the jobs. This approach, however, denies what every congregation intuitively recognizes-that some members are gifted by the Spirit in particular ways. It is not difficult to spot people in the congregation who are gifted at leading prayers, teaching the Word with clarity, or sensing the movement of the Spirit in worship with intuitive humility. The congregation should affirm and call out these Spirit-gifts, not just pass around a rota of work to he done.

"Prove all things" together

Our early Anabaptist author objected to the word of preachers from high pulpits descending upon people who have no chance to respond. The author contended later in the document that the very teaching the state preachers used to give in the first days of their reforming activities they later repudiated, and practised the opposite. Where was their forum for accountability?

This is no dated problem. Historians of preaching show that the long rhetorical sermon from a pulpit is a relatively late development. Early Christian assemblies interacted with their preachers, commented and asked questions. Even as late as the fifth century, sermons of the famous Augustine were dialogical.³ Those early preachers had to he able to explain further, to illustrate, to apply the word to their life on the basis of people's questions.

Some will object that this kind of interactive discernment of the word between preachers and people is impossible in big church buildings. Acoustics and seating arrangements in many modern churches, as well as habits of etiquette, militate against easy interchange about meanings and applications. These are indeed impediments, as is the assumption that successful churches will he large ones. There is nothing more "Constantinian" in the life of our churches than the assumption that big is beautiful.

Our churches would do well to listen to the warnings of our sixteenth-century Anabaptist. There is undoubtedly a place for carefully crafted addresses on theology or biblical exposition. But is the typical Sunday assembly really that place? Our preachers (and why shouldn't we have several per congregation?) have the opportunity to present the story of God and God's people in ways that invite, convince, and inspire us to live courageously the way of Jesus. They can do this spiritual task in vigourous interaction with us, the members of the church, and our everyday life concerns. There is an exciting hope in this vision which can unite us with our anonymous Anabaptist author in the pursuit of a church which is truly "a temple of the Holy Spirit".

Eleanor Kreider is a Mennonite author and lecturer, and was serving as a Theologian-in-Residence at Northern Baptist College in Manchester when she wrote this article. Her, first article in the Anabaptist Worship Series was on the Lords Supper (February 1993).

Notes

1. See Shem Peachey and Paul Peachey, eds., "Answer of Some Who Are Called (Ana)baptists Why They Do Not attend the Churches: A Swiss Brethren Tract", Mennonite Quarterly Review 45 (1971:5-32). In 1560, Heinrich Bullinger, Zwingli's successor as leader of the Zurich reformation, published a major work against the Swiss Anabaptists entitled Der Widertoeufferen ursprung (Zurich, Christoph Froschauer, 1560). Bullinger published the Anabaptist tract in order to refute it.

2. Additional reasons include: the preachers have forsaken their own earlier teachings (whereas the Anabaptists are faithful to the Reformers,' early insights); the preachers are colluding in violent suppression of dissenters; the preachers employ the sword of the state to compel faith and to protect their own interests; the Reformers' state church is not a disciplined church, but is a place of lovelessness, untruthful slander, infant baptism, and a general imperviousness to the work of the Holy Spirit.

3. G. Wright Doyle, "Augustine's Sermonic Method", Westminster Theological Journal 39 (1976-1977), 236.

AT 06: Children in an Anabaptist Congregation

by Harry Sprange
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 6, June 1994

We who identify with Anabaptist theology are committed to the concept of church as a voluntary association of believers. Few of us, perhaps, have grappled fully with how children fit into this understanding. Many of our congregations continue the tradition of Sunday School, even if it is disguised under a variety of more attractive names.

The problem with Sunday School is that it often is not a voluntary association of believers! There are at least four categories of children who attend: 1) those who believe and want to he there, 2) those who believe but do not want to be there, 3) those who do not believe but want to be there, 4) those who do not believe and do not want to be there. Many preachers would struggle to address these four different audiences at the same time in the worship service. Yet week after week, we expect our children's workers to cope with this scenario.

Children who want to be part of the church

A few years ago, after a move of the Holy Spirit upon our primary school age children, they refused to go out to Sunday School on communion Sundays: they wanted to be part of the church! There was nothing particularly attractive for the kids in our traditional Baptist communion service; I can't imagine a sip of blackcurrant juice and a tiny cube of bread being sufficient to entice them to remain. I believe there was a spiritual desire within them; something was telling them they are part of the body of Christ.

Some house churches have jettisoned separate Sunday children's classes, and insist on all being together for "family worship". This rarely works, and I have visited only one church where children, teens, and adults flowed together comfortably in worship. It is more common for the meeting to be disrupted by screaming babies, distracted by uncontrolled toddlers, and disturbed by negative vibes emanating from switched-out teens.

Should we force children to attend church at all? We cannot avoid the biblical expectation that parents are responsible for disciplining and discipling their children (Eph. 6:4); success in this is a requirement for church leadership (1 Tim. 3:4-5,12; Tit: l:6). But can we apply to church a mandate that addresses family without succumbing to the spirit behind the Conventicle Act of 1664 (which fined those who refused to attend state-controlled worship)?

I am not arguing for a division of children into "saved" and "unsaved", since that can place tremendous emotional pressure on them. It also can leave those who grow gradually into faith with a feeling of rejection because they have not experienced a "crisis conversion". Whatever the exact meaning of a believer's children being "holy" (1 Cor. 7:14), at least it gives biblical warrant for accepting children into the church family (without needing to go all the way down the road of covenant theology and ending up with infant baptism).

Room for children to grow and learn

I see need in the church for voluntary meetings of both children and teens where they can learn radical discipleship. In my experience, we have experimented with children in house groups in addition to a traditional Sunday School programme and evangelistic meetings. Teaching discipleship works well when all the children present are motivated to learn and want to grow spiritually. Parents who simply "send" their kids along to such meetings will kill the effort.

Instead of constantly pressing children for a "decision", we need to teach those who clearly are committed what it means to follow Jesus in today's world - including the concept of laying down one's life for others, sharing our faith and material resources. When God speaks to a church on a given issue - giving, evangelism, or anything else - then it often is essential to communicate that concern to the believing children. We may need to find a time and place when we can adapt the message to their age and experience, but we can pass on the essence of the challenge.

Faith is something caught, not taught. Are we nurturing our children so they know God and trust him? Do they live in expectation of his provision and intervention in their lives? If not, is it any wonder that many children in our churches, who genuinely profess conversion, appear to be bored with being Christians after a few months? Could it just be that we have expected nothing of them?

Children ministering to a congregation

In the Revival of 1859 in Scotland, a three year-old girl in Eyemouth gave her mother assurance of salvation by quoting the text she heard the minister preach on the preceding day. An eight year-old boy preached in Findochty, when "more were convicted and converted than on any other occasion". A ten year-old boy prayed publicly in Hopeman for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and revival broke out. In Portessie an elder of the Scot's Free Kirk was horrified one night to arrive home and find his fourteen year-old daughter preaching to a house full of people listening intently. Even C. H. Spurgeon (no friend of the Anabaptists, methinks!) concluded, "We have never developed the capabilities of youth as we should have done."

Successful growth in any area of life depends on the right combination of intake and output. Constant eating with no exercise is a recipe for disaster. If all we do is spoon feed teaching into our young people and provide no outlet for service_, let us not be surprised if they die off spiritually. After the 1989 Lausanne Congress in Manila, Phil Bogosian believed God was saying to him, "Since you do not teach your young people to give their lives to reach the world, they will be taken from you by the world. They will be useless to me and a great grief to you." Let us who seek to be on the forefront of the radical tradition today beware lest we fail to pass on our heritage to the next generation.

Harry Sprange was a Baptist minister in Edinburgh and a children's pastor in Leith. When he wrote this article he was director of Kingdom Kids Scotland. He is the author of Children in the Revival: 300 Years of God's Work in Scotland.

Editors' note: We invite readers to respond to Harry Sprange's concerns about children in an Anabaptist church in the the Children and Anabaptism forum. What have you found works for children in your congregation?

AT 06: Why Did Dirk Willems Turn Back?

by Joseph Liechty
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 6, June 1994

Late in the winter of 1569, Dirk Willems of Holland was discovered as an Anabaptist, and a thief catcher came to arrest him at the village of Asperen. Running for his life, Dirk came to a body of water still coated with ice. After making his way across in great peril, he realised his pursuer had fallen through into the freezing water.¹

Turning back, Dirk ran to the struggling man and dragged him safely to shore. The thief catcher wanted to release Dirk, but a burgomaster - having appeared on the scene - reminded the man he was under oath to deliver criminals to justice. Dirk was bound off to prison, interrogated, and tortured in an unsuccessful effort to make him renounce his faith. He was tried and found guilty of having been rebaptised, of holding secret meetings in his home, and of allowing baptism there - all of which he freely confessed.

"Persisting obstinately in his opinion", Dirk was sentenced to execution by fire. On the day of execution, a strong east wind blew the flames away from his upper body so that death was long delayed. The same wind carried his voice to the next town, where people heard him cry more than seventy times, "O my Lord; my God". The judge present was "finally filled with sorrow and regret". Wheeling his horse around so he saw no more, he ordered the executioner, "Dispatch the man with a quick death."

A child's perception of injustice

When I first encountered this story more than thirty years ago as a child, my attention was riveted on what happened to Dirk. For his great goodness he received in return imprisonment, torture, and death. That he should suffer such a fate violated my childish sense of justice and fair play. My notion of how the world worked was undone, and I needed to find a new understanding.

Trying to understand Dirk's story as an adult, I have come to make some strong claims about its significance. I believe that in the Martyrs' Mirror, a book filled with heroic examples of Christian obedience to Christ, the story of Dirk's simple action is the embodiment of some of the great strengths of Anabaptism. I also believe Dirk transcended and healed some great weaknesses of Anabaptism. In this action he obeyed Jesus' commandment to be perfect as his heavenly father is perfect - that is, to love fully and indiscriminately.

What would I do if ... ?

1569 was a bad year to be an Anabaptist. The Martyrs' Mirror lists a number of martyrs that year, some of whom lived close enough to Dirk's home that he would surely have known of their deaths. I imagine the prospect of death was constantly with him, a steady part of his inner life. I imagine he frequently asked himself, "What would I do if ...?" or, more likely in his circumstances, "What will I do when ...?" His ruminations must have been shaped to a great extent by the teaching of the little Anabaptist fellowships, one of which met in his home. With arrest and death ever-present dangers, Anabaptists spent considerable time preparing one another to meet them.

One source of instruction was letters from prison. A young purse-maker and minister of the word named Hendrick Alewijns, after his arrest in 1568, wrote many letters to his wife, three small children, and fellow Anabaptists. "There is no fear in love," he wrote, but "fearless ones run through patience ... not out of, but into the conflict that is set before us, and look not at the dreadful tyranny, but unto Jesus, the Captain, the Author and Finisher of our faith." Alewijns and other Anabaptists did not mean they sought persecution, nor did they deny themselves the right to flee from it. But even so, this fearlessness was a difficult expectation. I imagine that when Dirk considered haw he might respond to capture, he conjured up an array of options, ranging from fleeing at one extreme to calm acceptance of arrest at the other.

I try to imagine what thoughts filled Dirk's mind as he ran, followed closely by the thief catcher. Did fear and danger dull his mind or make it keen? In either case his thoughts must have been dominated by the effort to save his own life. In at least some small corner of his consciousness, he must have been considering what he had done in fleeing and what he might do if caught. Would he be able to brave torture? Would he renounce his faith? Such tormenting thoughts must have reduced him to so great a fear that, when he came to a body of water, he ran across the thin ice. He risked immediate death by drowning rather than submitting to the prospect of capture, imprisonment, torture, and death. But having saved his own life, Dirk turned back across the ice to save his drowning pursuer.

As a child, my attention seized first on Dirk's sad reward of death for virtue. But my focus soon turned to an earlier point, less dramatic but more mysterious, when Dirk turned back across the ice. It is this action I can hardly comprehend, that I return to time and again. I am surprised that Dirk even noticed his pursuer had fallen through the ice. I would have expected his desire to live was great enough to drive him forward, ears closed and eyes fixed ahead. Even if he heard cracking ice or a cry for help, I would have expected the desire to live to send him fleeing. Why did he turn back?

Intuitive response to evil

I believe that turning back was not a rational ethical decision, but an intuitive response. The properties of thin ice may almost have dictated intuitive action by leaving him little time to respond. Even if the thief catcher somehow caught hold of a piece of solid ice, and Dirk had a few moments to consider, I still believe his decision was more intuitive than rational. No combination of mental calculations was likely to take him back across the ice.

Perhaps Christianity, with its teaching on loving the enemy, comes closer than any other religious or ethical system to requiring Dirk to do what he did. But where would the command "love your enemies" have led Dirk? He had no reason to believe he could save the thief catcher. The more likely conclusion would have been two deaths, and loving the enemy does not demand futile suicide. In those places where Jesus discusses loving the enemy, none of his examples comes close to requiring that one die for the enemy. If in fact there were others at the scene, the thief catcher's compatriots, who could condemn Dirk if he had seen the man in distress as their business?

Perhaps chief among the considerations in Dirk's mind would have been the doctrine of two kingdoms, a basic Anabaptist motif. "There were from the beginning of the world two classes of people, a people of God and a people of the devil," wrote one Anabaptist martyr. The children of God "have always been persecuted and dispersed, so that they have always been in a minority, and sometimes very few in number, so that they had to hide themselves in caves and dens ... but the ungodly have always been powerful, and have prevailed."

When Dirk looked back on the thief catcher in the water, he saw not just a man near death, but a devouring ravening wolf. He saw not just an individual, but a manifestation of the kingdom of darkness, an agent of the devil himself. Anabaptists also frequently took an image from the book of Revelation. Martyrs, slain for the word of God, wait under the altar in heaven, crying to God, "how long will it be before you judge and avenge our blood on the inhabitants of the earth?" (Rev. 6:10) When Dirk looked back, he might have seen an answer to the martyrs' question - God delivering justice here and now. Or, he could have drawn on the image of Israel's deliverance from Egyptian captivity: his crossing of the ice was the Red Sea parted; the floundering thief catcher was horse and rider thrown into the sea.

Dirk had available to him sound biblical images to justify his running on and leaving the thief catcher to his fate. With the time he had gained, capture was far from inevitable. His crime in the Netherlands was not crime everywhere; he could have fled to other territories and reasonably hoped for a long and peaceful life.

Other examples of sacrificial love

Examining the usual range of sacrificial actions can take us some distance in explaining Dirk's decision to rescue his pursuer. There are many examples of parents sacrificing for children. I recall the story of an American soldier in Vietnam who threw his body on a grenade, saving the lives of his comrades. Less frequent are accounts of people who gave their lives for someone unknown to them. One example is Father Maximilian Kolb, who chose to die in place of another innocent man in a Nazi concentration camp. Examples of people risking their lives for enemies are scarce indeed. A few years ago the South African bishop Desmond Tutu risked his life to save a suspected police informer from an angry mob. That is remarkable, but it is still a case of the powerful acting to save the weak, and that is a long way from what Dirk did.

We may understand better how radical was Dirk's action if we transpose the Tutu and Vietnam stories into parallels of Dirk's situation. In the Tutu story, we would have to imagine that the informer, having almost reached safety, turned back to save one of his pursuers. We must imagine that the American soldier, fleeing what he expected to be torture in a POW camp, risked his life to save a Viet Cong soldier. These transpositions are difficult to imagine.

I am convinced that the only force strong enough to take Dirk back across the ice was an extraordinary outpouring of love. The only kind of love I know that extends to enemies is the love taught and lived by Jesus. When Jesus' earliest followers struggled to understand the mystery of his death, they found themselves extending the definition of love: Jesus had died for them "when we were God's enemies". We must allow that precisely this definition of love - a love that reaches so far as to die for enemies - had shaped Dirk's character to such an extent that in circumstances of gravest personal danger he was able to express his love in an intuitive response.

Did the Anabaptists love their enemies? We may be sure they taught it; they were never ones to shirk Jesus' hard sayings. They also had the example of Jesus in the way of the cross, which the Anabaptists generally understood as requiring the willing, nonviolent acceptance of suffering. Their frequently cited experience of having been loved by God before they loved him must have reinforced the teaching and example of Jesus. At very least they had thrown away their swords, so they could not respond to their enemies in the conventional ways.

The enemy as wolf and lost lamb

Like a nation at war, Anabaptists needed to maintain identity and bind themselves together in unity through the stresses of conflict. To this end they had positive means: community, discipleship and pacifism. But the Anabaptists also had negative ways of maintaining group cohesion. Like civilians uniting behind a war effort, Anabaptists were inclined to dehumanise their enemies by identifying them as entirely evil. They did this with the doctrine of two kingdoms: they were children of light, their enemies children of darkness; they were lambs, their enemies wolves. Today, when dualistic thinking is condemned as the root of many evils, the doctrine of two kingdoms has neglected merits. I would argue that without some form of a two kingdoms doctrine we are unlikely to understand fully Jesus' teachings or the demands of discipleship.

Yet the two kingdoms doctrine on its own makes a sorely deficient world view. Christians in the Anabaptist's position are called to do the nearly impossible: to see their persecutors as both wolves and lost lambs, as both servants of evil and confused neighbours. The contempt for enemies inherent in two kingdom thinking, coupled with bitter experience, must have stained the Anabaptists' souls.

It must have seemed to Anabaptists that terms of life were being dictated to them, and they must simply respond as well and faithfully as they could. The battle could hardly have been less equal as the Anabaptists struggled against the combined forces of Church and State with nothing more than spiritual weapons. When the weak attempt to love their powerful enemies, the results must be primarily passive and internal. Always hunted and sometimes on the run, they had no leisure to ask themselves, what can we do to express enemy-love in a positive way? If they could simply resist the spirit-deforming influence of hatred, they had accomplished much.

In these circumstances, the moment when Dirk stood poised between running on and turning back held a more than personal significance. The opportunity before him was a rare one, and he was choosing for all the Anabaptists who never had a choice either to run to freedom or to act on love for their enemies. The path Dirk took would be the testimony for a whole community of how deeply they had been penetrated by the love for enemies inherent in the cross they had chosen to bear.

In the next moment, when Dirk chose to turn back, he stood on holy ground, where things we normally hold apart were bound together. Dirk had accomplished the almost impossible: he had seen the thief catcher as both an agent of the devil and a helpless human brother. Only then was he free to fulfil the call to love his enemy - after all, lambs do not save wolves. He had acted on his own, and yet, perhaps, for his Anabaptist brothers and sisters as well. I expect that if we could ask Dirk why he turned to save the enemy, we would hear "Not I, but Christ in me". Yet if Dirk was simply obeying what could not be disobeyed, his act has little meaning. In my imagination I can only resolve it thus: as Dirk walked across the ice, he was sustained but not compelled by the hand of God.

When I search the scriptures to help me understand what Dirk did, I go where I have always gone -to the hard sayings of Jesus and to the cross. I search for other passages as well, ones that speak of extravagant praise. The gospel of Mark records the story of a woman who poured a jar of costly ointment over Jesus' head. The disciples were indignant at this appalling waste, but Jesus rebuked them, saying, "Let her alone; why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me ... And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is preached in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her." Like this woman, Dirk Willerns has done a beautiful thing for Jesus. Wherever the gospel is preached, it is goad that what he has done should be told in memory of him.

Joseph Liechty has worked in Ireland for Mennonite Board of Missions since 1980. When this article was written he was lecturing in the history department of St. Patrick's College, Maynooth, and at the Irish School of Ecumenics. His teaching and writing centre on issues of sectarianism in Irish history and society.

Notes

1. The story of Dirk Willems is from a 1660 Anabaptist martyrology compiled by Thieleman J. van Bracht, translated as Martyrs Mirror (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1950), 741-42. A longer version of Joseph Liechty's article on Willems appeared in Mennonite Life 45, no. 3 (1990:18-23).

AT 07: The Church and "God's Servant" the State, Part 1

by Nigel Wright
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 7, October 1994

First in a series that continued with The Powers and God's Providential Rule: Church and State and Respectful and Subversive: Church and State

If you go to the bible for guidance on how God's people should relate to the state, you find a range of possible strategies - some of which seem to he in tension with others. At the time of Ahab and Jezebel, for instance, Elijah came into conflict with a state in rebellion against God. Elijah was part of a faithful remnant which would not obey a corrupt government and bow the knee to Baal. Yet at the same time Obadiah, also faithful to Yahweh, was a top official in the civil service of the apostate king and queen. Obadiah used his position to protect a hundred prophets of Yahweh. Authors of this biblical story regarded both moral stances as acceptable: Elijah speaking from outside the system and Obadiah acting on the inside.

This paradoxical response of God's people to corrupt government reflects some of the ambiguity with which people of the Old Testament regarded the state. The early history of Israel tells of God liberating his people from oppression in Egypt, yet liberation was not an end in itself. The people were set free for the service of God in the Promised Land, and were to come under his direct rule. They were to be distinguished from the nations by their covenant relationship with Yahweh. So Israel in this early period was not a state; nor was she without social institutions or occasional charismatic leaders in the form of judges.

The state as concession to human sin

From these early experiences came the notion that the state is something God's people should suspect. Yahweh's kingship excluded rather than included human kingship! God understood Israel's later request for a king to be a rejection of himself as king (1 Sam. 8:7), even though he eventually gave Israel a king. Indeed, the period of the monarchy overall must he regarded as a period of judgement, throughout which faults of the system became glaringly obvious. Identification of the people of God with a state was never wholly comfortable, and there are hints of conscious distinction between the two. The spirit and accomplishment of Solomon was a reversal of Sinai. The institutional state, like certain other human conditions such as divorce and slavery, was a concession to human "hardness of heart". The prophets reinforced this, accepting the state as God-given but denying it the right to take the place of God.

Israel came to a new stage of relationship with the state during exile. It is significant that this period of Israel's history, in which Israel no longer existed as a separate state, was one of great spiritual fertility. Exiles in Babylon had to come to terms with living as a religious minority within a pagan state. Jeremiah told them to "seek the peace and prosperity of the city" in which they were exiled (Jer. 29:7). The book of Daniel is a fascinating analysis of the extreme dangers and unique opportunities of serving an imperial state. God's people were to witness to the living God in the midst of an idolatrous state.

The exiles were aware of the "beastly" character of empire, and yet chose both to serve and to challenge it in the name of the Lord. They were able to influence the state's policies and to benefit the people of God by their secular career positions. All the same, there was at this stage of Israel's history a deliberate debunking and mockery of Babylon's imperial gods, as evidenced by Isaiah 46 and 47. It is perhaps this period of Israel's history more than any other that has a direct correlation with our own position as those who are "in the world but not of the world".

Jesus and the apostolic church

The central fact of New Testament attitudes toward government is that Jesus Christ was crucified by the state. The creedal clause which affirms that Jesus "suffered under Pontius Pilate" must be a continual cautionary note about too optimistic a view of the state. Once more we find in the New Testament that the saving purposes of God are happening outside and in spite of the power structures of the state. Luke 3:1-3 is a striking example: the word of the Lord bypasses the strong and the mighty, and comes instead to John the Baptist. Once more the idea of a people being formed on the basis of their allegiance to God comes to the fore. God advances his purpose through the faith community which responds to his word.

We can draw insight from a number of New Testament passages:

Luke 4:5-8. Jesus faces a strong temptation to fulfil his messianic ambition through worldly power as politician or revolutionary. The devil claims that the authority and splendour of the world's kingdoms "has been given" to him - without mentioning who gave it. Jesus does not contest or confirm the devil's claim.

John 18:36. Here is a confrontation between two different kinds of kingdom and power. Pilate represents worldly power, Jesus the reign of God. Jesus' kingdom is "not of this world", not because it is reserved to an otherworldly, spiritual sphere, but because it does not use methods of this world (revolution or coercive violence).

Mark 12:13-17. People often quote this as a proof-text to validate the state: God has his realm, Caesar has his, and both make their legitimate demands. Yet Jesus' reply is not so straightforward. He exposes the degree to which Israel has bought into Roman rule: Pharisees and Herodians possess coins which bear Caesar's idolatrous imprint. Israel has become a nation like the other nations, with "no king but Caesar" (John 19:15).

Romans 13:1-7. Many Christians regard this as a pivotal passage for debates on the role of the state, and use it to legitimise government. God ordained the state to punish evildoers, and Christians should obey. Yet the context in which Paul set this teaching is that of following the way of love in relation to one's enemies. The Roman state, which persecutes the church, is one of those enemies. Christians, however, should not rebel but should imitate Christ in relation to the state. There is a kind of legitimation of the state here, in the sense that God permits the powers and overrules them. Yet God's highest will for humanity is his own reign; the state is an expression of human inability to bear God's reign.

Revelation 13. This chapter acts as the counterpoint to Romans 13. The author refers to Rome in its persecution of the saints, and reveals the beastly character of human power systems. In accordance with the nature of apocalyptic literature, the author describes here the potential nature of all human power. All governments have it within them to be idolatrous and to oppose the good; Rome just happened to be the dominant power at that time.

This brief biblical survey leads me to conclude that we cannot simply regard the state as one more part of God's created order. Rather, we must see the state as a configuration of powers under the conditions of fall and sin. The Bible almost universally sees the state in negative and threatening terms, although particular rulers may be regarded in a warmer light. A biblical theology of the state must be a "minimalist" doctrine, ascribing to the state a necessary but limited role - and only ambiguous legitimation.

Diverse perspectives in the early church

What have Christians throughout history made of the relation of church and state in the light of the biblical material? Broad traditions emerged early in church history, and we can associate them with names of prominent early churchmen:

1) The option of Eusebius

Eusebius of Caesarea (c. 265-c.339) was the church historian who chronicled legalisation of Christianity within the Roman Empire. He acted as political theorist of the new relationship between church and state following the "conversion" of emperor Constantine and the Edict of Milan in A.D. 313. Constantine became the champion of Christians, and subsequent emperors systematically persecuted dissenters.

This "Constantinian shift" appeared to represent the triumph of Christianity. Eusebius' task was to give expression to this imperial theology and to legitimise the rule of the emperor as God's chosen. Eusebius called Constantine the "thirteenth apostle" and spoke of him in almost messianic terms. Christianisation of the empire brought with it the principle of territoriality: the empire was Christian, and all that lay beyond its boundaries was barbarian. To fight for the empire was to fight for Christ. Christ was thus reduced to the status of a tribal god, and propagation of the gospel came to be identified with imperial conquests of empire.

The Eusebian option continued through the centuries, perhaps most clearly in Byzantine religion. It also appears in the Protestant notion of the godly prince, and in the idea of the divine right of kings familiar in English history. This is full-blooded Constantinianism - the identification of God's cause with particular nations or dynasties. It is the political philosophy which lay behind the Crusades and the imperial extension of so-called Christian nations. Problems with this option, though, are obvious. It reverses Christ's saying that his kingdom is not of this world. We can ask whether Constantine represented the victory of Christianity over the world or of the world over Christianity. Christianity became the religion of the status quo, justifying the power of the powerful, cutting out dissent and nonconformity.

2) The option of Augustine

Augustine (354-430) was Bishop of Hippo in North Africa and an outstanding theologian. In A.D. 410 Alaric the Hun sacked Rome, inciting some pagans to say this was judgement of the gods for Rome having embraced Christianity. Augustine sought to refute this argument by saying that what really mattered was the heavenly city. There are two cities, he said, distinguished by radically different loves: love of the world and love of God. Augustine characterised the earthly city in negative terms: the state was a band of robbers, not the noble enterprise Eusebius described. Nevertheless Augustine justified the mixed church of his day, stressing universality at the expense of purity. A negative view of the state did not prevent him from calling upon its aid in confronting the Donatists, an African dissident group that broke relations with the Roman Catholic church and advocated rigorous church discipline. He justified the use of state coercion as a form of church discipline; dissidents were to be compelled to come into the Catholic church. Subsequent theology found it possible to develop Augustine's thought in different directions, and I suggest at least three sub-options of his position:

2a. The Lutheran view. This is a "two-kingdom" doctrine: the church and state are two different spheres, one characterised by grace and the other by law. Both are necessary in the struggle against evil. The Christian may share in good conscience in either sphere, and operates in each according to appropriate standards. For instance, as a private person vengeance is forbidden. As a magistrate, however, the same person must exact vengeance. Both actions, though different in their spheres, are loving actions. The church persuades with the Word, the state coerces with the sword.

2b. The Puritan view. Characteristic of Calvin and his followers, this position is unwilling to divide too sharply between the worldly and the churchly spheres. Christ is Lord of all and his authority applies in both realms. The church dues right when it seeks to use powers of the state to further righteousness. The magistrate should act to ensure conformity in matters of religion, and to cut out dissent. This is the historical position of Zwingli s Zurich, Calvin's Geneva, the Church of Scotland, the Church of England, and - perhaps surprisingly - the bulk of English Separatists.

2c. The Free Church view. This is an outgrowth of Puritanism, which adopts the above basic attitude to the state as a power ordained by God for preservation of order. The Christian may serve in government in good conscience, with one significant exception: the area of conscience and religious conviction is beyond the authority of the state. The state is to confine itself to earthly, worldly matters and is not to meddle in areas of conscience. The classic Free Church view rejects any kind of established religion. The state is rightly a secular entity whose task is to hold open freedoms which enable people to make up their own mind in matters of religion. This is the viewpoint pioneered by Baptists in England and is at the basis of the American Constitution, the first article of which guarantees separation of church and state.

3) The option of Tertullian

Tertullian (c. 160-c.215) was a brilliant advocate of Christian faith in North Africa, who late in life joined the charismatic movement called Montanism. Tertullian saw the church as a counterculture, and Christians were to separate themselves. Christ had rejected an earthly kingdom, and Tertullian saw secular powers as not merely alien, but hostile to God. Nonviolence was essential to Christian discipleship, and the church stood as a challenge to politics. The church had withdrawn from politics in order to be a community of love without compromise with power.

Tertullian represents what is called "sectarianism" in sociological terms. Christians are not to desire or compromise with worldly power. Their value to the world consists in being different from it. Sometimes this approach is described as "withdrawal", but it may he better to call it "detachment". We see this tradition both in monastic movements and in some mediaeval renewal movements, which were attempts at radical faithfulness to the way of Christ. Above all we find Tertullian's way of detachment in the sixteenth-century Anabaptists. A new appreciation of the radical way of Jesus led to a deeper perception of the gulf between the way of Christ and worldly power.

Making hard choices and embracing paradox

While the Anabaptists were aware of the fallenness of the state and distanced themselves from it, they also recognised that the state is necessary. A sinful world requires the use of force; rulers are "God's servants". Cyrus, the pagan king, was even described once in Scripture as God's "anointed" (Isaiah 45:1). Anabaptists knew the nonviolent way of Jesus cannot he applied directly to unregenerate society. What we have in the Anabaptists, therefore, is an ambiguous legitimation of the state. The state is necessary because humans rejected God. God permits and providentially orders the state, and we should accept its necessity. That does not mean disciples of Christ settle for second best: they should live as those who have not rejected God, conscious that this sets them apart from the world.

Most of us will have difficulty accepting the more negative view of the state contained in the work of Tertullian. Nonetheless, I want to develop this basic position in my second article. I believe Tertullian's radical stance is the position closest to the biblical witness (especially to the witness of Jesus), and it gives us a highly realistic basis on which to view the political realm. That said, perhaps we need to recognise that over this issue, as in other areas of Christian belief, it is impossible to state the truth without a degree of paradox. A realistic theology of the state, therefore, may need to incorporate elements of the Augustinian tradition.

Nigel Wright is a Baptist minister and a tutor in theology at Spurgeon's College in London. He is the author of several books, including The Fair Face of Evil and The Radical Kingdom.

AT 08: Anabaptism as a Charismatic Movement: Diverse Phenomena in Early Decades

by Stuart Murray
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 8, February 1995

What would sixteenth-century Anabaptists have made of the "Toronto Blessing" that has impacted many churches in Great Britain in recent months? How did the Radical Reformers respond to such spiritual phenomena'? The charismatic aspect of Anabaptism has not received much attention from historians, but evidence of spiritual phenomena in early Anabaptist groups is substantial. Some welcomed manifestations of the Holy Spirit, while others were wary and attempted to regulate or discourage such expressions. Basic to the Anabaptist view of charismatic gifts, however, was a belief that a transformed life was the true measure and sign of Holy Spirit presence.

A charismatic view of discipleship

A sixteenth-century Anabaptist named Leonhard Schiemer wrote that believers receive "a power about which they have to say that things that were once impossible are now possible". Christians lacking such a change, he argued, "are not yet horn again of water and spirit, even the Holy Spirit".¹ Schiemer's quote indicates two distinctive emphases in Radical Reformation theology: a preference for the term "horn again" rather than "justification by faith", and a focus on the experience of new life. In contrast to other Reformers, Anabaptists spoke of power to live differently rather than mere freedom from guilt and assurance of forgiveness.

Anabaptists accepted the notion of "justification by faith", but did not find this term adequate to describe their experience of Christ and his Spirit. Through the death of Christ their sinful past had been forgiven, and now they wanted to live a Christ-centred life in the power of the Spirit. Common Anabaptist terms for salvation were related to the work of the Spirit and the expectation of a changed life. Words that frequently occur are: new birth, conversion, illumination, enlightenment, the new creature, and regeneration²

Inner light for a life of righteousness

For Dirk Philips, the Spirit had a vital role as agent of regeneration. The Spirit writes the new convenant on the hearts of believers and enables them to participate in the divine nature. The Spirit is the earthly presence of Jesus, empowering ministers called by God and helping believers interpret the Scripture. Anabaptists equated "baptism in the Spirit" with conversion, but expected more to happen experientially than did the Reformers. The radicals were not satisfied with forensic ideas of grace, typified by the legal terminology of "justification by faith". Rather, they saw grace as "the inner light that directed a life of righteousness ".³

Hans Hut, the must successful evangelist of first generation Anabaptism, often relied on prophetic dreams and visions, Melchior Huffmann, who introduced Anabaptism to the Netherlands, encouraged the exercise of charismatic gifts and valued the prophetic ministries of both male and female colleagues. Later Dutch leaders, such as Menno Simons and Dirk Phillips, were more wary of reliance on visions. Perhaps this was because "revelations" played a significant part in the Munster catastrophe (1534-35), when an Anabaptist faction gained control of a city government in Germany and inaugurated practices such as polygamy and holy war. But even the later Dutch leaders accepted charismatic gifts to the extent that they were authenticated by Scripture.

Jacob Hutter (from whom the Hutterite movement takes its name) claimed a miraculous dimension to his ministry as authentication of his calling. The Hutterite Chronicle contains several accounts of miraculous events. Among other Anabaptist examples of charismatic expression were the "prophetic processions" (at Zurich in 1525, at Munster in 1534 and at Amsterdam in 1535).⁴ The Martyrs' Mirror mentions a martyr named Martin whom authorities led across a bridge to execution in 1531 He prophesied, "this once yet the pious are led over this bridge, but no more hereafter." lust "a short time afterwards such a violent storm and flood came that the bridge was demolished".⁵ In Germany some Anabaptists, "excited by mass hysteria, experienced healings, glossolalia, contortions and other manifestations of a camp-meeting revival".⁶

Pilgram Marpeck rejected the belief that miracles were restricted to the early church, and assured readers miracles still were occurring. He referred to several Anabaptists who had gone joyfully to martyrdom "through the abundant comfort and power of the Holy Spirit". He makes the astonishing statement that "moreover, one also marvels when one sees how the faithful God (who, after all, overflows with goodness) raises from the dead several such brothers and sisters of Christ after they were hanged, drowned or killed in other ways... Even today, they are found alive and we can hear their own testimony." Marpeck said these things occurred "among those who are powerfully moved and driven by the living Word of God and the Spirit of Christ".⁷

Bible interpretation guided by the Holy Spirit

Experience of the Spirit, Anabaptists said, would enable believers to interpret Scripture reliably and faithfully. Martin Luther, in his early years, ascribed a significant rule to the Spirit in reading the text. The Bible "cannot he mastered by study or talent," he said; "you must rely solely on the influx of the Spirit.' Luther later reacted against those within his own camp and elsewhere with whom he disagreed. Increasingly he stressed the letter of Scripture, and said only those who were qualified and accredited should undertake interpretation.

Anabaptists felt Reformers quenched the Spirit, and said this disqualified them as trustworthy interpreters of Scripture. Pilgram Marpeck complained that "dull teachers have lost the sharpness of the Word, and the sword of the Spirit has been stolen from them and given over to human power. Thus the discipline of the Spirit, the sharpness of the Word, has been discontinued and blasphemed."⁸ Anabaptists felt that relying on the Spirit would result in more faithful application of the Scripture than that produced by relying on tradition, learning, or human reason. They saw no necessary conflict between Spirit and (written) Word. As a charismatic and biblical movement, they were committed to a "pneumatic exegesis" of Scripture.

It was not only leaders who emphasised work of the Spirit. Ordinary Anabaptists, under interrogation, frequently expressed dissatisfaction with the Reformers` forensic emphasis and testified to a more spiritual and life-transforming conversion. Heinz Kautz and Hans Peissher criticised the Reformer Philip Melanchthon's formulation of Justification by faith as lacking integrity. In their view, "if there was no evidence of the new man in Christ living a different kind of life from what he had lived before, if there was no moral change, then there could have been no forgiveness of sins."⁹

It is clear from the way Anabaptists spoke about their experience of the Spirit that their focus was on ethical change and power for holy living rather than on spiritual phenomena. Anabaptists were distinguished from the Spiritualists, not only by the greater attention they paid to the written Word, but also by their understanding of the Spirit's work as primarily ethical. Their use of terms such as "enlightenment" and "illumination" must he understood in this context.

In congregational life, too, Anabaptists welcomed activity of the Holy Spirit. An early Swiss Brethren tract complained about the exclusion of the Spirit from meetings in the state churches.¹⁰ Entfelder, a Moravian Anabaptist leader, defined a church as "a chosen, saved, purified, sanctified group in whom God dwells, upon whom the Holy Spirit has poured out his gifts, and with whom Christ the Lord shares his offices and his mission".¹¹ There was general agreement from the movement's earliest years that church leadership was charismatic in nature and depended on the Spirit's anointing rather than institutional recognition or academic training.

What about the "Toronto Blessing"?

Early Anabaptists certainly were acquainted with phenomena like the "Toronto Blessing". Indeed, there are reports from some sixteenth-century radical groups of practices as bizarre as anything reported in recent months - including adults playing with toys as a sign that they were "becoming as children", nude processions, and bodily contortions.

Reactions among Anabaptists probably would have been as divided in the sixteenth century as modern responses seem to he. Perhaps the questions their more discerning leaders asked in relation to contemporary phenomena are still helpful: What are the ethical results of spiritual experiences? How is the authority of the written Word maintained alongside activity of the Spirit?

It was the focus on ethical renewal, including a commitment to nonviolence, costly economic sharing, and truth-telling that prevented the Anabapti^sts from getting hung up on spiritual phenomena for their own sake. Pilgram Marpeck insisted, "Christ bids us to recognise prophets not by miraculous signs but by their fruits."¹² And it was the ability of leaders like Menno Simons and Pilgram Marpeck to hold in creative tension the Word and the Spirit that ensured their churches were built on secure foundations as well as being open to the leading of the Holy Spirit. Not all Anabaptist groups managed to maintain this tension: some slipped into spiritualism, many more into a wooden literalism where the work of the Spirit was quenched. Similar dangers continue to confront the church 450 years later.

Stuart Murray wrote his doctoral thesis an Anabaptist hermeneutics. He teaches evangelism and church planting at Spurgeon's College in South London.

Notes

1. Leonhard Schiemer, "A Letter to the Church at Rattenberg" (1527), in Walter Klaassen, editor, Anabaptism in Outline (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1981), 75.

2. Alan Kreider, "The Servant is not Greater than his Master: Anabaptists mid the Suffering Church" (Mennonite Quarterly Review 55:12).

3. Robert Friedmann, The Theology of Anabaptism (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1973), 138.

4. See Walter Klaassen, Anabaptism: Neither Catholic Nor Protestant (Waterloo, Ontario: Conrad Press, 1973), 63.

5. Martyrs' Mirror (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1950), 440.

6. George Williams, The Radical Reformation (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1962), 443.

7. William Klassen and Walter Klaassen, The Writings of Pilgram Marpeck (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1978), 49-51.

9. Klassen and Klaassen, Marpeck, 299.

9. Friedmann, Theology, 163.

10. Klaassen, Anabaptism in Outline, 127.

11. Williams, Radical, 267.

12. Klassen and Klaassen, Marpeck, 5 I.

AT 08: The Powers and God's Providential Rule: Church and State, Part 2

by Nigel Wright
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 8, February 1995

This is the second in a series that began with The Church and "God's Servant" the State and ended with Respectful and Subversive: Church and State, Part 3

In the first of three articles on church and state, we looked at evidence from both the Bible and the early church. I argued that the state essentially is a concession to human sin, that it is necessary, and that the radical way of Jesus should lead Christians to a certain level of detachment from the ways of worldly power.

We now have the more difficult task of developing a constructive theology of church and state. Colin Gunton once wrote that the church, through the centuries, has made some wrong choices in its relationship to the state. "The church - though it never lacked voices urging otherwise - has acquiesced in crusade and inquisition which deny the values for which Jesus died: fighting the battles of God in the way his mode of victory forbids... We still live in the aftermath of that historical disaster, as in a land polluted long ago by some nuclear accident."

A departure from authentic Christianity

The disaster of which Gunton speaks is the Constantinian reversal in the fortunes of the church, that watershed in the fourth century when emperor Constantine and the Roman imperial government embraced Christianity as a state religion. I take the view that Constantine represents a huge departure from authentic Christianity. From that time on Christianity was pressed into service to provide a religious justification for the exercise of power. By speaking of a "land polluted", Gunton means the church we have received is profoundly defective, polluted by Constantinianism, and stands in need of extensive reform. Gunton goes on to argue that we will not understand correctly the nature of the church unless we first develop a satisfactory theology of the church.

Anabaptists represent a movement of church renewal and restoration. The idea of the true church, of course, is familiar to all branches of Christianity - and often has been used to excommunicate others. Roman Catholics locate the true church around the bishop who is in communion with Rome; Protestants find it where Word and sacrament are rightly preached and administered; radicals find it where two or three come together in the name of Christ.

Traditionally radicals have argued that there is a New Testament pattern of the church we are called to imitate. I don't dissent from that, but do wish to argue at a deeper level. The church must be rooted in the trinitarian God; it must be an agent of God's mission to the world, and it must pursue that mission in continuity with and in imitation of the messianic activity of Jesus Christ now continued among us by the Holy Spirit.

The church is rooted in the being of God because God himself is communion. Through the Son and by the Spirit, believers are drawn into the communion of God's own being and become partakers of the divine nature. God comes to us in the word which is preached, offering participation in his being through faith. The church, therefore, is communion or fellowship. It is made up of those who have been gathered into communion, not of those embraced by an ecclesiastical system or by rituals alone.

God is dynamic, ever moving outwards to embrace the world. To he gathered into God's being is to become part of this mission. The church is a messianic community, sharing the earthly mission of the Messiah. How Christ - the incarnation of God - went about his mission is how we go about ours: "As the Father sent me, so t send you". Jesus pursued his mission by mercy, compassion, identification with outcasts, preaching, healing, liberating, and nonviolence. He incarnated the Word and gathered a community of friends in order to extend the mission through them. His mission came to fullest expression in the self-sacrifice of the cross. When we imitate Christ, fulfilling his mission in his way, we become the messianic community. Only in this way can the church he the agent of God's redemption. The tragedy of Constantine is that, at this point, the church forsook this vocation for another.

Redemption through the church, not the state

Traditional theology has located the state within the "order of preservation" - a temporary expedient which God ordains or allows because of sin; the state is a means of restraining chaos while the world waits to be redeemed. This is a doctrine of a limited state: the state dues not belong to the "order of redemption". It cannot he the means of redemption, which instead is focused in God's activity through the church.

Jesus was crucified by the state. Crucifixion, in the first century, was the form of execution reserved for political offenders and insurrectionists--and this is how the state perceived Jesus. No faith which has the cross at its heart can take a naive attitude towards political authorities. Just as all human sin is revealed at the cross, so the idolatry of human social and political structures also is revealed. The Christian faith is an eschatological faith: it envisages a future that questions the present. This element of future hope makes the Christian faith profoundly revolutionary because it calls the present order into question in the light of a better order which is to come. The Christian faith is a religion of transcendence: it locates the meaning of the world in a God who both embraces the world and lives apart from it. All human realities are relativised in the light of the transcendent Lord, and ultimate reality is due only to him. In the view of these convictions, I argue six propositions about the state:

1. The state is a secular entity. By this I mean that it belongs to this world and to this age. To be secular is not the same as being pagan. I use "secular" to mean "without any pretensions to divinity or ultimate importance". The gospel itself is a secularising power, since it unmasks as a lie the idolatrous pretence of created things. Paul said rulers are "God's servants to do you good" - not objects of ultimate devotion as in totalitarian systems. We today are used to the idea of "civil service", but when Paul spoke of the state as a servant it was unheard of - except perhaps in the history of Israel. What Paul is doing is secularising the state, robbing it of its pretensions to divinity and self-importance. He shows the state as the limited and functional earthly entity that it is.

2. The state is permitted rather than ordained. The best government is direct rule from God, as experienced by Cain when there was a perfect balance of justice and compassion. The best government is what God willed for Israel before they desired to be like the nations and have a king rule over them. God gave king Saul to the people because they were unwilling or unable to accept what God really wanted them to have. Kingship - which intrinsically involved domination and exploitation - was God's permissive ordinance, and it remained a flawed instrument (see 1 Samuel 8:11-22). After Constantine, the church read Romans 13 as legitimising the authority of the government. Yet this was not Paul's original intention (though he is giving the state some kind of legitimation). Rather, he is counselling believers against revolution on the grounds that the powers come under God's providential rule. As in the case of king Saul, however, this is an ambiguous legitimation which questions at the same time that it permits.

3. Each state is a unique configuration. Any actual state is rooted in the human capacity for organisation, and takes form under the conditions of sin and fall from such potential. States may vary in form and are capable of reconfiguration. Because sub-structures that give rise to the state are created entities, they are capable of redemption and reconciliation. But the particular configurations we call states will cease to exist when the kingdom of God comes in its fulness and we enjoy the direct rule of God.

4. Despite their God-given role, all systems of human government are flawed. All systems of government, however stable and peaceful in the present, have their origin in violence and the lust for power - and ultimately are maintained by violence. "The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them," Jesus said, "... But you are not to he like that. Instead, the greatest among you should he like the youngest, and the one who rules like one who serves" (Luke 22:25-26). At party conference time, the agenda is always masked in moral rhetoric; underneath is the naked struggle for power and dominance. The contrast between the way of the world and the way of Christ becomes clear in Jesus' words, "you are not to he like that". Reinhold Niebuhr, in his book Moral Man and Immoral Society, argued that human societies are always less moral than the people who compose them. There is a multiplication of fallenness when it comes to structures as opposed to persons. But in Christ the powers are to be redeemed, restored to their rightful place, and integrated into the communion of all things with their Creator. Here, then, is the paradox: To stress the createdness of the powers at the expense of their fallenness might lead us to fall prey to them. To stress their fallenness at the expense of their createdness might lead us to negate the good they can do. It is only in maintaining the paradox that we judge with sound judgement.

5. The limited, temporal role of the state involves the maintenance of ,justice, peace and freedom. The state needs to he reminded of the role assigned to it by God: to reward the good and punish the evil-doer. God orders the state to provide the structure within which humans may live out their lives peacefully, freely and fairly. However, because it is a fallen structure itself, it will only ever deliver a kind of justice, peace, and freedom. Only God can bring about the full reality.

6. In matters of religion the state is called to be impartial. A referee at a football match is impartial as regards to the sides, but not neutral as regards the rules. The role of the state regarding religion is to provide the framework within which religious faiths might argue and persuade. The duty of the state before God is to maintain religious liberty. Faith in Christ cannot he coerced; it comes though personal response to the gospel. Constantinianism created a hybrid of Christianity and coercive power which denied the freedom of God and the freedom of humanity. Breaking out of the shackles of this inheritance is something we have yet to complete, To argue for state impartiality towards religion is not the same as arguing for indifference. Religious traditions and living faiths play a hugely important rule in any society, shaping lives and fostering personal and civic virtues.

Nigel Wright is a Baptist minister and a tutor in theology at Spurgeon's College in London. He is the author of several hooks, including The Fair Face of Evil and The Radical Kingdom.

AT 09: Inviting Others to Know and Follow Jesus: Rethinking Traditional Evangelism

by Walfred Fahrer
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 9, June 1995

From the moment of my call to discipleship I have had to grapple with Anabaptist theology and its implications for faith. My childhood roots were in North American Lutheran pietism, and as a young adult I had a dramatic conversion experience which brought me into personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I was baptised as an adult believer encountered charismatic Christianity, and became a convinced Christian pacifist. Four years after baptism my wife and I first worshipped in a small Anabaptist congregation, and there we found our spiritual family. I served as minister in a congregation that grew from forty to two hundred participants, studied at a Mennonite seminary, and eventually moved to England for evangelism and mission work here.

My sojourn has allowed me reflection on witness and radical discipleship in two different cultures - American and British. It is out of that sojourn that I share preliminary insights about evangelism I have gained thus far:

1. Evangelism is more a congregational matter and less an individual issue than we evangelicals traditionally have assumed.

The Christian congregation is to be a community of invitation. Perhaps this is a pastoral issue a much as anything, since it has to do with the ethos or spirit of the congregation. What makes one congregation hesitant to welcome those who are beginning the journey of faith, and another eager to do so? It is the task of leaders to shape the character and ethos of a faith community. They need to create an environment of security that makes it possible to integrate people coming to faith.

One of the main obstacles to such an ethos is legalism. This can come in different forms, but it always contains at its core a sense that "We've got it right; therefore, anyone who wants to join must learn our way rather than discover with us what it means to follow Jesus faithfully." It is difficult to be both legalistic and evangelistic - unless you want to send all your new believers to some other congregation after you lead them to Christ! Legalism is the clearest indication that a congregation has ceased to be evangelistic in character. Congregational leaders need to guard against such an attitude.

Closely related to legalism is the matter of becoming isolationist. In other words, do members of the congregation have meaningful relationships with unbelievers? Sometimes new believers need to break off unhealthy relationships with past acquaintances in order to stand in their faith. But when this practice becomes the norm and all members of the church confine close relationships to like-minded Christians, the church loses its ability to share the gospel. Such isolationism needs to be guarded against. Congregations need to plan for mature believers to involve themselves with new Christians in their old friendship networks. New believers have found a life that is meant to be shared! If they don't share their faith within a few months, the potential for positive witness largely is over. Some Christians isolate themselves from unbelievers because they aren't sure their own faith is strong enough to keep them from being shaped by a sinful society. They fear that if God isn't powerful enough to keep them, how could he help someone who is deeply affected by a fallen world? Seeing people come to faith has the effect of strengthening the faith of committed Christians and re-opening them to witness.

Traditional evangelicalism has tended to assume that evangelism essentially is a one-to-one conversation between a believer and an unbeliever about the matter of faith in Christ. This, however, leaves out the importance of the community of faith. We cannot make a congregation evangelistic just by having evangelistic messages or by inviting evangelists to hold special meetings. Nor is it enough to hold evangelism training courses. The real issue for evangelism is the character of a congregation. Many people need to experience acceptance, love and compassion - and to see the life of Jesus in others - before they are ready to hear about faith.

2. We need to re-evaluate the traditional evangelical gospel presentation.

After attending a number of evangelism training courses, I can give you the classic elements of an evangelical gospel presentation: I ) God is holy, 2) people are sinful, 3) a gulf separates people from God, 4) the cross of Jesus is a bridge that brings God and people together, 5) believing in Jesus is the ticket to heaven.

The primary Anabaptist critique of such a message is that its goal is heaven. The goal of evangelism in Anabaptist thought is discipleship - following Christ in life - with the assurance that believers will enjoy eternal fellowship with God. The early Anabaptist mystic Hans Denck wrote a sentence that modern Anabaptists often quote, "no one can know Christ truly unless they follow him in life." To an Anabaptist Christian, the evangelical presentation leaves out the critical step of discipleship and thereby distorts the message. Jesus taught his disciples to pray that the kingdom of God would come to earth, not that the church would be taken up to heaven from earth.

It is possible, of course, for people to be committed to certain kingdom values and never know Christ is a personal way. Yet an ethical commitment, such as nonviolence, is no substitute for a spiritual encounter with Christ. Mennonites sometimes have experienced just such an outcome at times in our history. We have forgotten the second half of Hans Denck's sentence...... and no one can truly follow [Christ] unless they first have known him."

We need a holistic gospel message, one which includes both knowing and following. As Anabaptist Christians we need to think through that challenge and produce a clear, simple summary of the gospel that can be shared with unbelievers, and that contains the full sense of what we believe. Until Anabaptists do this, it is appropriate for a critic to say regarding traditional evangelism, "Although it is imperfect, I like what I am doing better than what you are not doing."

3. Our understanding of sin affects our approach to evangelism.

An additional critique of the traditional gospel message is its understanding of sin. The traditional evangelical explanation of the gospel understands sin as volitional (related to one's will or intentions). Sin is that which I have done (or not done) that is contrary to the will of God. The evangelical response is that an individual should feel guilty about such sin and repent (say "sorry" to God).

Such an individualised understanding of sin, however, is only one side of the coin. What we are learning from family systems psychology, for example, is that sin is progressive and intergenerational in its effects. Children of a violent or alcoholic father will be shaped by the sin committed against them. The children may grow up to repeat the same destructive pattern. Their adult behaviour is their own responsibility, but without healing for the sin that set them up, lasting change is exceptionally difficult.

How can I feel guilty for what was done to me, and how can I say "sorry" to God for it? We create emotionally damaging distortions if we try to force this kind of sin into the mould of repentance. We also do violence to the victim if we only focus on their attitudes toward the perpetrator of the sin. Which is more intolerable to God - that a twelve-year-old girl was violated by her father, or that, as an adult, she hates him for it? We evangelicals have tended to focus on her hatred and say "you need to repent."

Anabaptists knew from their history the devastating effects of the sins of others. They were victims of persecution for their faith - not from pagans, but from those who called themselves Christian. Their descendants know intuitively that the church's traditional message usually doesn't speak to the victim. 1n response, many modern Anabaptists have opted out of evangelism and have given themselves instead to voluntary service. Yet Jesus' life, death and resurrection have much to say to those who have been sinned against. Jesus was an innocent victim of the sins of others. He bore our grief and carried our sorrows (not just our guilt). He was despised and rejected.

We must include in our gospel presentation not just the truth of sins forgiven, but something of the power of God to set free those who are trapped in the pain and suffering of sin of which they are victims. It is not enough to call people to confession of faith and to assure them of forgiveness. We may need to take a page or two out of the "twelve step" groups (such as Alcoholics Anonymous) and examine on that basis the level of support and acceptance we offer within the faith community. For when we involve ourselves in a gospel of healing, we will rediscover a need for the faith community.

4. Our understanding of baptism influences our evangelistic efforts.

Becoming a Christian is a matter of responding to the love of God in Christ. How we respond to God has to do with the nature of love itself. There was nothing I could do to earn my wife's love for me. If I were able to make her indebted to me and she had to repay me by showing affection, it would destroy the very character of love. Love must be freely given or it is destroyed. But if I simply accepted my wife's love as a fact, and did not change my behaviour towards her, there would be no relationship. My response to her love and commitment was my love and commitment.

It is a distortion of the gospel to invite people to know Christ without cost, but inviting people to a cause without knowing Christ is equally incomplete. If there is a greater danger in our day, it is that much of contemporary evangelical Christianity focuses on a cheap passage to eternity with God. The doctrine of those of us who were brought up in Reformed Christianity is "salvation is a gift". Yet there is a major difference between teaching that justification cannot be earned and implying thereby that discipleship is not required.

Evangelical Christianity puts emphasis on the conversion experience: "Have you been born again?" Baptism becomes the public symbol of that experience, and we practise baptism because Jesus commanded us to. But such a view of baptism essentially is backward-looking, pointing back to the moment of accepting Christ. Anabaptist Christianity, in contrast, views baptism as a pledge to follow Christ in life. Anabaptist Christians have a tradition of "baptismal vows", in which baptism is forward-looking, expecting a walk of discipleship in the present and future. It is not the experience which sustains the commitment; it is the commitment which sustains the relationship.

5. Cross-pollination may release us to a Joyful experience of evangelism.

Can we once again bring together the two streams of knowing Jesus and following him in life? Can we invite people to all fe-giving experience and a life­long commitment? To invite others to an assurance that them sins are forgiven outside of the context of a desire to follow Christ as Lord, is to wrench the jewel of conversion from its true setting. To offer assurance of heaven without the need to be a disciple and work for the kingdom on this earth is to distort the nature of divine citizenship that Jesus offers. To call people to follow Christ without leading them to know his grace and forgiving love is to ask people to start a journey they can never complete. And to call people into solidarity with the kingdom of God without introducing them to the healing love of its king is to reduce divine fellowship to an ethical standard. The time has come to cross­pollinate, and to bring together the insights of Anabaptism and the evangelistic fire of evangelicals.

Walfred Fahrer is pastoral elder of the Cholmelev Evangelical Church in North London. He is the author of a book on Anabaptist ecclesiology entitled Building on the Rock (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1995).

AT 09: Respectful and Subversive: Church and State, Part 3

by Nigel Wright
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 9, June 1995

This is the third in a series that began with The Church and "God's Servant" the State and continued with The Powers and God's Providential Rule: Church and State

What is the proper relationship between church and state? In two previous articles¹ we looked at the biblical understanding of the state as a concession to human sin. We noted that governments are permitted by God to function, but invariably are flawed and have a limited role in God's design. How then are people of God's kingdom to relate to earthly powers?

Even the language of "church and state" betrays assumptions that we need to question about the "holy tandem" that long has existed between these two institutions. In the age of Christendom² there were fundamentally only two institutions in society: the church and the ruler. This itself was an advance on the days when there had been only one institution - the ruler who also was regarded as a god or priest. From the beginning Christianity has insisted that there be a dialogue between church and ruler, and this has been a stimulus towards a more open society. But we fool ourselves if we think that church and state are the only social realities with which we have to do. Church and state are two among many actors that make up modern society. One problem of the modern church is that it is a minority which still sometimes acts as though it were a majority. To understand the role of church within society I suggest the following:

1. We need to recover the distinction between the church and the world. I say "recover" because the church of Christendom assumed all people in a given territory were Christians, and wished to obscure the distinction between church and world. The church tried to co-opt the world, leveling out the demands of the faith so that Christianity became accessible to all regardless of whether or not they believed. Radical expectations of the gospel were siphoned off and kept alive in monasteries by those who had a special vocation. Yet Christian faith properly understood looks for a people to be formed upon earth who are not shaped by the world but by a coming reality which already is present: the reign of God incarnated in Jesus of Nazareth. The people of God walk to the beat of a different drum. The church which truly follows Jesus will find itself being, whether it wants to or not, a revolutionary and subversive presence.

2. The first duty of the church is to concern itself with the God revealed in Jesus the Messiah. We do not change the world by trying to change the world! The danger is that the church will allow the world to set the agenda for us, to spell out the terms in which we may be significant. Our task, instead, is to seek first God's kingdom. Humans always have a tendency towards idolatry and self-aggrandisement. The church performs a profoundly important political service when it affirms the demand of God to relate all things to him.

3. The church should recognise that the cause of Christ will never be advanced by means of worldly power. This was the error of emperor Constantine in the fourth century, and it stands in direct contrast to the way of cross and resurrection embraced by Jesus. Power is attractive, and in each generation we need to face and resist its temptations anew. We are tempted to seek worldly power in order to do godly things. Yet those who seek to bend earthly powers to their will eventually find themselves being bent. In this sense Christians are "anarchists"; we are suspicious of power and do not believe God's purposes are achieved by entering into the domination system and using it for supposedly good ends. In keeping with the mission of Jesus, the church is to remain detached from partisan power struggles, and to concern itself with truth rather than propaganda.

4. The church, as the church, should reject any form of alignment with political and governmental authorities. This is traditionally known as the "separation of church and state", and is a fundamental free church axiom. Its rationale lies in the fact that because the powers are fallen, any form of alignment of the church with them is bound to be corrupting. The powers of state inevitably seek to use religion for narrow political ends, to legitimate their own status or policies. Equally the church is tempted to pursue its ends by the illegitimate means of power, privilege and coercion. This is an unholy alliance and a wrong understanding of mission. In its own way it is a form of sectarianism, since it identifies the church with national, localised entities. The gospel, in contrast, calls into being a new humanity which transcends all earthly loyalties. Because it has faith in the crucified One and looks for the coming kingdom of God to replace the kingdoms of this world, Christianity makes an inherently unstable state religion. It is constantly calling the powers that be into question, fostering revolution in a way which does the opposite of what state religions are supposed to do.

5. Separation of church and state does not imply the separation of church from society. Christians follow the example of our Lord when we choose to engage society and live in it. We confess the lordship of Christ over all things. We are concerned to witness to the meaning of Christ for the public square and to see public affairs shaped, as much as possible, by Christian perspectives. Yet Christian influence upon the state must seek to ensure that the state remain properly secular (i.e., avoiding idolatry) and impartial in matters of religious confession (while respecting and safeguarding the place of religious faith among citizens). Christians will call the state to be committed to justice, peace and freedom. However, the state is a human enterprise not built upon faith in God. The state is an accommodation by God to human unbelief. 1n the political realm even Christians will be bound to argue for solutions and remedies which operate with what is humanly possible for a largely unbelieving society. Although shaped by their faith, Christian politicians will not necessarily have distinctively "Christian" policies to offer. There is no more a precise Christian politics than there is a Christian car maintenance. But there are Christian values and concerns which shape the way people are to relate to each other.

6. Despite its detached stance, the church seeks improvement in the social order. The church recognises the fallenness and limitations of all political powers. In this way we guard against false propaganda, delusion and false hope. We refuse to believe that final hope for humanity is found within any. human ideology or political system. Rather, hope is found in Christ. Our basic position of detachment, however, frees us to distinguish between bad and worse, between the less good and the better. These relative judgments are not to be despised. The fact that the powers are rooted in created reality and will be redeemed allows the possibility of improvement in the social order. It is the duty of all Christians to seek such improvement While the church as the church maintains a critical distance from government, this does not exclude the participation of Christian individuals in the legitimate spheres of government.

7. The church can be a major source of inspiration, values and innovation in the humanising process. Because we draw upon divine resources of faith, hope and love, Christians incarnate something new in the world. The justice, peace and freedom which are the responsibility of the state receive definition, in part, through the witness of the church. From within its own life the church is able to offer ways of relating in social organisms which may be translated to the wider community. Historically it is possible to point to the growth of free and democratic institutions in the wake of free church movements. Christians must pay attention to the fostering of their own messianic communities - not only to give glory to God, but also for the sake of their innovative potential for all humanity.

8. The political sphere is important, but no more important than any other sphere of life. The paradoxical view of the state we have developed takes seriously political affairs even while being fully aware of the fallen nature of the powers. While affirming that Christians may have a vocation in politics, we wish to resist the notion that human life can be defined by politics or that the political sphere is more significant than any of the other spheres of human life. Much political endeavour proves incapable of achieving the desired end. Christians may have a greater and longer term impact for good in many

other vocations. We resist the notion, therefore, that it is of particular importance for Christians to enter political life. We believe the purposes of God's kingdom may often be advanced more effectively in other ways.

9. In any sphere of life it is our duty to obey God when con-fronted with demands at variance with faithful discipleship. Within a fallen world system in which God is ignored, it is inevitable that certain actions are deemed necessary for preservation of the system. Christians may come under pressure to lie, conceal, misrepresent, or even to kill. Living in the world means that no Christian can avoid relative judgments or ambiguity. We live in the assurance of forgiveness and justification by_. faith. However, because we live by faith in the God of resurrection and infinite possibility, no Christian is bound by the false logic of fallen systems. We need to have courage to trust God. This sometimes will lead to conscientious objection through which the Christian exercises his or her witness.

10. It is the duty of Christians to work for the reduction of all forms of violence and coercion. Christians are followers of a Messiah who rejected the use of violence in pursuit of his cause, and chose the way of the cross rather than return evil for evil. The command "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Romans 12:21) must be taken as foundational to the ministry of Jesus and of all Christians. This creates a considerable tension between the Christian and a world in which violence is regarded as necessary and even on occasion praiseworthy. Utopia will elude us, but it is realistic to work of the minimising of all violence wherever possible, including the use of force by governments.

Until this summer Nigel Wright was a tutor in theology at Spurgeon's College in London. In his recent doctoral thesis he compared and contrasted the theologies of Jurgen Moltmann and John Howard Yoder. He recently moved to Manchester to be senior pastor at Altrincham Baptist Church.

Notes

1. See Anabaptism Today 6 (October 1994:9-14) and 7 (February 1995:16-20).

2. By "Christendom" I mean the era of European history beginning with Constantine in the fourth century, during which time church and state worked closely together to make all subjects in a given territory "Christian". Vestiges of Christendom still shape European society today.

AT 09: Through the Eye of a Needle: Faith and Discipleship

by Chris Marshall
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 9, June 1995

The “discipling” of new believers, leading them into a deeper personal relationship with Christ, has long been a practice within the Christian church. But the perception that discipleship is something that touches relationships, reconciliation, ethics and justice has not been so obvious. Christians often have tended to view discipleship more as an individual, spiritual affair - a matter of personal piety rather than corporate lifestyle or social commitment.

Discipleship central to the gospel narratives

Some form of the word "disciple" occurs hundreds of times in the gospel narratives. Alongside their intention to introduce Jesus and to clarify his significance, all the gospel writers were deeply concerned to communicate the meaning and implications of discipleship.

Jesus called all people to repentance and faith in light of the dawning of God's kingdom (Mark 1:14-15). He sought positive response to his message and a personal allegiance to himself as bearer of that message from all his hearers. But within this general summons, Jesus called certain individuals to a more exacting commitment of discipleship that involved leaving family and home to follow Jesus physically on his journeys around the countryside proclaiming the kingdom.

This means that Jesus had two main kinds of supporters: local sympathisers, who embraced his message but did not join him on his itinerant ministry, and disciples or followers, who accompanied him on his travels and who were personally authorised to minister on his behalf. The mutual sharing and fellowship of this group of men and women compensated for the loss they suffered as ones who left all to follow Jesus (Mark 10:28-30).

The inner circle of this group comprised twelve disciples or apostles specially appointed by Jesus in Mark 3:13-14. "The Twelve" were distinguished from the wider body by a combination of greater personal intimacy with Jesus ("to be with him") and a special commissioning ("to be sent out") to preach, exorcise and heal as Jesus' authorised representatives. They also had a symbolic role, constituting a backward reference to Old Testament Israel and a forward reference to the new messianic community. Despite their special role, however, the Twelve possessed no special dignity or authority within the larger body of disciples. Whenever they tried to arrogate such to themselves, conflict developed and Jesus gave corrective teaching (see, for example, Mark 9:33-41; 10:35-45).

Discipleship, then, is only one form of positive response to Jesus described in the gospels. Not all who repented and believed became disciples; most did not. Yet the gospel writers concentrate most attention on the experience of the disciples because the disciples provide the clearest illustration of what it means to encounter the kingdom of God. They exemplify most powerfully how a commitment to the way of Jesus touches relationships, reconciliation, ethics and justice.

Jesus' initiative in calling disciples

Discipleship always began with Jesus taking the initiative, calling those whom he wanted and laying down the conditions he required them to meet. Jesus delighted in choosing individuals who, by contemporary standards, were least qualified for the job. He chose fishermen, not learned experts in religious affairs. He chose small-town Galileans, not sophisticated urbanites from Jerusalem. He called tax-collectors, individuals regarded as "unclean" outcasts in Jewish society because of their collaboration with Rome in exploiting God's people. At the same time he chose violent, dangerous Zealots, fanatical nationalists who would as soon assassinate Romans (and tax-collectors!) as handle their coinage.

Greek philosophers and Jewish rabbis also had disciples. But in their case a disciple would approach the master and ask to join his school, and would typically be an able, studious individual, well equipped for higher learning. Not so with Jesus. He nominated his own disciples and paid little regard to the "natural equipment". Why? Because Christian discipleship is pre-eminently a gift, an unearned privilege, a relationship conferred by grace. The ability to succeed in discipleship is received, not achieved. "Apart from me", Jesus tells his disciples in John I5:5, "you can do nothing."

Yet Jesus did not dragoon people into the cause of the kingdom. His call, though authoritative, was not irresistible. It could be refused (cf. Mark 10:17-22) - and for good reason! Accepting Jesus' call involved some very difficult choices. It meant accepting the conditions of discipleship he laid down, and those conditions were not easy.

In Mark 1:15 Jesus demands a twofold response to his proclamation of the kingdom of God: repentance and faith. The fishermen respond to Jesus' call to discipleship in a twofold way: they leave all and follow Jesus. Becoming a disciple involved a fundamental act of repentance, expressed in their "leaving", and a radical commitment of faith, expressed in their "following".

In the biblical tradition, metanoia or "repentance" is not simply a change of mind or opinion, as it was in secular Greek. Nor is it primarily a feeling of remorse or sorrow for wrongdoing, as in popular usage today. Biblical repentance entails the redirection of one's entire manner of life. The term requires a turning away from an existing way of life, with all its values, ambitions, priorities and allegiances, and turning towards a new way of life, with a new set of values, ambitions, priorities and allegiances.

A decisive break with the social order

For the four fishermen in Mark 1:16-20, conversion to discipleship required them to make a decisive break with the existing social order in three main areas. First, they abandoned their possessions and means of livelihood: they left their boats and nets. Discipleship had economic implications. Second, they relinquished their positions of authority and control; they left behind their hired servants. Discipleship had implications for existing patterns of social status and power. Third, and most demanding of all, these fishermen detached themselves from family ties and traditions, the primary source of identity and stability for first-century Palestinians. Discipleship had costly ramifications for family life and kinship responsibilities.

Why did Jesus require such a radical conversion of his followers, such an emphatic break with life as usual? One common explanation is that Jesus expected the end of the world to be imminent. Time was short; extreme measures where needed for extreme times. As it turned out, however, Jesus was wrong about the closeness of the End and, by implication, the ethical radicalism he demanded of his followers can no longer be sustained today. According to this perspective, the response of the fishermen cannot be regarded as a viable pattern for Christian disciples today - which is most convenient!

Indeed, Jesus' mission was characterised by a sense of eschatological urgency, which in part accounts for the rigorous nature of discipleship as depicted in the gospels. But it was not so much the temporal imminence as the totalitarian character of the impinging kingdom that explains Jesus' radicalism. I suggest that Jesus placed such severe demands upon his followers because he wanted his company of travelling disciples to serve as a symbolic demonstration that God's kingdom lays claim to the whole of one's life and requires the radical transformation of everything one is and does.

Jesus' disciples had to make a categorical break with life as usual because life in God's kingdom, now breaking into the present, required a fundamental recalibration of their social, political and economic values and commitments. That is why, later in Mark's gospel, Jesus gives ethical teaching that corresponds directly to, and redefines the values of, the three spheres of existence left behind by the fishermen in order to follow Jesus:

• They had to make a break with their possessions and livelihood because within the new order of God's kingdom, a wholly new attitude toward wealth prevails: "Now hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!" (Mark 10:23).

• They needed to leave behind their hired servants because within the kingdom community there is to be a new attitude to social power, prestige and authority: ". . . whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all" (Mark 10:43, 44).

• The break with family was necessary to show that in the messianic community an entirely new concept and experience of family comes into being: "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother" (Mark 3:35).

In short, those entering discipleship had to leave behind the world as they knew it in order to enter a new world, with a disturbingly new vision of life. The discipleship community was to be a living, breathing demonstration that God was making a new way of life possible. It was to serve as a visible incarnation of God's kingdom on earth, a colony of the new age planted in the midst of the old.

Discipleship had to be radical. Otherwise where would have been a yawning credibility gap at the heart of Jesus' message. How could Jesus have gone about announcing the in-breaking of God's cosmic reign on earth - the climactic fulfilment of all human history - while allowing his followers to go about their normal lives as though nothing had changed?

And yet, Jesus did not expect the same expression of commitment from everyone who embraced his message. Localised sympathisers did not leave their jobs, home and families; they remained a functioning part of the existing social order. Nevertheless, the transforming agenda of the kingdom, most starkly visible in the company of disciples, was also apparent in the lives of local supporters. They too began to redistribute their wealth (Luke 12:13-21; 19:1-10); they used their homes and possessions to serve the goals of the kingdom (Mark 11:1-17; 12:41-44; 14:3-9; Luke 8:1-3; 14:12-14; 22:7-13); they cared for the poor and the sick, the prisoners and the oppressed (Mark 9:38-41; Matthew 25:31-46; Luke 10:25-37).

The almost suicidal renunciation of all means of human security placed the fishermen in a situation of radical dependency, even powerlessness. In order to follow Jesus they had divested themselves of all that gave them control or power over their own and others' lives. It was an unwillingness to live at such extreme risk and vulnerability that disqualified the rich man, despite his obvious piety, from following Jesus (Mark 10:17-22).

Conversion to a risky, dependent faith

Where does this all leave us today? From the perspective of the gospel narratives, "radical discipleship" is a tautology. There is no discipleship other than radical discipleship. It is radical because it requires a thorough-going conversion of one's personal, social and political values and commitments. It requires a risky, dependent faith that looks wholly and solely to Jesus for identity, provision and protection. The most strenuous commands of Jesus, such as those requiring redistribution of wealth or a nonviolent response to aggression, presuppose such conversion and faith.

It is true that the economic dispossession and itinerant lifestyle of those first disciples was a response specific to, and appropriate for, the unique circumstances of Jesus' historical ministry. Subsequent generations of believers are not required to imitate in detail the economic divestment and subordination of family ties required of the earliest disciples. (There is little evidence of such imitation by Christians in other New Testament documents though see 1 Cor. 13:3). Their lifestyle was not a blueprint to be replicated but a model to learn from. As the foundation of the messianic community, they are a paradigm for all Christians, not in the sense that we copy them in specifics but that, like them, we allow the reality of God's kingdom to challenge and transform every dimension of our lives so that we also become living proof that God has made a new corporate way of life possible.

The above essay is a shortened version of an article by the same title that appeared in Faith and Freedom (December 1994: 8-12). Used by permission.

Chris Marshall is Head of the Department of New Testament Studies at the Bible College of New Zealand in Auckland He is author of Faith as a Theme in Mark's Narrative (Cambridge University Press, 1989) and Kingdom Come: The Kingdom of God in the Teaching of Jesus (Auckland: Impetus Publications. 1993)

AT 10: For Such a Time as This: Beyond revival to transformation

by Noel Moules
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 10, October 1995

What a wonderful time to be a Christian! What a privilege to be standing at this kairos moment! What a challenge to be able to explore fresh ways of expressing what it means to be disciples of Jesus!

Does all this excite you? Or do you feel tired, jaded, frustrated, disorientated and angry about faith in general and church in particular? I meet many Christians today who do. We stand at the threshold of the third millennium, within an arid secular culture. While spiritual hunger is driving some people to pursue a genuine spiritual quest, the vision of the majority in our culture is determined by video and their values by virtual reality. Our culture is all too eager to write us off as just another "evangelical cult". Around the world the church is growing faster than at any time in history, but in Great Britain we don't see much of the action! Unfulfilled promises about the spiritual impact of the church on society, made by preachers in recent decades, have left many Christians here deeply disenchanted. There has developed a popular Christian appetite for happening in preference to being. People are looking for the "next thing" - whatever that may be - rather than rejoicing in the freedom of rugged discipleship.

Our challenge is to discover what it means to be an Anabaptist Christian today. We embark on this quest because, whatever our feelings and circumstances, Jesus is the one that inspires us. He is the "dawn" (Luke 1:78) and the "morning star" (Revelation 22:16); only he has the words of eternal life (John 6:68). We are also inspired by the lives and insights of our sisters and brothers, the Anabaptists. In the turbulent days of the sixteenth century, with society and church set against them, they demonstrated the creative power of following Jesus with the anointing of the Spirit. They left an indelible mark upon their own generation and those that followed. The challenge is for us to do the same.

I have never liked the use of the popular Christian phrases such as "revival", "renewal", "recovery" or "restoration". These simply are not biblical or New Covenant terms in the way most Christians use them. They each carry an inherent sense of a response to failure, and are backward-looking. The language of the New Testament looks forward and speaks about "eternal life", "outpouring", "fruitfulness", and "transfiguration". In Jesus' day there were many renewal movements, but his work was different. I believe that Anabaptism has to do with the demonstration of truth rather than renewal. I want to stand tall, girded in truth, in the "waters of the river of life" (Revelation 22:1) and expect them to get deeper Ezekiel 47:1-5).

Radical rootedness

I have always been gripped by the words "roots", "rootedness" and "radical" (from the Latin word for roots, radix). Here is a biblical principle that is key for the way ahead. The roots that we are to explore together can be nothing less than the roots of the Tree of Life. Roots are the life of the tree, drawing nourishment into the trunk and the branches; they provide strength and security to the whole. They are the hidden inner structure whose existence is revealed and demonstrated in the branches and the fruit. Those who feed upon the Tree of Life become like it in character, for "the seed is in the fruit" (Genesis 1:12). This is beautifully expressed by Jeremiah (17:7-8):

Blessed are those who trust in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. They shall be like a tree planted by the water, sending out its shoots by the stream. It shall not fear when the heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green; in the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit.

What then are the roots to the Tree of Life which are to characterise our lives both as individuals and communities of faith? Below are what I see as central and essential for those who are looking for Anabaptist discipleship distinctives:

1. Jesus

The word "root" is one of many titles given to Jesus in the New Testament (Revelation 5:5; 22:16). To be Christian is to be Christocentric - not only in name, but also in practice. We live in a "Christian" culture which gives lip-service to the centrality of Jesus. But in reality he has been reduced to a theological factor with specific reference to the atonement: that he died for our sins. Too few Christians believe that the incarnation is a pattern for discipleship, that Jesus showed us how to live. The example of Jesus' life is dismissed on the grounds that he was God, and so irrelevant because his way of living is unattainable. A primary task in bringing an Anabaptist perspective to our churches is to see people becoming disciples of Jesus in practical lifestyle terms, being obedient to his words and modelling their behaviour on his actions. This is the foundational element, in which and from which all other Anabaptist principles find their source. The task of bringing people to this point of understanding may appear straightforward, but it meets a great deal of resistance. Discipleship to Jesus begins by each of us individually making the commitment to "follow in his steps" (1 Peter 2:21).

2. Spirit

The Spirit is the sap that flows through the whole root system of the Tree of Life. The Spirit is inseparably linked with Jesus' call to a practical discipleship, and is that which makes such a response actually possible. Because evangelical charismatic Christianity has not been Christocentric, it has emphasised experience rather than discipleship. This has led to the pursuit of the latest phenomenon rather than the power of a consistently godly lifestyle. Biblical themes of spirituality and sanctification are too often neglected in the regular teaching of the church; holiness is usually reduced to legalism. The possibility of substantial sanctification is largely dismissed, with the resulting expectation that Christians will inevitably sin. But the New Testament appears to put no limits upon the possible work of the Spirit in the life of the believer. The person of the Spirit is a constant reminder to us that in our exploration of radical discipleship "the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power" (1 Corinthians 4:20). The presence and anointing of the Spirit must be tangibly demonstrated in the actions of our lives.

3. Shalom

Here is the all-embracing vision, a declaration of cosmic wholeness, integration and peace. Shalom (the Hebrew word for all-encompassing peace) sets the scene for our understanding of God's eternal purpose for all things, a time when everything fits and moves together in perfect creative harmony in the power of the Spirit. Cosmic wholeness in the new heaven and earth is the only restoration the New Testament understands. This vision and reality is so clear that radical disciples of Jesus must by definition be "shalom activists", working for peace. God's peace is not on our agenda, it is our agenda. The gospel is nothing less than the proclamation of peace to the whole creation (cf. Mark 16:15; Ephesians 2:17). The shalom mandate touches everything from personal integrity to global ecology and eschatology. At every point it works to put right broken or unjust relationships.

Shalom focuses on Jesus' call to nonviolence, nonretaliation and strong gentleness. Peaceableness is at the very heart of the gospel, but rarely on the agenda of the local church. Even people committed to a peace agenda often tend to think of it primarily in terms of war in the international sphere. But we live in a society in which there is violence at every level, expressed in a multitude of ways. It is this localised violence that the community of shalom must also creatively tackle.

4. Justice

Inseparably linked with shalom is the issue of justice, or putting things right. The pulsating heart and motivation of justice is found in righteousness, love, mercy and compassion. Justice stands against evil and corruption with invincible tenacity while nurturing the vulnerable and the damaged with deep tenderness.

Both local and global, justice-seeking must be the work of every disciple of Jesus. Right economics are at the heart of true holiness. Two-thirds world debt and the unfair distribution of resources must be our concern, as must be the plight of street children in the cities around the world as well as the homeless across Britain today. Justice is concerned with prisoners of conscience, with prison reform (and perhaps abolition!) and the overthrow of the death penalty. Justice means peacemaking at the heart of violence and mediation that makes enemies friends.

Religious toleration was an important theme to the original Anabaptists, and I believe it is a justice issue today. We have the privilege to live in a multi-faith yet secular society, and both facts are a source of anxiety to many Christians. Some view Islam as the new enemy and Hinduism as an alien pollutant. As witnesses to justice and truth, we must make sure that those of other faiths have freedom of worship and freedom from prejudice. True justice is a light that will enlighten through the power of the Spirit. We don't compromise on our beliefs, but are secure amid other faiths.

5. Truth

We live in a church culture that stresses creed rather than character. Biblically, the essential question is not, "what is truth?" but "who is truth?" The answer, of course, is God revealed in Jesus. It is essential to express what we believe in words. Yet to embrace truth is to become Christlike in character, not simply to give verbal assent to a doctrinal statement. So often truth is seen as a set of intellectual propositions rather than a life-changing encounter with the risen Jesus through the power of the Spirit.

"What is the gospel?" is one of the most important questions to ask in these days of church growth and church planting. The gospel is not simply a call to spiritual transaction, but to a total conversion and radical discipleship. The question of Christian initiation is one of the biggest challenges to church today; it involves the message preached and the response made. What is essential is to bring together preaching the gospel, embracing baptism and receiving the Spirit as a single focus. Does our proclamation of the gospel as a call to discipleship see people make a complete break with the past? Do believers embrace new values, and have a dramatic encounter with the risen Jesus through the power of the Spirit?

"How do we interpret scripture?" is the question that lies behind almost every difference between Christians. The early Anabaptists had a Christocentric approach, and recognised both unity and discontinuity between the Testaments. Anabaptists wanted the community to interpret Scripture together, and tested the quality of interpretation by the quality of life it produced. All this will help us capture the heart of Bible interpretation - along with the more technical tools of modern scholarship.

6. Freedom

"You will know the truth and the truth will set you free" (John 8:32). Freedom is something few Christians really cope with, even though it is the hallmark of truth. The emphasis of many churches is almost exclusively on freedom from (sin, death, fear, guilt); but Jesus also promises freedom to. Most Christian teaching on freedom is cloaked legalism, whereas Jesus calls us to messianic anarchy. To follow Jesus is an invitation to explore and experiment with a freedom that is characterised by truth and shaped by discipline. This is the wonderful, dangerous freedom characterised by self-control, strong gentleness, sensitive love and deep joy.

The heart of freedom is grace, the extravagant goodness of God. It is an environment of knowing God's forgiveness and being wrapped in his love. It is the place for dealing with guilt, disillusion, anger, doubt and hurt. It is an ethos that encourages questioning and doubt as a means of working though to mature faith and security. We must all work energetically to see this liberating grace become the air that the church breathes and the ethos it expresses.

7. Wisdom

This is the ability to apply truth practically to everyday life in a way that harmonises with the kingdom of God. It is the self-expression of mature godly freedom. In a culture that is saturated with information, there is a crying need for wisdom. In a church that has both knowledge and experience, but scant ability at application, wisdom is the missing but essential ingredient. Biblically, wisdom is something you seek (Ecclesiastes 1:13), and you "become" wise. It is a gift of the Spirit, and like shalom it is something that radical disciples pursue. Wisdom reminds us that church is to be a learning environment. It is the place where we bring our questions and experiences and share them together.

Wisdom is the quality expected of a leader, reflecting experience and maturity. Instead of wisdom, today there is a great deal of insecurity in the church. This often expresses itself in narrow thinking, top-down autocratic styles, and a fear of opening the congregation up to new ways of thinking. The lack of wisdom is evident in the failure to have a true cultural and historical perspective on the spiritual phenomena currently being seen.

8. Community

Somebody observed that "Jesus came preaching the kingdom of God and what appeared was the church". Yet the church is the God-ordained means for God's people to operate in the world. For those who are struggling with hurts and anger towards the church, this may be galling. For those who are isolated or hanging on to local church by their fingertips, this will be frustrating. The fact that most of us who want to see an Anabaptist vision grip the church are thinly scattered around the country makes the difficult task of community-building even harder. Yet church community is the environment in which roots of the Tree of Life are to be planted and fruits of the Tree are to be seen.

Local church is vital, but networking among churches is essential and an important point of nurture for both the individual and the whole church. Local church is an important starting point for those who are isolated or hurting. We need each other if we are to sharpen our faith and mature, if we are to find support as we experiment with truth. We need each other for encouragement, protection and the opportunity for celebration. We need individuals and groups to infiltrate existing local churches with radical discipleship and Anabaptist ideas; the call is to be subversive! It takes time and patience, but it can begin to happen. Truth always works on a bottom-up rather than top-down principle - as in yeast, mustard seed or dew.

We should not underestimate the power of the model. Until people see Anabaptist vision and values incarnated in local communities of faith the values will not be widely embraced; others need to be able to "see what we mean". So the planting of peace churches is vital; make it top priority! There is no one single pattern for church in the New Testament. Rather, there are principles that can express themselves in many different ways. There is a real opportunity and vital need for people to experiment with truth. We must excite children with faith and radical discipleship; they are a central part of the body today and the voices of tomorrow. We have failed children in church and we must put it right. We must inspire them and learn from them.

For such a time as this

For Christians in Britain today it is unlikely that the doors of our homes will burst open with armed officers coming to arrest us. Is someone going to drag you in front of the local magistrate before whom you can give an eloquent defence of your faith? There is little chance that you will spend the night in prison at the hands of the torturer, or that in the morning you will have your tongue torn out and be dragged to the stake and burned as a witness for Jesus. Nevertheless, a challenge of equal importance awaits us all in bringing the joyful message of radical discipleship to our country. It is important to reflect on what we would have done in the sixteenth century, but much more important to decide what we will do today!

The call is to feed on the Tree of Life with our roots soaking up the Water of Life. Then, as Jeremiah told us, our leaves will stay green, we will not be anxious in the drought, and we will not cease to bear fruit. However lonely, hurt or disillusioned you may feel, stand tall and follow Jesus in the power of the Spirit. Walk as a free, joyful, holy person through the church and the world, exuding the aroma of life. As Mordecai said to Esther, "Who knows? Perhaps you have come to [the kingdom] for just such a time as this!" Esther 4:14)

Noel Moules is the founder and director of Workshop, a nationwide teaching programme in Christian discipleship and leadership which more than two thousand students from all major denominations have completed. This article is adapted from his presentation at the Anabaptist Network conference in Leeds in September, 1995.

AT 10: Recovering Anabaptist Spirituality: Training the reflexes

by Alan Kreider
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 10, October 1995

Daniel Liechty, ed., Early Anabaptist Spirituality: Selected Writings. New York, Paulist Press, 1994. 304 pp. £14.99

Marlene Kropf and Eddy Hall, Praying with the Anabaptists: The Secret of Bearing Fruit. Newton, Kansas, Faith and Life Press, 1994. 176 pp. £8.75; with cassette, £15.50

As depicted in a famous engraving, the image is unforgettable: the Anabaptist Dirk Willems, safely across the frozen river, spontaneously doing the dangerous thing. He turns around and pulls to safety the dripping thief-catcher—who had fallen through thin ice—even though this led to Dirk being arrested and burned for heresy. What Dirk did was not a carefully considered action; it was reflexive, an expression of his character.¹ God had so worked in his life that loving the enemy was not something he decided to do; it was rather an expression of who he was. But what was it that shaped Dirk's character? What was the spirituality of Dirk and the other early Anabaptists?

For centuries people in the Anabaptist tradition didn't talk about "spirituality" -a word that would have seemed too Catholic. Prayer was something that was central to their lives, but to talk in detail about it seemed akin to "praying on the street corners" (Matthew 6:5), and hence, proud. In recent decades relatively few Anabaptist scholars have paid attention to the spirituality of their ancestors - partly because of the early Anabaptists' reticence and partly because of their own preoccupation with ethics and polity. In light of this neglect from within, it is not surprising that writers from other traditions have treated Reformation spirituality as if the Anabaptists made no distinctive contribution to it.²

Two recent books, however, agree in finding a lively and distinctive spirituality in the Anabaptist tradition. Other researchers also are at work, whose writings will further illuminate prayer in the Anabaptist tradition. Thus we may grow in our capacity to understand and learn from the inner life and spiritual disciplines that animated Dirk Willems and the other martyrs.

Leichty: a new translation of select writings

Daniel Liechty's volume, Early Anabaptist Spirituality: Selected Writings (in The Classics of Western Spirituality series), is the more conventional of the two. It consists of a selection of thirteen writings by nine Anabaptists, all newly translated by the editor. The texts are fascinating, opening up to the reader the varieties of early Anabaptist reflection on the Christian life. Liechty's rendering makes them readily comprehensible. A number of them—especially the writings of Hans Denck and Peter Walpot—make a strong impression and would be suitable for group discussion.

But these writings still do not help us greatly in our search for the spirituality that animated Dirk Willems. Another Dirk, Dutch Anabaptist leader Dirk Philips, reminds us of the problem. In 1556 he wrote: "Jesus Christ, the only son of God ... is the example to all Christians, ordained by the Father that we might be conformed to him. For godly character, which is to be our pattern, is perfectly reflected and shown in him. Therefore, all those who claim to know the new birth should have the character and nature of Christ and hold firmly to his character from beginning to end"³

Dirk Willems might well have pondered this passage. Yet Dirk Philips doesn't tell his readers how to pray, or how to go about achieving the inner transformation necessary to live reflexively like Jesus. Nor do the other writers in Dan Liechty's volume.

To be sure, clear theological themes emerge from Liechty's Anabaptists. As he summarizes their themes (pp. 9-14), three stand out. First was a classical theme in spirituality: the believer's personal relationship to Christ. To this the Anabaptists added the distinctive assertion that this relationship was immediate and no priest was necessary to enable it. Second was a central Anabaptist concern: the believer's life of discipleship. The Anabaptists believed that Christ was unknowable unless one followed him in practical and costly ways, even at the cost of persecution. Finally, there was a distinctive emphasis upon community. The Anabaptists claimed to know Christ through their life together with other members of his body.

But how did the Anabaptists go about realising these themes? How did they pray, individually or together? The writings in Liechty's collection tell us little about this. This is in part because they are theological writings, not writings about spirituality in the classical sense. It also is perhaps because Liechty has limited himself to writings by "recognized leaders" among the Anabaptists, instead of drawing upon the less cultured sources which reveal more of the inner life of the empowered "rank and file" which made the Anabaptists such a distinctive movement.⁴ If Liechty had drawn upon Anabaptist letters and court records - not least those recorded in the remarkable source so underused by historians, the massive Martyrs' Mirror- we would know more about how the Anabaptists prayed. How useful it would have been, for example, if Liechty had included accounts such as that of the weaver Joriaen Simons and his fellow prisoners in 1557 in the Haarlem Jail: "Our sister Mariken ... is of such courage and good cheer, that she delights and rejoices us all. We exhort each other with the Word of the Lord, as much as God gives each to speak, now by words, now by hymns; yea, I have many hours in which I never once think of it that I am a prisoner; such is the joy which the Lord gives us.”⁵

Liechty could also have devoted more attention to two categories of Anabaptist texts which give particular expression to their spirituality: prayers and hymns. Liechty includes two prayers by Hans Schlaffer; but other prayers are scattered throughout Anabaptist writings which can yield fascinating insights.⁶ As to hymns, the Anabaptists were reflexive singers, and Liechty acknowledges this by providing the text of six hymns, including two by people (one by Annelein of Freiburg, and one by seven anonymous prisoners in Gmund) who were hardly leaders. Through these hymns, multiplied many times, the Anabaptists internalised their faith and experience. These were vehicles of worship; these were means of telling the martyrs' stories; these were prophetic expressions of resistance. In 1552 the glazier Adriaen Corneliss was thrown into solitary confinement, "whereupon," he reported, "I immediately began to sing the hymn" based on Isaiah 59:14: "Justice is turned back, and ... truth stumbles in the public square."⁷ Far more than the writings of the theologians, the Anabaptist hymns put us into connection with Anabaptist spirituality and help us understand what shaped the Anabaptists' reflexes.

Kropf and Hall: Anabaptist spirituality for today

The second volume, Praying with the Anabaptists, is an attempt to shape an Anabaptist spirituality in our own time.⁸ The book grew out of a retreat on the part of a number of North American Mennonites, who agreed on the book's main themes and then commissioned two participants - Marlene Kropf and Eddy Hall - to do the writing.

The book's format is simple. Each of its fifteen chapters begins with a meditation upon verses from John 13 - 17 and proceeds with brief quotations from a sixteenth-century Anabaptist writer. Next in each chapter comes the heart of the book, and the part which could shape our character and reflexes: the "Guided Prayer Exercises" which enable the reader to pray on the theme of the chapter. Each chapter ends with a prayer of an Anabaptist martyr in the context of his or her story. The book is divided into three large sections: "Abiding in the Vine", "Joined in Love," and "Bearing Fruit". These develop a threefold Anabaptist "rule of life" -"a vital, personal relationship to Jesus Christ", "a wholehearted, loving commitment to life in Christian community", and "joyfully following Christ's way in the world through a holy life of witness, service and peacemaking - even through suffering" .⁹ This threefold balance of emphases corresponds neatly to that of Liechty.

Kropf and Hail are not Anabaptist historians, so they rely in part upon edited selections of early writings. But the source in which they find thirteen of their fifteen Anabaptist prayers is the Martyrs' Mirror. At times they quote these prayers precisely; at other times they find implied prayers, editing the texts to write prayers that are usable today. Some edited prayers may bend the original intent of the text, but in general I find them to be a valid way of appropriating Anabaptist words in prayer today. For example, Maeyken Boosers, burnt in 1564:

Martyrs' Mirror: "My heart constantly longs to be fit in His sight, that I might finish to His praise that which He has commenced in me."

As altered by Kropf and Hall: "O Lord, my heart constantly longs to be fit in your sight that I might finish to your praise that which you have commenced in me. Amen."¹⁰

The heart of Kropf and Hall's book is its "Guided Prayer Exercises". Whether or not one finds the book helpful will depend on how one responds to these. Each exercise begins with the invitation to listen to a hymn or song on the accompanying cassette tape; the cassette is optional, at an extra cost, and reflects the importance which North American Mennonites have placed upon congregational singing as a means of praising God and experiencing his presence (the choral singing, to my ears, is pleasing, but I found myself just using the book). Then, after a Preparatory Prayer asking God's Spirit to grant a particular grace, the exercise leads the reader into a variety of forms of prayer. There are imaginative meditations, meditations on scripture, prayers of stillness and centering, listening prayers, and prayers of intercession and confession. These prayers can often lead to action. For example, a community-building prayer:

Remember the gifts of love you have received through the body of Christ. Give thanks for these gifts. Ask the Spirit to bring to mind those failures of love in which you or your congregation have taken part. Confess your sin and the sin of your people. Ask God to forgive you. As in Isaiah's vision, imagine God's cleansing as a live coal that touches your lips and body as well as your congregation. Receive the words of grace, "your sin is blotted out" (Isaiah 6.7). In silence, wait before God. Is God asking you to take some healing or reconciling action? How are you called to respond?¹¹

It is fascinating to see how Kropf and Hall, not having an extensive literature of Anabaptist prayer techniques to draw upon, have borrowed freely from the strengths of others. The prayer for discernment, which could be especially useful in congregational business meetings, seems indebted to Quaker insights and practices. Elsewhere the debts seem to be largely to Catholic, especially Ignatian, spirituality. Kropf and Hall (p. 98) talk about these prayers as "spiritual exercises". Praying with the Anabaptists thus mediates insight in two directions: prayer techniques from Catholics to Anabaptists and Evangelicals; and a wholistic "three-fold" theology from the Anabaptists to Catholics and other Christians. I find this to be encouraging, a sign of God's providence. Certainly these exercises will help contemporary Christians - some of whom are having great difficulty praying at all - to pray in new ways. Over several weeks I have used these exercises, and they - like much Ignatian spirituality - have been helpful to me.

Charismatic nature and social setting of early Anabaptism

There are two themes in early Anabaptist spirituality which do not find an adequate voice in either of our books. The first of these is the charismatic nature of some early Anabaptist piety, which Liechty does not mention and which Kropf and Hall do not develop.^l2 It is not that, in general, the Anabaptists spoke in tongues; while some of them may have done, tongues do not seem to have been apart of the prayer repertoire of most Anabaptist communities.¹³ But there was, nevertheless, an openness to the Holy Spirit and to enthusiastic phenomena which would be familiar to many contemporary charismatic Christians.1¹⁴ It certainly was no staid congregation that could utter, "Praise God with shouting"¹⁵ - or that could speak fresh words as if from Jesus: "If I the Lord and Master am poor, it is evident that my servants are poor, and that my disciples do not seek or desire riches."¹⁶ It is important for modern students of Anabaptism not to filter out of the historical record the undomesticable spirituality of the early years. In terms of the renewal of the church and its witness today, it also will be immensely helpful when contemporary Anabaptists appropriate charismatic as well contemplative spiritual riches.

The other theme that receives less attention than it merits is spirituality's social setting. In the Liechty volume, it is the Hutterian Peter Walpot who mentions this in his doughty insistence that wealth has spiritual consequences: not only does it fetter discipleship, it locks and "occupies" the heart.¹⁷ Kropf and Hall mention the theme at least by implication; they provide a guided prayer inviting us to consider whether possessions are impeding us from responding when God calls us to serve.¹⁸ But many sixteenth-century Anabaptists were keenly aware that prison and suffering changed the way that they perceived reality and therefore the way they prayed. "O dear brothers and sisters," Joost Verkindert wrote in 1570, "we now look through quite different eyes ... than when we were out of bonds; for out of bonds I could never pray to God as I now sometimes do."¹⁹ I wonder: can well-fed, well-adjusted Western Christians really pray with the Anabaptists?

We can, I believe. But it will take more than searching for themes of spirituality in Anabaptist theological texts. If we, with Kropf and Hall, ask Jesus for the grace of prayer - "Lord, teach us to pray"; if we go on to develop forms of prayer that are liberating and antennae that listen to God not only in churches and retreat centres but also in the world; if we then venture out into areas of risk, oppression and suffering - then we may experience that growth in fellowship with Christ and his disciples which will transform the way we live, our character and our reflexes. Then we may also discover that Dirk Willems will become more than an Anabaptist icon; he will become an elder brother whom we, by God's grace, are coming to understand.

Alan Kreider is director of the Centre for the Study of Christianity and Culture at Regent's Park College in Oxford. He and his wife Eleanor coordinate study groups in the Anabaptist Network and frequently speak at churches and other settings in the UK and Ireland.

Notes

1. For recent discussion of Dirk Willems' response, see Joseph Liechty, "Why Did Dirk Willems Turn Back'?" Anabaptism Today 6 (1994: 7-12).

2. Alister McGrath, for example, in Roots that Refresh: A Celebration of Refornration Spirituality (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1991}, does not mention Anabaptist spirituality.

3. Dirk Phillips, "Concerning the New Birth and the New Creature," in Liechty, 216.

4. Hans Hillerbrand makes this point in his "Preface" to Liechty, xviii.

5. Thieleman I. van Braght, The Bloody Theater of Martyrs Mirror of the Defenseless Christians (henceforth MM; 1660/1685; this ed. Scottdale: Herald Press, 1951), 566.

6. E.g., Menno Simons, Complete Works (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1956), 955-58; also the prayers in Martyrs' Mirror cited by Kropf and Hall (MM, 427, 429, 430, 431-32, 434-35, 464, 467-68, 517, 667, 800, 826, 979). There are many more that they could have chosen.

7. MM, 531.

8. A review of this book already appeared in this journal. Anabaptism Today 8 (1995:22).

9. Kropf and Hall, 10-11.

10. MM, 667; Kropf and Hall, 65.

11. Kropf and Hall, 82-83.

12. See Stuart Murray, "Anabaptism as a Charismatic Movement". Anabaptism Today 8 (1995:7-11).

13. MM, 516, 790.

14. Claus-Peter Clasen, Anabaptism, A Social History, 1526-I618 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1972), 121-22.

15. MM, 429

16. MM, 457

17. Liechty, 145.

18. Kropf and Hall, 129.

19 MM, 852, 761.

AT 11: Conflict and Church Decision Making: Be clear about process and let everyone be heard

by Nelson Kraybill
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 11, February 1996

If you have been part of congregational decision making that left people feeling angry or alienated, you know how painful that can be. Good process and careful listening may not remove the hurt of dealing with conflict in groups, but they increase the likelihood of a satisfactory outcome. My first article (October 1995) dealt largely with conflict between individuals; the following article draws from biblical sources and mediation theory to suggest ways conflict and decision making in groups can be most productive.

Acts 15 tells how early Christians faced a volatile dispute (whether Gentiles must be circumcised to be saved) and went through stages of group process that issued in a decision most participants were able to accept. Conflict in this case went through the following steps:

1. There was a big argument. "Certain individuals" differed with Paul and Barnabas on the question of circumcision, and "no small dissension and debate" arose ( Acts 15:1-2).

2. The church sought out a forum in which all parties could be heard. The local faith community took action, and appointed "Paul and Barnabas and some of the others to go up to Jerusalem to discuss this question with the apostles and the elders" (Acts 15:2).

3. People in conflict had opportunity to tell their stories. The delegation of disputants arrived at Jerusalem and "reported all that God had done with them" (Acts 15:4).

4. There was enough time to air convictions, feelings and perspectives. There was "much debate" (Acts 15:7).

5. Leaders, after careful listening, proposed a way forward that took into account concerns raised by both sides on this issue. "After they finished speaking, James replied, 'My brothers ... I have reached the decision that we should not trouble [with circumcision] those Gentiles who are turning to God ... but we should write to them to abstain only from things polluted by idols and from fornication ..." (Acts 15:13-21)

6. The proposed solution was ratified by consensus. With the "consent of the whole church" the leaders at Jerusalem sent a delegation to Antioch to convey the agreements reached (Acts 15:22,25).

7. The entire decision making process was handled with sensitivity to all participants, under Holy Spirit guidance. The end result "seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us" (Acts 15:28).

Actual events of Acts 15 might not have been as positive and pastorally sensitive as the interpretation above would suggest. Nevertheless, even by standards of modern conflict theory, the early Christians got it right when they brought conflict out into the open and gave all parties a good hearing. People in conflict want to be heard, and this especially is true when individuals believe they will be affected by decisions made by leaders or by the group.

Be clear about process

Perhaps no principle of group decision making is more foundational than the need for everyone involved to understand and accept the process by which the matter will be resolved. People are most likely to accept the outcome of group decision making if they agreed in the first place with how it would be decided. Congregations and denominations vary on process; some Christian groups make decisions "from the top down", with leaders setting a direction and others expecting to follow. Other groups work "from the bottom up", eliciting perspectives from all participants before moving toward a vote or consensus.

Circumstances of sixteenth-century history predisposed many early Anabaptists to adopt "from bottom up" leadership and decision making. Persecution and geography made it difficult for centralised, institutional leadership to mandate decisions "from the top". Congregations often had to come to their own conclusions on controversial matters, as believers gathered together around the scriptures. Church leaders today facing congregational or denominational disputes would be wise to spell out to themselves and others how the matters at hand will be resolved.

Leaders preparing a congregation for making a major decision making might, for example, propose something like this:

1) for one month we will elicit as many ideas (or nominations) as possible

2) during the second month a committee agreed to by the congregation will study the various ideas put forward and make a recommendation

3) during the third month we will decide the matter by an 80 per cent vote (or by consensus or lot or whatever the group agrees).

There are many variations possible on the above plan, and the length of the whole process should suit the scale and complexity of the issue. The important thing is to be specific about the process, and to be certain participants agree it is acceptable. Group decisions are strongest when participants also have opportunity to express their convictions and concerns. The notion that the Spirit of God moves through all believers is biblical (Acts 2:17-18), and Anabaptists understood this as one aspect of the priesthood of all believers.

Give everyone a fair hearing

The following are a few suggestions on ways to air differences in the process of decision making and increase the likelihood of real dialogue. These ideas assume there is a sensitive chairperson, respected by the group, who is determined to suspend judgement for a while and give all parties a fair hearing.

l. Provide more than one way for people to be heard. Typical church business meetings favour group members who are effective public speakers and who are secure enough to engage in public debate. If this is the only forum for response, certain personality types gain a disproportionate share of power. There are many alternatives: questionnaires, voting, small group discussions with reporting back to the larger gathering, one-to-one interviews, sermons or written presentations with opportunity for oral or written reply, and "straw polling" (an "unofficial" vote just to see where most people are).

2. Experiment with alternative group processes. There are many ways to get a group to interact on controversial issues without simply inviting persuasive speeches from the most articulate. Among these are:

a. The Human Rainbow (so named by my colleague Alastair McKay). If there is a difference of opinion on a matter to be decided, the chairperson can invite all participants physically to position themselves at some point between two extremes in the meeting room. Suppose, for example, there was a debate about whether or not the church should renovate their worship space. The chairperson might say: "Imagine there is a line down the centre of this room from one end to the other. In a minute I'm going to ask everybody to stand at some point on the line. Those who strongly favour renovation, please stand at the left end of the line; those who definitely are against renovation, please stand at the right end. If you are somewhere in between those extremes, position yourself accordingly. There is no "right" place on the line; this is simply a way to visualise our different views. Nobody stand, please, until everybody knows exactly where on the line they will be. When I give the signal, everyone will move quickly to take their position."

After everyone is in position, then the chairperson may give opportunity for people at various points on the Rainbow to say why they stand where they do. It is surprising how this exercise enables people to express themselves to a group. At minimum people can be "heard" simply taking a visible position on the line; often they are able to state a reason for why they stand where they do. On complex issues it may be useful to have participants stay in their positions for a few minutes, talking about what they observe about the group's convictions. The chairperson can also say "what do people at this end of the Rainbow need from your sisters and brothers at the opposite end?"

b. The Samoan Circle (reportedly used by villagers in Samoa). Suppose fifty people at the business meeting. are divided into two or more factions on the church renovation issue. Fifty chairs are placed in a circle (or concentric circles) with enough space in the centre for a smaller circle of, say, six chairs. The group agrees that all discussion (for a set period of time) will take place within that innermost circle of six chairs. It may be helpful, to start the process, for one or two individuals from each side of the debate to present their argument at the inner circle. Other volunteers fill chairs in the centre circle along with the presenters, and amongst themselves they begin to discuss and debate. Anyone else from the larger circle, at any time, can join the debate by moving to a chair in the inner circle. If all chairs are full, people from the larger circle may come and stand behind one of the chairs already occupied. Whoever is seated there is under obligation to move out within a short period of time, when they are finished speaking. This method of dealing with disagreement (or processing difficult decisions) works well if everybody respects the rules (no comments from the outer circle!). In situations of high tension, this structure has the effect of slowing down and moderating interaction. People in disagreement have to look their opponents in the eye and be close enough for actual dialogue, with the assembled congregation as witnesses. Angry people are less likely to make careless statements in that context. Congregations in conflict have used this structure over a period of several meetings for up to eight or ten hours. Much less time may be needed for relatively simple issues or conflicts.

Look for common areas of concern

People in church decision making often take a position and seek to defend it ("I absolutely do not want us to renovate the meeting space!"). Good group process should help people voice the underlying interests that led to their position. For example, a pro-renovation group might say "We want to renovate our meeting space because we believe it will make our church more attractive for visitors and increase our impact on the neighbourhood" The anti-renovation group might say, "We want to use the money that would go to the renovation to start a day care programme that will be a means of service in our neighbourhood." In that case both groups have a common interest: to make an impact on the neighbourhood. Underlying common interests may take time to identify, but usually the commonalties are there. Look for them, and help participants in the debate step back a bit from their positions to reflect on underlying interests.

Having identified the interests of both parties, the group then is ready to move toward possible solutions. Here brainstorming may be useful. A flip chart or chalkboard is essential, and the chairperson writes down all suggestions and ideas for a possible solution. The chairperson must emphasise that this is a time for any ideas, and that none will be evaluated until the brainstorming time is finished. The more ideas there are offered, the more people will think creatively. With many ideas available, the group then need to make choices. Seek solutions that take into consideration underlying interests of the various participants. Seek God's will by providing space for silence and prayer. When the group comes to a decision, write out the agreements clearly so there is no disagreement in the future about what was decided. Be prepared to revisit the decision again some time in the future; perhaps even incorporate a formal review after a trial period of, say, a year or two.

Nelson Kraybill is an elder at the Wood Green Mennonite Church in North London. He and Alastair McKay work with Bridge Builders, a mediation and conflict training programme for churches sponsored by the London Mennonite Centre. If you are interested in mediation or training for your congregation, contact Bridge Builders, 14 Shepherds Hill, Highgate, London N6 5AQ (Tel: 0845-4500 214). Or see the Bridge Builders website

AT 12: A Stubborn Misinterpretation: Jesus and the Whip

By Tim Foley
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 12, June 1996

Perhaps the most common objection to the claim that Jesus rejected violence is the story of Jesus cleansing the temple (Matt. 21:12-17 and parallels). The last time I heard a sermon from that passage I was treated to a drama which portrayed Jesus not only whipping people, but kicking and punching them as well. This makes for exciting preaching, but is it an accurate picture of what really happened in the temple? If it is, how does this fit in with the otherwise nonviolent picture of Jesus?

The temple-cleansing incident seems to persist in popular Christian folklore as an example of acceptable violence by Jesus. Bruce Milne comments that John 2 "has been frequently used as evidence of Jesus' support for the use of physical and military force to liberate the victims of oppressive political structures".¹ One example of this can be found in the book Unyoung, Uncoloured, Unpoor by Colin Morris. He supports S. G. F. Brandon's thesis that Jesus actually condoned the use of violence, but the early church whitewashed this in order to save their own skins. This thesis suffers from the old problem of assuming what it tries to prove² and has been discredited as an accurate picture of Jesus.³

Little comment from Anabaptists

It is surprising that Anabaptist sources scarcely refer to the temple demonstration (I consulted only English translations). Menno Simons, Dirk Philips, Pilgrim Marpeck, Balthasar Hubmaier and Conrad Grebel do not mention it, although there is a reference in The Chronicle of the Hutterian Brethren where it is used to support community: "Christ does not want any trading of goods in his house; he wants Christian community. This buying and selling is a sign by which one shall recognise the false church, discerning the evil that Christ drove out on two occasions with a good whip."⁴ Thomas Muntzer refers to the incident as an example of the "sternness of Christ" as he faces the roots of idolatry.⁵ However Muntzer used the story in a sermon which invited his hearers to help the godly destroy the wicked and establish the kingdom of God on earth. This interpretation would not have been supported by the majority of Anabaptists and was used at a time when his movement was passing into its violent phase.

Stuart Murray observes that Anabaptist hermeneutics were developed "in debate with opponents as well as within friendly meetings".⁶ It could well be that the Anabaptists rarely referred to the temple demonstration simply because the reformers such as Luther and Calvin did not use it to support violence. Luther wrote "this act of Christ cannot be cited as an example to be emulated", because he understood Jesus to be spanning the gap between Old and New covenants. To Luther, Jesus was here acting as a servant of the Old Testament, a "disciple of Moses" and therefore "in accordance with the Law of Moses he here resorts to force."⁷ It is interesting that Luther mentions the Anabaptists at this point, failing to distinguish them from Muntzer: "The devil bade the Anabaptists, Muntzer and the Pope have recourse to the sword, although Christ strictly forbade this to his apostles and preachers."⁸ In Calvin's commentary on the Gospel of John there is no explicit reference to the whip. Calvin thought that Jesus was purifying the temple "in order to bring back to its original purity the worship of God, which had been corrupted by the wickedness of men". According to Calvin, Jesus did this to awaken "sluggish and drowsy minds", to in some way take possession of the temple in order to give proof of his divine authority.

It may have been that the Anabaptists paid little attention to the temple demonstration simply because they did not understand it, but knew that it could not teach a discipleship of violence. Stuart Murray points out that the failure to acknowledge difficulties in Scripture seemed to be a feature of hermeneutics both for the Anabaptists and the Reformers,⁹ but perhaps the availability today of other sources can shed some light. A brilliant example of this is found in the writings of Richard Bauckham, who interprets the action of Jesus as a prophetic act of protest against economic exploitation in the temple courts.¹⁰ He argues convincingly that the priestly aristocracy were plundering the people of God, particularly the poor. In so doing they represented God not as a Father who provides, but as a King like any other who demands tax. Bauckham uses Matthew 17:24-27 (Jesus' conversation with Peter about the temple tax) as background for the temple-cleansing to show Jesus' opposition to the temple tax (which was presented by Jerusalem religious authorities as theocratic taxation). In Matthew 17 Jesus gives the father-son relationship precedence over the king-subject relationship for the children of God. The sons are exempt, and "God does not rule his people in the way that earthly kings do".¹¹ God does not treat them as subjects who owe him taxes, but rather he provides for them. Even today in the local church the Old Testament concept of the tithe is often used to persuade people into a strict ten percent giving, under a thinly veiled threat of "robbing God" (Mal. 3:9). This is not a Jesus-centred handling of the Old' Testament, and only results in the well-off keeping more than they need and the poor giving away more than they can afford - all in the name of God's rule over his people, just as with the temple tax.

A social justice reading of the temple episode

The connection between Matthew 17 and the temple demonstration is clearly seen when Jesus overturns the tables of the moneychangers. By doing this he "attacked the most visible manifestation of the tax operations", and so directly criticised the very existence of the tax and aimed it at the highest level of the economic hierarchy - the priestly aristocracy - who claimed to operate in the name of God himself. Bauckham's thesis is strengthened by the reference to the selling of doves. He uses a variety of Jewish sources to show that the temple treasury had a monopoly on the selling of doves because of the strict requirements on fitness and rearing which they imposed. This probably created a monopoly where the treasury could charge prices as high as it liked, making the most common sacrifice of the poor a burden to them in the same way as the tax itself. The idea is not that Jesus objected to the sacrificial system, but rather sought to fulfill its real purpose: "The scandal of the temple trade in these days was that the laws specifically intended to make worship possible for the poor were being so applied as to make them a financial burden on the poor." Bauckham uses the sources to make a similar case for the "merchandise" being carried through the temple courts, which were probably vessels used to deliver the other materials used in offerings (flour, oil, wine) which were also monopolised by the treasury.¹²

When Jesus drove out those buying and selling in the temple courts, it is reasonable to interpret his actions with reference to the commercial transactions of the temple, rather than the worshippers themselves. Those selling were not necessarily profit-keeping themselves, but were the custodians of a vast economic enterprise with huge reserves of money which made the temple comparable to a bank. This made the temple an important employer and resource for Jerusalem, but one with little benefit for the many Jews outside the city. Tom Wright tells us of the temple that "its importance at every level can hardly be overestimated."¹³ This was the place where God lived, ruled and restored Israel by grace through the sacrificial system so that she could continue to be his people. The temple also combined in itself the functions of national figurehead, government and financial institution. Wright points out that it occupied around one quarter of Jerusalem city, symbolising its central place for every aspect of existence for the Jew. Thus at the very heart of Jewish life God was being misrepresented and his real relation to his people obscured, obstructing the very purpose of the temple and its worship. It seems most likely then that it was commercialism rather than corruption that provoked the prophetic demonstration of Jesus.

Alan Kreider notes a second purpose in the protest of Jesus, to do with the location of the transactions. That the place of worship for the outsider (the Court of the Gentiles) was taken over by commercialism was a powerful illustration of Jewish nationalism and exclusivism which by this time probably pervaded Israel. Jesus demonstrates that the purpose of God was to include the outsider, "The enemies were to be loved, the nations were to be brought in."¹⁴

A questionable translation

Bauckham's interpretation makes good sense of Jesus' actions, but he follows most commentators in understanding that Jesus used the whip against people. However, J. Lasserre shows that the traditional translation of John 2:15 - which has Jesus violently driving out people with a whip - is an incorrect one which even today is present in popular Bibles. ¹⁵ The questionable translation is: "Jesus ... drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen" (NASB and similarly The Message, the Authorised Version, NKJV, NEB, RSV and The Jerusalem Bible). The NIV and Amplified have a similar translation to that which Lasserre supports: "Jesus ... drove them all from the temple, the sheep as well as the cattle". The point is that there is no need to include people amongst the animals which Jesus drove out with the whip.

Lassere examined the grammatical construction used in John 2:15 (particularly the Greek words te kai) and compared it with eighty other occurrences in the New Testament.¹⁶ He found that in seventy-six instances it supports the translation of "sheep as well as the cattle" and not "as well as sheep and cattle". Even in the remaining four instances the former translation would be natural and normal. Lassere is quite correct to conclude that a violent interpretation of the demonstration cannot be justified. Even the phrase "driving out" (Mark 11:15) used in the synoptics to portray Jesus chasing people out, perhaps whip in hand, is a bad translation. The same verb can just as easily be translated "send out" (as in Matt. 9:38 and many other places). The fact that recent commentaries on the gospels do not refer to Lassere, despite J. H. Yoder's support and use of him, shows how big a part pre-understanding plays in exegesis. It would not seem feasible then to use the temple demonstration to justify violence toward people, as Jesus did not use the whip on them.

Furthermore, even for those who disagree with Lasserre's translation the temple incident does not easily justify violence. For example, George Beasley-Murray supports the traditional translation, but notes that the grammatical construction of John 2:15 draws attention to the expulsion of the animals rather than the people.¹⁷ He thinks that the demonstration's purpose is to bring about the new era where sacrificial worship has been fulfilled. However, he notes that this is achieved not through the demonstration itself and the use of the whip, but through that to which its use leads - the death of the Messiah. This is why Psalm 69:9 is quoted, and the righteous sufferer is cited elsewhere in the New Testament with reference to the death of Jesus: "In all four gospels the event signifies less the action of a zealous reformer to purify the worship in the temple than an act of judgment that presaged a new and more worthy order of worship of God. That new order is achieved not by Jesus throwing the traders and their beasts out of the temple but by the death to which his action leads, and the resurrection which is inseparable from it."¹⁸ Since Jesus did not intend his actions to directly accomplish his purposes, they cannot be used by his followers as justification for force today.

James Dunn is broadly representative of New Testament scholarship when he concludes that Jesus was not a violent revolutionary: ". . . we can be fairly confident that the revolutionary option was open to Jesus in one form or another.

But it is also sufficiently clear that Jesus did not commend or accept that option."¹⁹ Jesus did not condone violence, either by example or by words, and so his disciples are called to follow him in this area as in every other. This is both a crucial demonstration of God's active presence in the world, and a precious realisation of our status as peacemaking children of God (Matt. 5:9, 45).

Tim Foley recently served as associate pastor at Folly's End Christian Fellowship in Croydon, and is a graduate student at Spurgeon's College in South London.

Notes

1. B. Milne, The Message of John (Leicester: IVP, 1993), p. 72.

2. J. D. G. Dunn, Jesus' Call to Discipleship (Cambridge: CUP, 1992), p. 47.

3. N. T. Wright, The Interpretation of the New Testament 1861-1986 (Oxford: OUP, 1990), p. 380.

4. The Chronicle of the Hutterian Brethren, vol. 1 (Rifton, New York, 1987), p. 270.

5. G. H. Williams and Angel M. Mergal, eds., Spiritual and Anabaptist Writers (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1957), p, 67.

6. S. Murray, Spirit, Discipleship, Community.- The Contemporary Significance of Anabaptist Hermeneutics (unpublished Phd thesis; Oxford: The Whitefield Institute, 1992), p. 59.

7. J. Pelikan, Gospel of John chapters 1-4, in Luther's Works, vol. 22 (Saint Louis, Missouri: Concordia Publishing House, 1957), p. 224.

g Pelikan, Luther's Works, vol. 22, p. 225.

9. Murray, Spirit, Discipleship, Community, p. 96.

10. R. Bauckham, "Jesus' Demonstration in the Temple", in g. Lindars, ed., Law and Religion (Cambridge: James Clarke, 1988).

11. Bauckham, "Jesus' Demonstration", p. 82.

12. Bauckham, "Jesus' Demonstration", p. 78.

13. N, T. Wright, The New Testament and the People of God (London: SPCK, 1992), p. 224.

14. A. Kreider, Journey Towards Holiness (Basingstoke: Marshall-Pickering, 1986), p. 154.

15. J Lasserr^e (trans. 1. H. Yoder), The Whip in the Temple: A Tenacious Misinterpretation, Occasional Papers of the Council Mennonite Seminaries and Institute of Mennonite studies, No. l (Elkhart, Indiana: 1981).

16. Lasserre, The Whip in the Temple, p. 37.

17. G_. Beasley-Murray, John, Word Biblical Commentary (Waco: Word Books, 1991), p. 40.

18. Beasley-Murray, John, p. 50.

19. Dunn Jesus^.' Call to Discipleship, p. 47.

AT 13: The Church as a Community in Worship

by Eleanor Kreider
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 13, October 1996

"An Anabaptist congregation will exhibit an understanding of community that makes possible radical economic sharing, the exercise of loving church discipline, and the development and deployment of a wide range of gifts for the benefit of the church and the world beyond the church." - Stuart Murray, Anabaptism Today, June, 1996, p. 12.

The Church as "community" is a reality many Christians long for, but it often seems difficult to achieve. Geography, poor transport, architecture, mental habits, traditional churchy culture - these and many other factors militate against the kind of genuine relationships we desire. Worship is an important context for congregations to build community. The following are a few ways in which the worship of a church can establish and nurture community relationships (small churches find these things easier, but even larger ones can do them):

Learn to know each other in community

• Use pictures and names to build relationships. One Sunday during after-service coffee a member of one congregation went around snapping informal photos of all the little clusters of people in conversation. The next week there was a big poster in the hall with everyone's name next to their photo. It was not an expensive idea, but it helped everyone - especially newcomers - to get to know each other on a personal basis. The children especially were pleased to be known individually.

In another small church the children three years old and younger went out during the sermon for their own activities. When they returned to the main room for the closing songs and blessings, they were carried or escorted in with a special song: "Welcome, welcome Christopher! We are glad you're here" . . . "Welcome, welcome, Catherine! We are glad you're here!" The little ones then received a special prayer of blessing by the whole church: "God loves you. God goes with you. God stays with you."

Another church - a much bigger one - has pledged that every adult will learn the names of all the children and will address them face to face. A tall adult standing to speak to a little child is not an acceptable posture. Adults will either sit down or get down to speak directly to the child. This may sound trivial or drastic, but it embodies an important point: in this church children are valued members of the community. The idea of learning names comes first because it is essential to building community.

• Learn what others do during the week. A new pastor asked permission to "shadow" or visit each member, for at least a few hours, at their place of involvement or employment. He took photos and soon these decorated the entry hallway under the label "our church in mission". It was funny to see people in unfamiliar-looking clothes because they always came to church casually dressed. Our "churchy selves" are only one part of the picture. We need to learn more about each others' lives.

• Pray, for specific day-to-day needs of members. Some churches forget to pray for their own members. If we know people's names and something about their weekly involvements, we can make intercessions practical and specific. One large church has a number of people involved in the health professions, a cluster of school teachers, and a lot of university students. Once a month, in rotation, they hold extended prayers after the evening service around the weekday concerns of these particular groups of people.

Some churches appoint a "prayers group" to function with the same seriousness as the more familiar music groups. In worship meetings the prayers group consistently and systematically lead congregational prayers which include the members' individual and corporate work concerns. Churches who are only good at praying about medical needs and bereavements can learn to ask for and accept prayers dealing with a wider range of commitment and concerns.

Prayer telephone "hot-lines", prayer partners, adult-child mentor programmes, service sheet inserts with prayer requests - these and other methods can help a church to pray for its own needs. Prayer is a valuable link between individual and corporate life. We need to pray for one another, both in worship and through the week. Praying together builds community.

• Use notices to strengthen community ties. Perfunctory announcements of dates and times of meetings can give way to sharing news of what those groups of people are actually doing. It is also helpful to have "feedback notices" which remind people what happened in last week's events. Notices and prayers can converge. Notices might go like this:

"The women's group convenes on Thursday morning at Betty's house at 10 Rose Close. This week they will be writing letters concerning prisoners of conscience. They have asked the church to pray as they prepare to write these letters, and especially to intercede for the safety of a particular prisoner (named)."

"Last week our children enjoyed a day out at the nature reserve. Thanks to Sue and Jim and Sally who planned and took care of all the arrangements. One concern arose on that day for which we ask the church to pray. . ."

 

Notices, prayers and shared projects of mercy and service - bringing these specific concerns of our humanity into worship helps to build community. Do we hear notices like the following one in our worship and prayer meetings? If so, our worship is getting well earthed into the wider community:

"Are there four volunteers for Tuesday to help clear the site of the Jones' garage, which recently burned down'? We might not know this family personally, but they are neighbours to our church. They are distressed because they lost some valuable equipment in the fire. Let's pray for them and for the workers who will go to help with this job."

Encourage economic sharing

As members know more about each other's weekly work and family circumstances and as they work together in projects of mercy and aid, they can give support of many kinds - including economic. This might be in the form of a "koinonia fund" through which gifts of money are loaned or given according to need. In many churches money is a "hot" issue - an area of secrecy and control, sometimes of misery and isolation.

We can work corporately at defusing the power of money. One of the ways is through worship and prayer, giving thanks for God's provision, recognising it is not only our brilliance and hard work that builds our bank account. We can study and pray on the basis of Jesus' and the early Christians' concerns that we be content rather than greedy. Sharing what we have and giving generously are not instinctive acts. But they can be taught, caught, learned, practised, enjoyed - and all of these may be encouraged in corporate worship.

For example, there is the potent symbol of the offering plate. Sometimes the quiet, solemn music of the "offertory" gives a funereal impression: what a sad thing it is, to part with our own hard-earned money! I recently got many surprised comments after playing a jolly song as the plates came forward. We could learn from African Christians who make the offering a high point of their worship, giving their gifts with festive singing and dancing. Children can fully take part in such an offering, learning and dramatising the importance of freely giving back to God what God has given to us. It's fun, too - and fun builds community.

The offering plates are sometimes placed onto the communion table. This action is a reminder of early Christians' generous and responsible care for the needy within and outside their immediate fellowship. Gifts in kind, gifts of service - many offerings could go into the plate and onto the communion table, incorporated into the fellowship of bread and wine. After all, the very name communion derives from the word meaning "sharing". Community, communion and sharing all tit together.

Foster disciplined relationships

Discipline means learning. Worship leaders should always ask, "How can we, in this service, help people to grow as Jesus' loved disciples?" It will mean more than going through a series of songs and sermons and then leaving it up to each person to figure out how worship connects with their life. Worship leaders present Jesus, worthy of our adoration - but also Jesus as our winsome teacher, the one who challenges and coaxes us on our disciple way. We are on the way together; common discipleship builds community.

But it is for each one to approach worship with hopeful expectation. ( know a person who says, "When I go to worship, I always listen for at least one thing which will be significant for my daily life." Whenever Christians meet for prayer and worship, each one should be able to gain an insight, make a resolve, confess a weakness, or determine to take a step forward in their walk of faith. Every worship service needs a point for inner appropriation, for a movement of each person's will under the leading of the Spirit. There needs to be space, silence, and room for this to happen. We need to face up to our varying degrees of success in taking that step, or remembering the insight.

Corporate worship can easily link with one-to-one relationships within the church, with spiritual friendships in which we are able to be lovingly honest with one another. When relationships are strong, honesty with humility can flourish. We will be able to give and to receive the hard words as well as the approving ones. We need to help each other learn the mind of Christ, and learn to walk in his way. Loving discipline builds community.

Elicit and deploy many gifts

Corporate worship is not the place for practising what we don't know how to do. The church asks those to serve the group who show the spiritual gift for a particular function. The finest pianist is not necessarily gifted to lead music in worship. The most fluent public speaker isn't always the best Bible teacher. Church members know these things. Ask them which person most enables them to pray; ask them who most winsomely visits the ill. The church discerns the gifts. The church then sees that the gifts are trained, developed, and accepted into the fabric of worship and service.

A good check on this is to return to a church after a couple of years' absence. Are you surprised and delighted with the growth and maturity of gifts? Young people may be leading prayers and heading up service projects. People may be serving in ways that they didn't know they could do. The church is maturing and gifts are growing! Growing the gifts builds community.

But spiritual gifts aren't only for internal benefit. The spiritual qualities and gifts which a congregation most needs are the same ones that the world out there is crying for: the merciful spirit, humility in careful listening, discerning God's prophetic word for a particular situation, a heart that mourns for broken lives, a gift of healing prayer. "These we can practise within the church. But they will spill over beyond the Christian fellowship. In significant ways they shape the kind of neighbours and work mates we are throughout the week. In our worship meetings we can hone our peacemaking skills, our disciplined corporate prayer, our thankfulness and ability to discern God at work These expressions will flow out into the mission that is our daily work and walk of life. We need spiritual gifts for the community beyond the church. Gifts of the Spirit expressed in mission build community.

Every Christian congregation values strong community life. But I believe that there is something about Anabaptist definitions and practices which give distinctive shape and impetus to community. Community is not an optional feature; for Anabaptists it is about solidarity as we walk together. It is about survival in the face of testing. Community is about sharing bread for the journey. It is about sharing joy and good times in the life of God's Kingdom. All of these qualities are expressed in the worship of the church.

Based at Regent's Park College in Oxford, Eleanor Kreider teaches, writes and speaks in the area of Christian worship. In 1997 she will publish Communion Shapes Character (Herald Press).

AT 15: Adult Baptism in the Early Church: Some evidence from Ireland

By Eoin de Bhaldraithe
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 15, June 1997

In the report of the Evangelical-Roman Catholic dialogue on mission we read:

A large number of Evangelicals (perhaps the majority) practise only believers' baptism. That is they baptise only those who have personally accepted Jesus Christ as their Saviour and Lord and they regard baptism both as the convert's public profession of faith and as the dramatisation (by immersion in water) of his or her having died and risen with Christ.'

Members of the mainline churches, on the other hand, are almost all baptised as infants. Unfortunately, this very often leads to mere nominal christianity. Scholars still disagree on the prevalence of infant baptism in the early church. Yet new evidence continually impresses on us how widespread adult baptism was. It seems clear, for example, that many of the holy wells in Ireland were the adult baptisteries of the pre-Norman church. Here we re-examine some of the local evidence as a Roman Catholic contribution to the debate.

Patrick

St Patrick came to Ireland as a missionary bishop some time in the fifth century. The date of his death is disputed: either 461 or 491 AD. He has left us two documents. The first is a letter excommunicating Coroticus, a British chief who carried away some of his neophytes into slavery in Britain. The better known one is his Confession which is largely autobiographical.²Those documents mark the beginning of historicity in Ireland. Ecclesiastically, they offer an even more important insight into the British church that sent him to Ireland.³

Studies on Patrick continue to abound. Most recently David Howlett and Maire Brid de Paor have discovered the chiastic structure of the Confession.⁴ The work of Daniel Conneely sets his thought firmly in the context of the fifth century controversies on grace. So when Patrick tells us how in his youth he was dead in sin and unbelief Conneely insists that "we must interpret him here as meaning exactly what he says and not diminish his presentation, for an entire argument is built on it".⁵

From the five passages cited by Conneely we may quote the following. "I did not believe in the living God, nor had I believed in him from childhood, but remained in death and unbelief."⁶ While he was a slave in the wood of Foclut, probably in present day County Mayo, God literally made him a believer. All this makes much more sense if Patrick was not baptised at the time. Indeed it is virtually incomprehensible if we presume that he received baptism as an infant.

He prayed several times in the day and night for "the Spirit was fervent" in him.⁷ This means that the Spirit had come upon him now for the first time. Like the Gentiles who came to Cornelius, he received the Spirit before baptism. Then when he returned to Britain or Gaul he was baptised and ordained.

Patrick came from a Christian family. He tells us in the Confession that his father was a deacon and his grandfather a presbyter. But at this time even that fact would not guarantee baptism. Augustine, who died earlier in the fifth century, was reared by a Christian mother yet she did not baptise him. Such was the custom at the time. The Confessions of both, then, describe a sinful unbelieving youth and adult conversion. As well as Augustine and Patrick, their near contemporaries, Jerome, Basil and Ambrose were baptized and ordained in quick succession.

Columba

When we read early church history without presuming infant baptism, many other possibilities emerge. St Columba, apostle of Scotland, known as Colm Cille in Ireland, died in 597 AD. Adamnan, his tenth successor as abbot of lona (679-704), wrote a biography of the founder in the style of the time.⁸ From it we get some insights into practice at the turn of the eighth century.

Adamnan tells us that while Columba was still in the womb, his mother saw a vision which indicated that the child would be famous. There is, however, no indication of the child being sanctified in the womb like John the Baptist. Next we are told that he was fostered to a priest called Cruineachtán. One night he saw a ball of fire standing over the child as he slept. Then the priest "understood that the grace of the Holy Spirit had been poured from heaven on his foster-son". This statement would be meaningless if Columba had already been baptised and was regarded as having the Spirit in infancy. Rather, like Patrick, he was now receiving the Holy Spirit prior to his actual baptism.

An objection to this might be that Adamnan later mentions another time when "the grace of the Holy Spirit was poured" on Columba. So perhaps the phrase could be used of a child who already had the Spirit. This later vision is quite different, however, as Adamnan says that the grace came "abundantly and in an incomparable manner" It lasted three days. The secret mysteries of the Scriptures were revealed to Columba.⁹ It was the culmination of his mystical experience. The vision of his foster father is most naturally interpreted as a first coming of the Spirit.

The ritual

In the Bangor Antiphonary we find a hymn, Ignis creator igneus', which was to be sung at the blessing of the paschal candle on the night of the Easter vigil. Michael Curran translates the last two verses as follows.

You store up the nourishment of divine honey in the secret recesses of the honey-comb: purifying the innermost cells of the heart, you fill them with your work, so that the swarm of new offspring, begotten by the word and the Spirit, may leave behind the things of earth and soar towards heaven on carefree wings.

Curran regards this as "a fine expression of the deeply experienced reality of the early church on Easter night". He believes that it indicates that at the time there must have been "a large number of candidates for initiation at Easter".¹⁰ The purification and the abandonment of earthly things by the neophytes could only refer to adults, not to infants. This precious document was compiled about 680 AD and so is roughly contemporary with Adamnan. This is the kind of initiation he presupposes for Columba.

The Second Synod of Patrick is a pseudonymous document dated by Bieler to the seventh century. This is its prescription for infants. "On the eighth day they are catechumens. (Octavo die caticumini sunt.) Thereafter they are baptised on the solemnities of the Lord, that is Easter, Pentecost and Epiphany". ¹¹ One might imagine that they were then baptised at the next major feast, and so before one year old. However, the parallel practice of the Eastern church shows that baptism was deferred to a mature age. This is also borne out by the holy wells which were clearly suited for baptising adults.

Yet another text gives us some insight into the actual ritual of baptism. In The Alphabet of Devotion we read:

In baptism three waves pass over a person and in these is made a threefold renunciation; firstly, the world and its pretensions; secondly, the devil and his snares; and thirdly, the lusts of the body. This is what changes a person from being a son of death into a son of light.

This description presumes that renunciation is part of baptism and therefore for adults. The text goes on to say that if one fails in those renunciations, "heaven is closed to him unless he first dips into three pools", namely, repentance, discipline and labour. Dipping in the pool must be the equivalent of the waves passing over a person and so is a clear reference to baptism by immersion.

A few further details of the ritual may not evoke as much sympathy from some evangelicals. The well or font was to contain living water. That meant that it was to be flowing rather than stagnant. It was blessed by a thanksgiving (or eucharistic) prayer. Then holy oil (or chrism) was poured into the water. Water and oil flowed away but the well remained holy or "blessed".

After baptism in some rites water was sprinkled on the people as a memorial of their own baptism. In Gaul and in Ireland, however, the people drank some of the holy water in a ceremony reminiscent of Jesus' words about drinking living water. Christianity was first brought to Gaul by Irenaeus. He was closely connected to the community which gave us the Gospel of John. The church spread from Gaul to Britain to Ireland. Perhaps this is why so many distinctively Johannine emphases are found in the Irish tradition.

Curran implies that the system of baptising adults at Easter was in vogue in western Europe at this time also. It seems that it was about a century later with Charlemagne that baptism of infants was first prescribed for all. This quickly became normal practice on the continent while peripheral Ireland conserved the older way of doing things.

Norman reform

A life of Columba written in the Old Irish language tells how he was baptised immediately after birth. But Maire Herbert shows that this life was written as late as 1150 AD at a time when the Irish church was striving to reform itself by coming into line with practice on the Continent.¹² Infant baptism was one of these reforms. When the Normans came twenty years later they made a law that the baptistery was now to be inside the church. The surviving examples show that they were for the baptism of infants but still by immersion.

The Normans had behind them the authority of Pope Alexander III who wrote to Henry II urging ecclesiastical reform in Ireland. The abuses of the Irish church are a common theme of medieval literature. Because it existed on the periphery, many older usages survived in Ireland when they had gone out of fashion elsewhere. What was universal practice at an earlier stage was now regarded as an abuse. This was the main worry of the continentals about Ireland.

Pope Alexander complained that the Irish ate flesh during Lent and did not pay tithes.¹³ Gerald of Wales, who described the conquest of Ireland, claimed that Henry was ordered to ensure that every household in Ireland would pay one penny a year to the Pope, known as "Peter's pence". 14 The significance of this and other reforms was that they could be imposed by the sword. Because infant baptism was now the law, everybody would have to accept the reforms. In the earlier Irish church one freely embraced Christianity and baptism as an adult. So many people elected to remain pagan. This system the medieval papal church regarded as a great abuse. Today perhaps we are agreed that it is an ideal to which we should all return.

Brother Eoin de Bhaldraithe, O. Cist., is a monk of Bolton Abbey, Moone, Co. Kildare, Ireland

Notes

1. B. Meeking, J. Stott, eds., The Evangelical-Roman Catholic Dialogue on Mission l977-1984: A Report (Exeter, Paternoster, 1986), 57.

2 L. Bieler, Libri Epislolarum Sancti Patricii Episcopi: Introduction, Text and Commentary (Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, 1993).

3. C- Thomas, Christianity in Roman Britain to AD 500 (London, Batsford, 1981), chap 14, "St Patrick's Episcopate and the British Church".

4. D.R. Howlett, The Book of Letters of Saint Patrick the Bishop (Dublin, Four Courts, 1994): acknowledgement to M.B. de Paor, p. 110.

5. D. Conneely, St Patrick's Letters: A Study of their Theological Dimension (Maynooth, An Sagart, 1993), p. Ill.

6. Conneely, 68; Howlett, 70.

7. Conneely, 66; Howlett, 63.

8. A.O. & M.O. Anderson, eds., Adomnan's Life of Columba (London, 1961).

9. Ibid., p. 503.

10. M. Curran, The Antiphonary of Bangor and the Early Irish Monastic Liturgy (Dublin, Irish Academic, 1984), P. 63.

11.Second synod of St Patrick, 19; L. Meter, The Irish Penitentials (Dublin, 1963), pp. 191-92.

12. M. Herbert, Iona Kells and Derry: The History and Hagiography of the Monastic Familia of Columba (Dublin, Four Courts, 1996), text in Irish, p. 226; in English, p. 253; date. p. 192; church reform, p. 109.

13. Douglas and Greenaway, eds., English historical Documents, If (London, Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1953), pp- 774-80.

AT 15: The Pastoral Epistles Speak to Anabaptists Today

by Lloyd Pietersen
Originally published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 15, June 1997

Introduction

Much scholarly discussion on the Pastoral Epistles (1 & 2 Timothy, Titus) has focused on the question of their authenticity. Predictably, many conservative scholars argue that Paul wrote them, whereas most non-conservatives would disagree. The general scholarly consensus, in what has become a somewhat sterile debate, is that they were not written by Paul. In addition, it has often been assumed by readers that the purpose of the Pastorals is to provide instruction on church leadership and organisation. The questions of authorship and purpose combine to produce the consensus that the Pastorals were written to promote a particular form of church organisation in the period following the death of Paul when the church was undergoing the transition from charismatic leadership to a much more institutionalised structure.

I hope, in a series of articles, to focus on particular passages in the Pastorals (not least those which appear to marginalise women). For the purpose of this introductory article, however, I want simply to highlight certain themes which I believe are relevant for today.

Comfortable Christianity?

The debates about authenticity and church structure have meant that the Pastoral Epistles are not the books in the New Testament that people would instinctively go to for insight on radical discipleship. Many would agree with Martin Dibelius' famous description of the Pastorals as having as their goal "christliche Bürgerlichkeit" translated either as "good Christian citizenship" or, more pejoratively, as "bourgeois Christianity". For Dibelius, and many scholars following him, the Pastorals reflect a version of post-Pauline Christianity which has settled for a comfortable co-existence with the world. Furthermore, for many the Pastorals also reflect a move away from Paul's vision of egalitarian Christian community to a hierarchical and patriarchal ecclesiastical structure in which women are marginalised. The history of scholarship on the Pastorals does not prove a fruitful hunting ground for anyone who wishes to view them as radical documents!

I beg to differ. Space does not permit me to rehearse all the arguments here (the arguments form the bulk of the content of my current PhD work!). My position, stated briefly, is that the Pastorals address Pauline communities struggling over what it means to stand in genuine continuity with Paul in the period following his death. I believe that the second half of the first century CE witnessed a battle taking place between competing images of Paul in Christian communities that cherished his memory. The Pastorals participate in this struggle and seek, therefore, to promote a particular view of Paul against competing claims.

Unlike Dibelius and others, I do not believe that the Pastorals reflect a settled community at ease with itself and the world. On the contrary, the letters betray signs of intense strife affecting the communities. In Ephesus there are teachers in the community teaching a different doctrine (1 Tim 1:3-7) and advocating an extreme asceticism (1 Tim 4:1-3). As a result of their impact households are being disrupted (1 Tim 5:13-15; 2 Tim 3:1-9), and there is a suggestion that they are out for financial gain (1 Tim 6:5). In Crete too they are disrupting households and teaching for financial gain (Titus 1:10-16). It is not my purpose in this article to dwell on the false teachers; suffice it to say that the author of the Pastorals is profoundly concerned about their impact on households. To counter this he places specific emphasis on the household. The episkopos must be able to manage his own household well (1 Tim 3:4), so too must diakonoii (1 Tim 3:12). Children or grandchildren of widows must first learn their duty to their own household (1 Tim 5:4) and the church itself is described as the household of God (1 Tim 3:15). The author's concern for stable community, which has been rightly noted by the scholars, arises in my view, not out of a desire to conform or compromise with the world, but out of the specific circumstances which the communities addressed find themselves - namely the risk of being torn apart by factions within. Furthermore, the author's concern is that this internal strife affects the communities' witness to the wider world.

Dibelius and Conzelmann rightly point out that eusebeia (godliness/piety), a key word in the Pastorals occurring no less than ten times, elsewhere in the New Testament is found only in Acts and 2 Peter. They note that the word occurs frequently in Greek honorary inscriptions alongside words such as "virtue", "righteousness" and "goodness." It is thus a word which appears "in those schematic catalogues of virtues which were so popular". For them words such as eusebeia and semnotes (dignity) highlight the Pastorals' concern to promote "good Christian citizenship." What they fail to note is that the kind of eusebeia advocated by the Pastorals is eusebeia "in Christ Jesus" (2 Tim 3:12) and that the "mystery of godliness" (to tes eusebeias mysterion) points to Christ (1 Tim 3:16). The Pastorals' emphasis on eusebeia, therefore, would be well understood in the Hellenistic culture in which the communities found themselves, but this does not imply that the author of the Pastorals expects the communities simply to conform to the surrounding culture. It is specifically Christ-centred eusebeia that is being advocated-and the author well knows that this kind of eusebeia leads inevitably to persecution (2 Tim 3:12).

2 Tim 3:12 has been widely neglected in scholarship. Either fairly bland comments about Jesus and Paul expecting their followers to face persecution have been made, or the threat of persecution is treated merely as a rhetorical device of the author to encourage faithful living. It deserves far more attention, particularly in an Anabaptist context where early Anabaptist history bears eloquent and painful testimony to the verse's insistence that "all who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted". If taken seriously and literally, it calls into question the whole "bourgeois Christianity" line of interpretation.

Tradition

The Pastorals emphasise tradition. In the context of competing claims about Paul the Pastorals want to state clearly: "we stand in this Pauline tradition—we can do no other". The emphasis is on a standard of sound teaching which has been received from Paul and is to be passed on to future generations (e.g. 1 Tim 4:11-16; 2 Tim 1:13-14; 2:2; Titus 1:9). In the current climate, when there is so much emphasis on the "new thing that God is doing," the Pastorals issue a timely reminder that we are to pay attention to our tradition. One of the great strengths of the Anabaptist Network has been the desire to learn about the Anabaptist heritage and thus to develop a sense of historical perspective. Of course the author of the Pastorals is convinced that he stands in the true Pauline tradition and thus Paul's authority for a new generation is simply assumed. Our task has to be more critical—there are aspects of our Anabaptist heritage that we would not necessarily want to endorse; furthermore, sixteenth century Anabaptist solutions cannot be uncritically transposed into our late-twentieth-century context. Nevertheless, there is still much for today's global church to learn from the early Anabaptists.

Mission

I do not subscribe to the scholarly consensus that the Pastorals reflect introspective communities more concerned about their own internal structure and organisation than with engagement with the world. The Pastorals have a massive emphasis on "good works". Sound teaching, as far as the Pastorals are concerned, is not merely for the purpose of right believing but is to promote right living. This is familiar Anabaptist territory! Christian belief is outworked in appropriate conduct. Furthermore, instead of the endless debate as to whether the emphasis on "good works" is a departure from Paul, scholars would do well to pay attention to the fact that this emphasis on good works is "Sermon on the Mount stuff". Good works, according to Mt 5:16, are essentially mission-oriented and I believe the Pastorals need to be seen in this light too. 1 Tim 2:1-2, which for many serves to epitomise the Pastorals as concerned with "bourgeois Christianity", is immediately followed by a statement concerning the saving will of God. Prayer for peaceful conditions is not so that the church can be comfortable but to facilitate mission. The author is acutely aware that outsiders are influenced, either positively or negatively, by the conduct of the Christian communities. This leads to my final point.

Cultural Engagement without Cultural Conformity

This is a massive subject which I can only briefly touch upon here. Let me give just one example. It is generally accepted by Pastorals scholars that the moral exhortations in the letters combine the central concerns of Hellenistic ethical writings with Jewish traditions in a way very similar to that of the first-century Jewish apologist Philo. For example, three of the four Hellenistic cardinal virtues – self-control, justice and piety - are combined in Titus 2:11-12. The ethical concerns of the Pastorals would have been thoroughly understood in a Hellenistic context. Nevertheless, it is significant that the fourth virtue, "courage", is absent from this text, from the Pastorals generally, and indeed from the entire New Testament. This is because classically the virtue of courage was associated with valour in war. Warlike valour is not a Christian virtue. Instead "courage" is replaced by "endurance" as a New Testament virtue.

This highlights a distinctive aspect of the Christian tradition in relation both to Hellenistic and to Jewish traditions. Because Jesus was crucified by his enemies without meeting their violence with counter-violence, the early Christian tradition eschews violent resistance. Like Jesus, however, Christians were sometimes persecuted, and the kind of courage they would need was "endurance".

So, in connection with the cardinal virtues valued by the surrounding culture, the Pastorals engage with those values and yet do not simply embrace them. Courage is transformed into endurance; piety, as we have already seen, is Christ-centred piety; self-control is a mark of the Spirit (2 Tim 1:7); the virtues flow out of lives transformed by the grace of God (Titus 2:11-12). The Pastorals thus seriously engage with the challenge of mission-how relevantly to address contemporary culture without compromising with it. For the author of the Pastorals compromise is not an option; he well knows that the kind of Christian praxis he is advocating is paradoxically both profoundly attractive and yet ultimately threatening to the value systems of this world. At the end of the day this kind of discipleship leads not to an easy life but to suffering and hardship (2 Tim 1:8; 2:3; 3:12; 4:5).

Lloyd Pietersen was, for a number of years, an elder in Bristol Christian Fellowship. He is currently doing doctoral research on the Pastoral Epistles at Sheffield University.

Notes

1. M. Dibelius, Die Pastoralbriefe (HNT 13; 2nd edition; Tubingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1931), pp. 24-25; M. Dibelius and H. Conzelmann, The Pastoral Epistles (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1972); referred to hereafter as D-C.

2. The related verb eusebeo (to live piously) occurs once and the adverb eusebos (godly) occurs twice.

3. D-C, p. 39.

4. This verse does not fit well with D-Cs thesis concerning "bourgeois Christianity". All they say about this verse is: "The apostle's experience of suffering is applied to all Christians in the form of a general thesis. Thus the verse expresses the intention of these biographical allusions" p. 119.

5. See Stuart Murray's excellent essay "Introducing the Anabaptists", Anabaptism Today 14 (February 1997), pp. 4-18, especially pp. LS-17. 6. The phrase occurs no less than fourteen times: l Tim 2:10; 3: l; 5:10 (twice), 25; 6:18; 2 Tim 2:21; 3:17; Titus 1:16; 2:7, 14; 3:1, 8, 14.

7. See Mt 5:16 where the same phrase is used. Incidentally, it is my firm conviction that an Anabaptist hermeneutic, in which "the uncomfortable and provocative Jesus of the Gospels" (S. Murray, "Introducing the Anabaptists", p. 16) is made the controlling centre for interpretation, consistently sheds light on the Epistles. Failure o make connections between the Jesus of the Gospels and the teaching of the Epistles leads to a distinctly impoverished understanding of the New Testament.

8. See the important argument, supporting this view of the Pastorals, of Philip H. Towner, The Goal of Our Instruction: The Structure of Theology and Ethics in the Pastoral Epistles (JSNTSup, 34; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1989).

9. See S.C. Mott, "Greek Ethics and Christian Conversion: The Philonic Background of Titus 2:10-14 and 3: 3-7", Novum Testamentum 20 (1978), pp. 22-48 (23-26) for the connection between piety (eusebeia) and the Platonic cardinal virtue of wisdom (phronesis).

10. Although Mott notes this fact he fails to see its significance; op.cit. p. 28.

11. See the astute comments of M. Davies, The Pastoral Epistles (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996), pp. 20-22.

12. M. Davies, op.cit, p. 21.

AT 16: Michael Sattler: An Early Swiss Anabaptist Martyr

by Stuart Murray
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 16, October 1997

One of the remarkable features of the early Anabaptist movement is the very brief periods of ministry of the most influential leaders (some not even as long as the ministry of Jesus). Few survived to die peacefully in old age; some (like Conrad Grebel) succumbed to the plague, but many more were drowned, burned or beheaded after only a few years - or even a few months - of ministry. If the writings of these leaders which have survived seem a little rough and ready by comparison with their more illustrious Protestant contemporaries, this is not surprising, given the brevity and precariousness of their lives as Anabaptist leaders. Anabaptist theology has been characterised as "theology on the run". What is more surprising is the continuing influence of some of their writings centuries later.

In the summer of 1526, only eighteen months after the first believers' baptisms in Zurich had signalled the start of the Anabaptist movement, Michael Sattler suddenly appeared on the scene. In a whirlwind ministry tour, he preached, baptised and taught new converts in various Swiss villages, continued these activities in Strasbourg and nearby Lahr, held talks with the Strasbourg reformers, Martin Bucer and Wolfgang Capito, fell out with some of the early South German Anabaptists, participated in the crucial Schleitheim Conference and was arrested shortly after this in Austria. By May 1527, less than a year after starting his active ministry as an Anabaptist, he was dead. But in this brief period, Sattler left a lasting imprint on the Swiss branch of the movement.

History does not record how Sattler was converted to the Anabaptist cause. He had been the Prior (second in seniority) within the Benedictine monastery of St. Peter's of the Black Forest, but we do not know whether he was still there when, in 1525, this monastery was captured by a peasant war band during the widespread unrest that historians refer to as the Peasants' War. Since this war band included men from Waldshut and Hallau, where Anabaptism was already becoming established, it may be that Sattler encountered Anabaptist ideas through his contact with the peasants who overran his monastery. We know too that someone by the name of Michael spent time in the village of Klingau with the Anabaptist Hans Kuenzi; this may have been Sattler.

But his Anabaptist convictions were sufficiently thought out, and his reputation within the movement adequately established, for Sattler to play a significant role in the Schleitheim Conference. This conference drew together' Swiss Anabaptist leaders and produced the Schleitheim Confession, which in seven articles spelled out key convictions of the emerging movement. Sattler may well have been the author of this document, and of the "Congregational Order" which circulated with the Confession and spelled out seven further articles dealing with congregational practice. His influence is certainly evident. Arnold Snyder refers to the Schleitheim articles as the "crystallization point" for Swiss Anabaptism, defining it as a movement and giving it a rallying point. These articles were not all endorsed by other branches of the diverse movement that comprised Anabaptism, but they were fundamental for the Swiss Brethren.

In his short ministry, Sattler had three significant debates with other Anabaptists, each of which reveals some of the tensions in this rapidly developing movement. Each also highlights an issue of continuing concern for Christians.

(1) He argued against the spiritualist Anabaptists Hans Denek and Ludwig Hatzer (who called him a "sly evil lurker") that the teachings of Scripture must be obeyed to the letter. One of the issues which troubled and divided early Anabaptists was the relationship between "Word" and "Spirit". Anabaptism was both a charismatic movement with a deep awareness of the presence and power of the Holy Spirit, and a biblical movement with a deep concern to take very seriously the explicit teachings of Scripture, especially the words of Jesus. Michael Sattter represented the wing of the Anabaptist movement which emphasised the necessity of obeying the letter of Scripture and not allowing this to be spiritualised or explained away by appeal to general principles.

(2) He argued against the apocalyptic Anabaptists led by Hans Hut, the most prolific and successful early Anabaptist evangelist, who anticipated the return of Christ within months and was fascinated by the prophetic passages of the Bible. Sattler argued that the church should concern itself primarily with obedience to Christ rather than speculation about the future.

(3) He argued against the magisterial Anabaptist Balthasar Hubmaier, who was much more hopeful than most of his contemporaries that society as a whole might be reformed and who encouraged Christians to play an active role within society. Sattler disagreed and urged a more separatist line. His underlying theological framework was that there were "two kingdoms" - the kingdom of Satan or the world, and the kingdom of Christ, the church. Christians were to live distinctive lives and to submit to the rule of Christ rather than the customs of the world.

Michael Sattler does not emerge from what little we know about him as the most appealing of early Anabaptists. His monastic training seems to have resulted in his understanding Anabaptism as a new "rule" for living, and his writings emphasise obedience to the letter of Scripture to the extent that he has often been accused of literalism and legalism. But within the context of the first decade of the Anabaptist movement, he seems to have provided an important check on those who were in danger of downplaying the teaching of Jesus in favour of spiritual experiences, prophetic speculation or political ambitions. Sattler insisted on a firmly Christocentric interpretation of the Bible, which eventually came to be accepted as the norm within the movement and which continues to challenge biblical interpreters to take Jesus seriously. But the Schleitheim Confession is his most enduring legacy.

Extracts from the Schleitheim Confession can be found in the Freeze Frame in this issue. This document gives us important insights into the concerns of the early Swiss Anabaptists. But another kind of document is also available as a resource for understanding the early Anabaptists - therecords of their trials. Some of these make poignant reading. These are Christians under pressure, not engaging in careful study or polite debate. Their comments are sharp and likely to get them into even deeper trouble. But they help us understand what issues were regarded as significant by those who persecuted them, and how the Anabaptists presented their convictions in a hostile environment.

We do not have enough information about Michael Sattler's life to justify a lengthy article. But we have an account of his trial, which gives us an indication of what kind of man he was and why the Swiss Brethren so quickly warmed to the ex-prior. What follows is a dramatised (and abbreviated) account of Sattler's trial, drawn primarily from Thieleman van Braght's The Martyrs ' Mirror.

The date is the 17th of May 1527. The place: the imperial city of Rottenburg in Germany. The court is in session with Count Joachim of Zollern in the chair. On trial are Michael Sattler and thirteen other alleged Anabaptists.

Count: Defendants, you may choose a lawyer to represent you.

Sattler: Thank you, Sir, but we choose not to be represented. Though we know you are servants of God in your capacity as judges, we also know that the Word of God gives you no right to judge matters of faith. This court is not competent to try us.

Count: You insolent fellow! You will soon see what we are empowered to do to you. Read the charges.

Clerk: The charges against Mr Sattler are (1) that he and his adherents acted contrary to the decree of the emperor; (2) that he taught, maintained and believed that the body and blood of Christ were not present in his sacrament; (3) that he taught and believed that infant baptism was not promotive of salvation; (4) that they rejected the sacrament of unction; (5) that they despised and reviled the Mother of God, and condemned the saints; (6) that he declared that men should not swear before a magistrate; (7) that he has commenced a new and unheard of custom in regard to the Lord's Supper, placing the bread and wine on a plate, eating and drinking the same; (8) that contrary to the rule he has married a wife; (9) that he said that if the Turks invaded the country, we ought not to resist them, and if he approved of war he would rather take the field against the Christians than against the Turks.

Count: Now do you answer these serious charges?

Sattler: May I ask for them to be read again so that 1 may fully understand them?

Clerk: He has boasted that he has the Holy Spirit. If that is true, we do not need to read the charges again - the Holy Spirit can inform him?

Sattler: Please read them again. (Clerk reads them again.)

Count: Will you now reply to these charges?

Clerk: The charges against Mr Sattler are (1) that he and his adherents acted contrary to the decree of the emperor.

Sattler: This first charge was directed against the Lutherans and urged them to preach only the gospel and the word of God. We have observed this for we have not acted contrary to the word of God.

Clerk: (2) that he taught, maintained and believed that the body and blood of Christ were not present in his sacrament.

Sattler.^- The second charge 1 accept as true and 1 will show you many Scriptures to defend this.

Clerk: (3) that he taught and believed that infant baptism was not promotive of salvation.

Sattler: The third also is true, for baptism is for believers, not for infants, as the Scriptures clearly show.

Clerk: (4) that they rejected the sacrament of unction.

Sattler: The sacrament of unction is nothing. Oil is made by God and so is good, but no papal blessing improves it.

Clerk: (5) that they despised and reviled the Mother of God, and condemned the saints.

Sattler: We do not revile the Mother of God, but the Scriptures do not allow us to treat her or the saints as intercessors for us.

Clerk: (6) that he declared that men should not swear before a magistrate.

Sattler: The sixth charge is true, for swearing oaths is forbidden by Christ himself.

Clerk: (7) that he has commenced a new and unheard of custom in regard to the Lord's Supper, placing the bread and wine on a plate, eating and drinking the same.

Sattler: 1 will make no response to the seventh charge, for it is not worth defending.

Clerk: (8) that contrary to the rule he has married a wife.

Sattler: As to my marriage, this is an ordinance of God. How many chaste priests do you know?

Clerk: (9) that he said that if the Turks invaded the country, we ought not to resist them, and if he approved of war he would rather take the field against the Christians than against the Turks.

Sattler: As regards the Turks, we will not fight, for we are told "Thou shalt not kill".

Count: Is this your full reply?

Sattler: 1 am happy to discuss these matters in greater detail with you if you will allow me to appeal to the Scriptures.

The judges became infuriated at Sattler's calm confidence and began to ridicule and threaten him, but he did not lose his composure. At length they conferred pronounced him guilty and declared the sentence. Two

days later Sattler was executed. His ordeal began in the marketplace where a piece was cut from his tongue. Pieces of flesh were torn from his body with red-hot tangs. He was tied to a cart and the tongs used five more times on the way to the site of execution. To the guards' amazement, Sattler was still able to speak and he could be heard praying for his persecutors. Then he was bound to a ladder and pushed into the fire.

Sattler: People, judges, Lord Mayor - hear the word of God, repent and believe the gospel. Almighty God, eternal God, you are the way and the truth. Because 1 have not been shown to be in error, 1 will with your help this day testify to the truth and seal it with my blood.

When the ropes on his wrists burned through, Sattler raised the two fore fingers of his hands, giving the promised signal to the brethren that a martyr's death was bearable. Then the crowd heard him say through seared lips...

Sattler: Father, I commend my spirit into your hands.

Two days later, Sattler's wife, Margareta, refused to recant her beliefs and was drowned.

As you reflect on this account, you might want to ask these questions:

(1) This was trial by a Catholic court. Which of the charges against Sattler would equally have applied to a Protestant defendant, and which were distinctively Anabaptist?

(2) How would you have responded to these charges?

(3) Which, if any, of these issues are still significant issues of disagreement among Christians?

(4) What convictions might land Christians in late twentieth century Britain in trouble with the courts?

Stuart Murray teaches church planting and evangelism at Spurgeon's College, London.

AT 17: Women and the Pastorals, Part 1

Part 1 of a two-part article by Lloyd Pietersen in his series on the Pastoral Epistles
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 17, Spring 1998

Introduction

I have received several enquiries concerning whether I was going to tackle the "difficult passage" 1 Timothy 2:11-15 in this series. It was always my intention to do so and, in light of these enquiries, I have decided to tackle the passage sooner rather than later. At the outset, I confess that I approach this text with several hats on:

1. As an Anabaptist, I am passionately committed to women having an equal role alongside men.

2. As a Christian nurtured in the evangelical tradition, I am committed to taking Scripture seriously and cannot simply ignore a passage because it does not seem to fit with my convictions.

3. As a New Testament scholar, I must insist that this text is not taken out of its context. I Tim. 2:11-15 is not a unit on its own - it forms part of the unit 1 Tim. 2:8-15. Furthermore, 1 Tim. 2:8-15 is imbedded in 1 Timothy as a whole. Finally, 1 Timothy forms part of the corpus known as the Pastoral Epistles - I Timothy, 2 Timothy and Titus. This is crucial, for we need to understand what the author's concerns about women are, and this can only be achieved by examining the whole of the Pastorals rather than prematurely making 1 Tim. 2:11-15 the controlling centre for interpretation.

4. Finally, as an Anabaptist New Testament scholar, I cannot make 1 Tim. 2:11-15 the controlling centre for a New Testament understanding of the role of women in any case. A Christocentric hermeneutic (to which 1 am committed) insists that our text must be read in light of the Jesus revealed in the Gospels.

Context

I am firmly convinced that the Pastoral Epistles are not to be read as a manual of church order. The purpose of the Pastorals (or at least 1 Timothy) is stated in 1 Tim. 1:3-4. In my view, the Pastorals are polemical documents written to counter false teaching which was threatening to undermine the communities addressed. The false teachers took pride in propagating special knowledge or "gnosis" (1 Tim. 6:20) with a strong ascetic thrust (1 Tim. 4:1-3) based on the understanding that the resurrection had already taken place (2 Tim. 2:18). The fact that these false teachers forbade marriage (1 Tim. 4:3) is particularly significant.

In a recently published article, I argue that the polemic is particularly strong because the opponents had previously been influential leaders within the Christian community. They were clearly able to teach in some capacity (1 Tim. 1:3; Titus 1:1 1); Hymenaeus and Alexander, leading opponents, are described as having "suffered shipwreck in the faith" (1 Tim. 1:20), implying that they had once been regarded as "in the faith". Even the passages concerning qualifications of church leaders serve the author's overall purpose. Those who forbid marriage, for example, cannot be "the husband of one wife" (1 Tim. 3:1; 3:12; Titus 1:6) and so are disqualified from serving as overseers, deacons or elders within the community.¹

It would appear that these teachers enjoyed particular success among women (2 Tim. 3:6) and we need to examine why this might be the case.

The Widows (1 Tim. 5:3-16)

It continually amazes me that, whilst much time and attention is given to the question of women in I Tim. 2:11-I5, relatively little is paid to 1 Tim. 5:3­16. This is particularly important when we notice that 1 Tim. 5:14 refers to bearing children and that the verb teknogonein and its related noun teknogonia occur only here and in 1 Tim. 2:15 in the entire New Testament. Some commentators go to great lengths to assert that the childbearing referred to in 1 Tim. 2:15 refers to the birth of Jesus and yet completely ignore 1 Tim. 5 :14. It seems to me that the question of the widows is both of great concern to our author as he devotes so much space to it and of relevance to the question of women in 1 Tim. 2.

The passage is not without its own difficulties. Commentators are divided as to whether it refers to one group throughout or whether a separate group of enrolled widows is addressed from verse 9. My view is that only one group is addressed - the passage is framed by the concern to assist those who are "real widows" (1 Tim. 5:3,16), The Greek term chera (widow) refers to a woman who is living without a husband. Its most common meaning was the one we would associate with the word "widow" - a woman whose husband had died. However, this was not its only meaning. A woman without a husband might be divorced or might have renounced her marriage as did the later Montanist prophetesses, Maximilla and Priscilla.² Furthermore, the context in 1 Tim. 5 suggests a further extension of the word to include all women who had taken vows of celibacy, whether previously married or not.³ This interpretation is supported by a passage from Ignatius, "I greet the households of my brothers with their wives and children, and the virgins who are called widows. "⁴

The Old Testament regularly exhorts the community of faith to take care of widows and the early church continued this tradition (Acts 6:1). However, it would appear that in the communities addressed in the Pastorals the circle of widows had grown to include those whom the author did not consider "real widows" worthy of support. Included in this circle were younger women who had taken vows of celibacy. The problems seem to have been two-fold. First, supporting such a large group was draining the com­munities' resources (1 Tim. 5:16). To deal with this, the author restricts the supported group to those "who are really widows". To qualify as a "real widow" worthy of support a woman would have to meet several criteria:

• No family to provide support (verses 4-5).

• At least sixty years old - the recognised age in antiquity when one was classified as "old" and correspondingly less likely to remarry (verse 9).

• Faithful to her previous husband (verse 9).

• Well attested for good works, bringing up children, hospitality, etc. (verse 10).

• No support from other believing women in the community (verse I6).

The author specifically forbids support for younger widows (verse 11). His initial argument focuses on the seriousness of potentially breaking the vow of celibacy (verses 11-12). However, this is not his main concern, as he clearly does not want them to take such vows in the first place - he wants younger widows to get married (verse 14). Why does he want them to marry, bear children and manage their households? Because their household responsibilities would prevent them from "gadding about from house to house" and being "gossips and busybodies, saying what they should not say" (verse 13). This is the second problem posed by the circle of widows.

These younger widows were revelling in their freedom from the constraints of the traditional household structure. Having already taken the celibate route, they were also particularly vulnerable to false teachers who were forbidding marriage. If they were enjoying the freedom that celibacy brought, it would not be a huge step to embrace teaching that actually opposed marriage. Here is the crux of the matter and what really concerns the author. The opponents have already had some success amongst this circle of widows (verse 15).⁵ The opponents' rejection of the household structure is deeply threatening to the community of faith which is addressed by the author as "the household of God" (1 Tim. 3:15). His solution to preserve this potentially vulnerable group of women from the error confronting the community is that they should marry, bear children and immerse themselves in their households (1 Tim. 5:14).

1 Tim. 2:8-15

Having set the scene, we come at last to this passage. As stated above, we cannot concentrate attention on just verses 11-12 or even verses 11-15. Verses 9-15 are concerned with women but verse 9 begins with hosautos (likewise) - verse 9 is a dependent clause subordinate to verse 8. So the text reads "I want men to pray... likewise (I want) women to adorn themselves..." The passage is concerned about relations between men and women in the community of faith. However, because false teaching appears to have enjoyed particular success among women, after a brief exhortation to men the author turns to address women for the rest of the chapter. His concern is for appropriate behaviour in the household of God (1 Tim. 3:15). It would appear that women have not behaved appropriately. This is particularly true of the younger, celibate "widows" and, of course, of those who have succumbed to false teaching.

Whatever the precise nature of the false teaching (and scholarly opinion varies on this), clearly its effect was to disrupt households (1 Tim. 4:4; 5:13-15; 2 Tim. 3:6-7; Titus 1:10-11). I have argued that women were particularly attracted to this teaching as it provided them with freedom from the constraints of the patriarchal family structure. In addressing women, therefore, precisely because of the problems facing the community, the author reinforces the traditional family values of both Jewish and Graeco-Roman cultures. The contrast between external adornment and moral virtue for women was a regular feature in ethical writings of the time. In particular, the author wants women to display sophrosune. This word occurs in verse 9 and 15 and is virtually untranslatable by a single word. It was one of the four Greek cardinal virtues and involves modesty, prudence, temperance, discretion, sound judgment and self-control.

This emphasis on sophrosune which frames this passage highlights both that verses 11-15 cannot be divorced from verses 9-10 and that the entire passage is rooted in the ethical concerns of the day. As David Scholer rightly notes: "...there is no exegetical, historical or hermeneutical basis to regard 2:9-10 as normatively different from 2:11-12. Nevertheless, most evangelicals, including those who see 2:11-12 as warrant for limiting women in ministry, take the injunctions against women's adornment in 2:9-10 to be culturally relative and do not seek to apply them in the unqualified terms in which they are stated. Furthermore, many who discuss 2:11-12 as warrant for limiting women in ministry do not even consider 2:9-10 in their discussion or they treat it rather briefly. The point is that 2:9-10 is intended to protect women from the enticements of the false teachers. Thus 2:9-10 is part of Paul's specific response to the false teaching in Ephesus that had been directed especially at women who had been made vulnerable by their treatment as inferior or marginal in society."⁶

To underline the point, if anyone insists, on the basis of this passage, that women cannot teach or exercise authority over men in the church today, then they must give equal seriousness to the injunction that women should dress appropriately, not have their hair braided, nor wear gold, pearls or expensive clothes. Either we take the whole passage as normative for today or we recognise that it is concerned with specific issues facing the community addressed.

The author goes on to address the crucial question of teaching within the community. That the question is raised at all demonstrates the prominence women enjoyed in early Christian communities. If women had never taught, or at least aspired to teach, there would be no need for the prohibition here. Some commentators, seeking to combine a respect for the passage with an egalitarian approach, have argued that the emphasis falls on "let a woman learn" and not on "I do not permit a woman to teach". I taught this for a number of years, but having spent a fair amount of time wrestling with the text, I am no longer persuaded by it.

First, the structure of verses 11 -12 forms what is technically known as a chiasm. This is a literary two-part structure in which the second half is a mirror image of the first. In the chiastic structure ABCBA, found in verses 11-12, the emphasis falls on the middle term C. In the text the phrase corresponding to C is "I do not permit a woman to teach" and so this is structurally where the emphasis lies. In any case, far too much is made of the supposedly revolutionary nature of "let a woman learn". "It simply goes too far to argue from this that he is herewith commanding that they be taught, thus inaugurating a new era for women. The rest of the data in the

New Testament makes it clear that that had already happened among most Christians. "⁷

Second, the author grounds his prohibition on women teaching and exercising authority over men in the creation account. If the Adam and Eve narrative were being used to support the imperative of verse 11, then reference to it should be placed immediately after "let a woman learn". The Genesis account provides a two-fold warrant for the author. First, the sequence of creation - Adam, then Eve - draws on "the widespread [contemporary] assumption that the first born ...has superior status and rightful authority over younger siblings".8 This supports his contention that a woman should not exercise authority over a man. Second, relying on Gen. 3:13, he argues that Eve, not Adam, was deceived. "The author's reasoning is that the deception of Eve and not Adam reveals this to be a weakness peculiar to women, and the particular success of the opponents with women confirms it. Thus women must not be permitted to exercise the crucial role of teacher lest their vulnerability to deception permit the spread of false teachings in the church (cf. 5:13)."⁹

Finally, reference to childbearing in verse 15 is highly unlikely to refer to the birth of Jesus for at least three reasons. First, it would be an obscure way of referring to the Incarnation. Second, the act of bearing Jesus is nowhere else suggested as the means of salvation. The word certainly cannot be stretched to mean Jesus himself Third, as stated above, the related verb occurs in 5:14 where it clearly refers to bearing children. It is a vital part of the author's argument that women find salvation through a role which is the exclusive preserve of women - that of childbearing. If some women were revelling in their freedom from the traditional household structure, and this made them susceptible to false teaching, then, to counter the effects of this false teaching, women will be saved from error by accepting their traditional role as childbearers. In an amazing twist on Gen. 3:16, the author insists that just as Eve, the archetypal woman, was "cursed" in childbearing as a result of her deception, so she will now he saved from deception by means of childbearing.

Those women who bear children are unlikely to be affected by the heresy. Of course, childbearing alone is no guarantee against error so women need to continue in faith, love and holiness with sophrosune. Many commen­tators argue that "save" here cannot mean salvation from error as it is consistently used in the Pastorals to denote redemption from sin. However, 1 Tim. 4:16 is consistently overlooked. Timothy is exhorted that, by paying close attention to himself and his teaching, he will be able to "save" (same Greek word) both himself and his hearers. In I Tim. 4, the context is clearly the refutation of error.

Jouette Bassler sums up what this passage is essentially about:

The reference to bearing children has an obvious anti-ascetic and thus anti-heretical thrust. It may be that because of the Pastor's concern to reject the celibate lifestyle advocated by his opponents, he sought here to counter the suggestion of Genesis that childbirth is a curse, an idea that would play into the hands of the heretics. Indeed, the heretics, who were skilled in manipulating Jewish myths (Titus 1:14), may have already exploited the potential of this idea. The Pastor then polemically transformed the Genesis curse into a Christian blessing, which may have operated on two levels. A woman will be saved from the allure of the heretical message by bearing children, and because she thus avoids making a shipwreck of her faith (I Tim 1: 19), she will also be saved in the absolute sense of the word, provided, of course, she continues in faith, love, and holiness. ¹⁰

Summary

To counter the effects of heretical teaching on women, the author reinforces the traditional expectations of women in Graeco-Roman society. He insists, in common with other contemporary ethical writings, that women should be examples of moral uprightness and fulfil their traditional family role as mothers, thereby saving themselves from the error of the opponents. In view of the perceived problem of deception, he refuses to allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man. He grounds his argument in the account of Adam and Eve found in Genesis 2-3.

Llovd Pietersen is currently doing doctoral research on the Pastoral Epistles at Sheffield University. In the second part of this article he will explore further the implications of this understanding of this passage.

End Notes

1. For further details see my paper, "Despicable Deviants: Labelling Theory and the Polemic of the Pastorals". Sociology of Religion 58:4 (1997), pp. 343-352.

2. Eusebius. Ecclesiastical History 5.18.3. Priscilla, according to Apollonius (cited by Eusebius in this passage), was thereafter called a virgin by the Montanists.

3. Verse 12 appears to suggest a vow of chastity and verses 1 1 and 14 refer to marriage and not remarriage.

4. Smyrnaeans 13.1, my emphasis.

5. I am indebted to Jouette M. Bassler, "The Widow's Tale: A Fresh Look at I Tim. 5:3-16", JBL 103 (1984), pp. 23-41, for an insightful analysis of this passage emphasising the attractiveness of freedom from the traditional household constraints for these celibate younger widows.

6. David M. Scholer, "1 Timothy 2:9-15 and the Place of Women in the Church's Ministry" in Alvera Mickelsen (ed.), Women, Authority and the Bible (Basingstoke: Marshall Pickering, 1987), pp. 193-219 (202). I am substantially in agreement with both Scholer's exegesis and conclusions.

7. Gordon D. Fee, I Timothy and 2 Timothy, Titus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1988), p. 72.

8. Jouette M. Bassler, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Abingdon New Testament Commentaries (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 1996), p. 60.

9. Jouette M. Bassler, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, pp. 60-61.

10. Jouette M. Bassler, "Adam, Eve, and the Pastor: The Use of Genesis 2-3 in the Pastoral Epistles," in G. Robbins (ed.), Genesis 1-3 in the History of Exegesis (Lewiston, NY: Mellon, 1988), pp. 43-65.

AT 18: Women and the Pastorals, Part 2

Part 2 of a two-part article by Lloyd Pietersen in his series on the Pastoral Epistles
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 18, Summer 1998

Timeless teaching or Cultural context?

I suspect that many readers will be disappointed with my exegesis of 1 Timothy 2:11-15 in the previous edition of Anabaptism Today. It appears to reaffirm the traditional interpretation of this passage, which denies any teaching role for women in the church. However, I have consistently stated that the passage has to be understood against the background of the serious nature of the opposition encountered in the communities receiving this letter. The author is proposing a specific solution to a very specific problem. This makes it unlikely that this text should be taken as some timeless command prohibiting women from any teaching or authoritative role in the church.

The major objection to the argument that this passage is a historically limited, ad hoc text is that the author seeks to ground his argument in the Genesis creation account. The appeal to so-called "creation ordinances", it is often argued, makes the author's prohibition particularly authoritative. However, the author is highly selective in his use of the Genesis material and draws on traditional Jewish exegesis of Genesis 3 to argue that Eve, rather than Adam, became a transgressor (1 Tim. 2:14).¹ The grounding of an argument in the Genesis creation account does not necessarily thereby give the argument universal, timeless significance. For example, Paul uses material from Genesis 2 in 1 Corinthians 11: 7-9 to support his argument that women ought to have their heads covered when they pray and prophesy. Most commentators would accept that the issue of head covering is culture-bound, yet Paul uses material from the so-called creation ordinances to buttress this culture-bound argument. To accept this in 1 Corinthians 11 :7-9 but to deny it in 1 Timothy 2:8-15 is, I suggest, hermeneuticallv inconsistent.²

Starting with Jesus?

Furthermore, to suggest that 1 Tim. 2:11-15 is a timeless prohibition on women teaching or exercising authority is to make this text the controlling centre for interpreting biblical teaching on the role of women. An Anabaptist hermeneutic refuses to start here but insists that this text must be read in the light of the way Jesus treated women. This is a massive subject in its own right, but here are a few examples:

• Women specifically travelled with Jesus alongside the twelve in his ministry of proclaiming the gospel (Lk. 8:1-3).

• Jesus cut across the traditional and religious concepts of a woman's role (Lk. 10:38-42; 11:27-28).

• Jesus held a theological conversation with a woman and specifically revealed himself to her as the Christ (Jn. 4:1-27).

• This woman was the instrument in evangelising many from her city (Jn. 4:39).

• According to John's account, Jesus first revealed himself after his resurrection to a woman and commissioned her to tell the disciples. She is thus the first eyewitness to the resurrection (Jn. 20:14-18).

Paul clearly follows in the Jesus tradition. As most commentators acknowledge, this is nowhere more clearly expressed than in Galatians 3:28. A cursory reading of Romans 16 also highlights the importance of women in Paul's ministry. In my view, the examples of Jesus and Paul bear eloquent testimony to the fact that 1 Timothy 2 cannot be treated in isolation and cannot be taken as a timeless injunction.

1 Timothy 2 today

What then are we to do with this text today? I conclude by listing some possible implications for those of us who want to take the text seriously but recognise its time-conditioned nature.

• I emphasised in the first part of this article that the whole of verses 8-15 form a unit. Although I have concentrated on verses 9-15, this point must not be forgotten. The whole unit forms a household code with reciprocal instructions to men and women. Exhortation in the form of a household code was given to encourage Christians to live respectably in accordance, as far as possible, with the rules of the surrounding society. As Towner has persuasively argued, this was not in order for the church to live comfortably, but to assist the church in its task of mission. ³ 1 Timothy 2:8­15 thus displays a sensitivity to the surrounding culture in order to advance the missionary activity of the community.

• In the same way, therefore, in the spirit of the household code, the church today should be sensitive to relevant developments and trends in our contemporary culture, in order effectively to engage with that culture in the task of mission. I would suggest that insisting on women having no teaching or leadership roles in the church today neither engages with our culture nor assists the church in its missionary task!

• The specific problems facing the communities addressed in 1 Timothy 2 required drastic action. The only way to deal with the problem of the effect false teaching was having on women in the communities was to prohibit any public teaching or authoritative role for women. Here we have the very real pastoral tension between the actual and the ideal. I do not think the spirit of Galatians 3:28 is entirely lost in the Pastorals. The author does not deal with the problem by clamping down on women entirely. He does still insist that they should learn (1 Tim. 2:11), he allows women deacons in the community (I Tim. 3:11),⁴ he acknowledges true widows as those who have set their hope on God and continue in prayer (1 Tim. 5:5) and older women do have a teaching role in relation to younger women (Titus 2:3-5).

• I would suggest, therefore, that this text illustrates that there are times when the pastoral problems faced by the church are of such magnitude that some clear principles (here, the egalitarian position of Gal. 3:28) have to be modified for a time (not abandoned) in the light of other clear principles (here, safeguarding the church from error) in order to deal with the problems at hand. Of course, how those principles are modified, by whom and for how long are not easy questions to answer.

• An Anabaptist Christocentric hermeneutic must, therefore, be carefully applied. It is not quite sufficient to appeal to the example of Jesus as though that settles the issue. Even in New Testament times, it was not always sufficient to refer to Jesus' example. Paul, for instance, acknowledges that it was a command of Jesus that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel (1 Cor. 9:14), yet he felt quite free to ignore this command. Paul recognised that what was appropriate for Jesus and his disciples in Palestine was not necessarily appropriate to the altered social circumstances of mission to the Hellenistic cities of the Mediterranean world.

• Nevertheless, a commitment to a suitably qualified Christocentric hermeneutic would serve to subvert all attempts to make texts such as the one under consideration normative. A tragedy of church history has been that texts such as 1 Timothy 2 have been divorced from the example of Jesus and have thus served to perpetuate, in the name of the New Testament, the subjection of women.

Finally, I can do no better than conclude with David Scholer's comments concerning the hermeneutical implications of this passage:

• The text speaks clearly and urgently about the importance of the church's sensitivity to the destructiveness of false teaching.

• The text speaks even more powerfully to the tension between the church's engagement with culture and its critique of culture.

• The text speaks most powerfully to a concern for sexual fidelity, faithfulness and respect between and among men and women, and to a concern for a rejection of material extravagance.

In the first century AD in the Roman Empire, sexual fidelity/infidelity and material extravagance/modesty were seen primarily as responsibilities of women. For us in conversation with this text in the church today, we must understand that faithfulness to each other as men and women and faithfulness to God with reference to material possessions are necessary for the "adornment" and integrity of the gospel in our world. 1 Timothy 2:9-15 says to the church today that such faithfulness between men and women and to the demands of the gospel must be expressed over against culture in order to speak attractively and persuasively with integrity to culture. Today we understand that both men and women share these demands together.⁶

Lloyd Pietersen, an accountant in Bristol, is currently doing doctoral research on the Pastoral Epistles at Sheffield University. The first part of this article appeared in Anabaptism Today, .Spring 1998, pp. 8-16.

End Notes

1. For example, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) reads: "From a woman sin had its beginning and because of her we all die."

2. See David M. Scholoar, "1 Timothy^, 2:9-15 and the Place of Women in the Church's Ministry" in Alvera Mickelsen (ed.), Women, Authority and the Bible (Basingstoke: Marshall Pickering, 1987), pp. 208-212; Philip H. Towner, The Goal of Our Instruction: The Structure of Theology and Ethics in the Pastoral Epistles, JSNT Supplement Series 34 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1989), pp. 217-218.

3. Towner, Goal.

4. I know this point is disputed but I am convinced that this is the best way structurally to read the ambiguous "women likewise" in 1 Tim. 3:11, coming as it does in the middle of a discussion about deacons. See Jouette M. Bassler, 1 Timothy, 2 Timothv, Titus, Abingdon New Testament Commentaries (Nashvlle, TN: Abingdon, 1996), pp.70-71.

5. See G. Thiessen, "Legitimation and Subsistence: An Essay on the Sociology of Early Christian Missionaries", in his The Social Setting of Pauline Christianity (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1982), pp. 27-67.

6. Scholer's response to Nancy Wiles Holsey's response to him in Women, Authority and the Bible, p. 253, note 87.

AT 19: Swiss Anabaptism and the Sword

by Andy Potter
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 19, Autumn 1998

He [God] admonishes us therefore to go out from Babylon and from the earthly Egypt, that we may not be partakers in their torment and suffering, which the Lord will bring upon them ... Thereby shall also fall away from us the diabolical weapons of violence - such as sword, armour, and the like, and all of their use to protect friends or against enemies - by virtue of the word of Christ: "you shall not resist evil."¹

These words taken from the Schleitheim Confession (1527) capture what is for many people the dominant image of early Swiss Anabaptism - that of a separatist, pacifist movement. However, whilst this is certainly an accurate picture of the movement by the end of the 1520s, it is not true of the entire movement in its earliest years. In fact the first few years of the Swiss Anabaptist movement were marked by a variety of approaches to the Sword and it was only with the Schleitheim Confession that widespread agreement was reached.

The Sword in Early Swiss Anabaptism

The Swiss Anabaptist movement had its roots in the tension which existed from the second half of 1523 between Ulrich Zwingli and a group of erstwhile supporters, including both Conrad Grebel and Felix Mantz. As early as September 1524, Grebel set out his vision of a believers' church which seemed both to embrace pacifism and move towards apoliticism. In a letter to Thomas Muntzer, he wrote that,

The gospel and its adherents are not to be protected by the sword, nor [should] they [protect] themselves... True believing Christians are sheep among wolves, sheep for the slaughter. They must be baptised in anguish and tribulation, persecution, suffering and death, tried in fire, and must reach the fatherland o f eternal rest not by slaying the physical but the spiritual. They use neither worldly sword nor war, since killing has ceased with them entirely. ²

The logical implication of Grebel's argument that Christians wield "neither worldly sword nor war" is that they should not participate in the process of government and by December 1524 Zwingli was reporting that some of his opponents believed that "no one who is a ruler can be a Christian."³Felix Mantz seems to have held similar views to Grebel and his position is beautifully expressed in his farewell song penned shortly before his death sentence:

The true love of Christ shall scatter the enemy; so that he who would be an heir with Christ is taught that he must be merciful, as the Father in heaven is merciful... Christ never hated anyone; neither did his true servants, but they continued to follow Christ in the true way, as he went before them. This Light of life they have before them, and are glad to walk in it; but those who are hateful and envious, and do thus wickedly betray, accuse, smite and quarrel, cannot be Christians. ⁴

Initially Anabaptism spread as a series of inter-related local initiatives in response to local issues and concerns rather than as a single, coherent movement. For instance, much of the effort of the Anabaptist congregation in the village of Zollikon was spent on clarifying and defending their position on the meaning and significance of baptism rather than working out the ethical and ecclesiological implications which follow. In fact, testimonies from the village say very little concerning government and the Sword (despite the fact that most of the adult men in the village were experienced soldiers) and there is no evidence that Zollikon Anabaptism espoused a doctrine of apolitical non-resistance.

However, the growth of Anabaptism in 1525 cannot be understood apart from the Peasants' War which affected many parts of Central Europe, particularly the German-speaking regions. The war was part of the ongoing conflict between landowners and peasants which was one consequence of the shift from a feudal society to a capitalist one. Although the conflict had its roots in economic and political issues, it also had significant ecclesiastical and religious components (not only was the church one of the major landowners at the time but the vast majority of the upper clergy were an integral part of the aristocracy and thus dependent on the revenues produced by their serfs and tenant farmers). Indeed, many in the peasants' movement believed that the Reformation meant not only religious reform but also social change which would lead to a more egalitarian society, in which they would have both a political and a religious voice. As historian Arnold Snyder observes, the peasants' revolt" was a search for social, economic and political redress which found ideological legitimisation in Reformation concepts."⁵

The Anabaptist movement thus found a sympathetic audience, not only in the religiously motivated common people who longed for a reform in both the structures and practices of the church, but also among those who were disaffected with social and economic conditions. However, their very success among the lower-middle and artisan classes presented Anabaptist leaders with a stark choice as to whether or not to support the peasants in their increasingly violent struggle. In practice, a number of Anabaptist reformers entered into de facto alliances with the peasants and it is likely that some of those who were baptised actually took up arms. For instance, Hans Krusi, the reformer of St Gall, gave the peasants moral support in their battle against tithes. In return, the peasants pledged themselves to defend their preacher with arms (unfortunately for Krusi, they failed to carry out their pledge when he was arrested in the middle of the night!).

In the town of Hallau, the peasants' struggle for local autonomy and opposition to the tithe on both religious and economic grounds provided the context for Wilhelm Reublin and Johannes Broth's attempt to create a radical Anabaptist variety of Reformed Christendom. Initially the two reformers enjoyed great success and, in the early months of 1525, virtually the entire population of the town was baptised. At the same time, peasant troops from the town participated in a variety of local armed conflicts, including an attempt to occupy the nearby city of Neunkirch, and when the Schaffhausen council tried to imprison Brotli and Reublin, the rebellious villagers actively protected their pastors. Whilst there is no evidence that Brotli and Reublin themselves were active participants in violence, it is clear that they were willing to receive armed protection and implicitly, at least, to legitimise the use of the sword in a "just cause." Indeed, it is difficult to imagine how the Anabaptist movement could have taken root as a populist one in towns such as Hallau if it had completely disassociated itself from the peasants' struggle.

In the town of Waldshut, north of Zurich, the reformer was Balthasar Hubmaier. Hubmaier initially set out his reformation programme in April 1524, which he began to implement a few months later, although it was not until Easter 1525 that he was baptised (by Reublin) and began to baptise others, including the majority of the town council. By this time, the town was under the military protection of the peasant army, whom Hubmaier believed were engaged in justified resistance to tyranny. Consequently, during April and May, the city gave military assistance to the peasant army in the form of men, cannon and wagons. In July 1525, in the middle of the peasants' struggle, Hubmaier stated his position on the Sword as follows, "there should be a government which carries the Sword ... The more Christian it is, the more it, like Solomon, asks God for wisdom to rule."⁶

Hubmaier's comment, and the development of Anabaptism in St Gall, Hallau and Waldshut, point to the fact that the movement as a whole had yet to develop and articulate a pacifist, separatist ethic. In fact, the mass Anabaptism of these towns (which was for most of 1525 the main locus of Swiss Anabaptism) was rooted in the idea of a popular, voluntary, Anabaptist church ruled by a Christian government. There is no suggestion at this stage that social and governmental functions, such as the magistracy or even the army, were regarded as inappropriate spheres for Christian participation. Nonetheless, even in these towns there are hints of a more apolitical approach. In Waldshut, Jacob Gross and Ulrick Teck were exiled for refusing to fight alongside the peasants, although Gross was willing to accept non-combatant service. Similarly, Junghans Waldshuter from Hallau was exiled for his less than wholehearted support for the peasants' cause. After his exile he argued that "a Christian government should not kill people ... [since] no Christian is permitted to kill."⁷

The Schleitheim Confession

By the end of 1525, the peasants' revolt had failed and the fledgling Anabaptist movement faced a much more hostile environment. Hubmaier had fled Waldshut; Reublin and Brotli had left Hallau, whilst Grebel, Mantz, and others were held in prison. Although Grebel escaped in March 1526, he died soon after of the plague. It is at this point that Michael Sattler, an ex-Benedictine prior, emerges as one of the leaders of Swiss Anabaptism. It was Sattler who would give voice to the radical separatism which would soon become a defining tenet of Swiss Anabaptism.

Whilst it is not clear when Sattler joined the Anabaptist movement, by June 1526 he is reported as "preaching, teaching and baptising in the same Swiss villages where the peasants had earlier taken up arms."8 At some point, his ministry spread to Strasbourg and the surrounding area, where he held discussions with Bucer and Capito, the city's reformers. Subsequently, Sattler wrote to them in the form of twenty articles, in which he justified his Anabaptist position and appealed for the release of some Anabaptist prisoners in the city. These articles foreshadow what was to become a central theme in the Schleitheim Confession, that of the basic duality between the Kingdom of Christ and the Kingdom of the world, in which Christians are seen as citizens of heaven and not of earth, with no further need of worldly arms.

By the beginning of 1527, the movement was in severe danger; local authority persecution had intensified (Felix Mantz was drowned by the Zurich authorities in early January), whilst conversations with the Strasbourg Reformers had reached an impasse. It was at this crucial time

that leaders of the fledgling Anabaptist movement converged on Schleitheim and, guided by Sattler, produced a document which not only provides a biblical and theological grounding to the Anabaptist experience of persecution, but also sets out a fundamentally different vision of reform from the magisterial model, albeit one which is achieved by being separate from the world and by living and modelling an alternative vision of church and society.

The confession itself comprises seven articles: baptism, ban, the Lord's Supper, separation from the world and all evil, shepherds, sword, and oath. The fourth article describes a church which is separated from a sinful world:

Now there is nothing else in the world and all creation than good or evil, believing and unbelieving, darkness and light, the world and those who are [come] out of the world, God's temple and idols. Christ and Belial, and none will have part with the other.⁹

It continues by rejecting the use of "the diabolical weapons of violence - such as sword, armour and the like." However, it is the article on the Sword which, more than any other, sets out the separatist non-resistance stance which was quickly to become the norm in Swiss Anabaptism. This article asserts that, whilst government is installed by God in order to punish the wicked and protect the good, it is "outside the perfection of Christ" and thus a no-go area for Christians. Moreover, Christians should forsake the Sword even "against the wicked for the protection or defence of the good, or for the sake of love." Rather, the disciple of Christ should be meek and lowly of heart, acting with mercy and forgiveness, refusing to pass sentence in disputes and strife about worldly matters or to participate as a magistrate in the government of the temporal realm. Christians, it argues, are citizens of heaven, not of this world, whose battle is not against the flesh, but against "the fortifications of the devil", and whose weapons are spiritual not physical. Thus, whilst the worldly are "armed with steel and iron.... Christians are armed with the armour of God, with truth, righteousness, peace, faith, salvation and with the Word of God."¹⁰

After the events of 1525 and 1526, Swiss Anabaptism became a largely rural, "underground" movement, whilst further persecution also saw notable migrations to places where there was either outright toleration of Anabaptism or where legal enforcement was less severe. Nonetheless, Hubmaier from his new base in the Moravian city of Nicholsburg continued to reject separatist non-resistance as a valid option. In his final work, On the Sword,¹¹ published a month after Sattler's execution in June 1527, he argued that Christians, much to their own regret, are citizens of this world and that the governmental role of punishing the evil and protecting the good is best accomplished by a Christian government. Christians are to imitate Christ by being faithful to their calling, "be it in government or obedience."

Ironically, just one month after the publication of On the Sword, Hubmaier was arrested. He was subsequently to suffer the full force of the governmental Sword when he was burned at the stake in Vienna in March 1528 as a rebel and a heretic. His state-church Anabaptism did not survive much longer and, although the text of Schleitheim was quoted infrequently as the century wore on, its Christocentric, separatist, non-resistant position on the sword not only survived but became the political ethic of the Anabaptists.

And Today...

Nearly 500 years after the emergence of Swiss Anabaptism, in the vastly different political and ecclesiological environment of the late twentieth century, the contrasting approaches of Sattler and Hubmaier and of Hallau and Schleitheim still remain before the Anabaptist movement. In reality, the challenge for contemporary Anabaptists is probably how to combine the best from both approaches whilst learning from their weaknesses. In outline, some of the features of such a witness might include:

• viewing the church as a paradigm whose mission is to reveal God's intention for the whole of human society;

• combining a vision for social transformation with a healthy suspicion of worldly power (whilst rejecting the "pure church"/"evil world" polarity);

• working for the reduction of all forms of violence, coercion and oppression and towards the establishment of shalom;

• being willing to form tactical alliances with those outside our community where there is a common interest;

• giving priority to grassroots activism ("the mustard seed conspiracy");¹²

• following the pattern of Jesus by obedience to his teaching and his example.

Andy Potter has recently completed studies at Spurgeon 's College and is now minister of the Baptist Church in Margate, Kent.

Notes

1 Translated by J.H. Yoder, The Schleitheim Confession (Scottdale: Herald, 1973).

2 Letter from Grebel to Munster, Zurich, September 5, 1524. Translated in Harder, L., The Sources of Swiss Anabaptism (Scottdale: Herald, 1985), 290.

3 J.M. Stayer, Anabaptists and the Sword (2nd Edition) (Lawrence, 1976), 103.

4 Felix Mantz, "Admonition", 1526. Translated in Klaassen, Anabaptism in Outline (Scottdale: Herald, 1981), 268.

5 C.A. Snyder, Anabaptist History and Theology: An Introduction (Kitchener: Pandora, 1995), 32.

6 Balthasar Hubmaier, "On the Christian Baptism of Believers", 1525. Translated in Pipkin, and Yoder, Balthasar Hubmaier, Theologian of Anabaptism (Scottdale:: Herald, 1988), 98.

7 Stayer, "Reublin and Broth: The Revolutionary Beginnings of Swiss Anabaptism", The Origins and Characteristics of Anabaptism (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1977), 100.

8 Snyder, Anabaptist History and Theology, 60.

9 Yoder, The Schleitheim Confession, 12.

10 Ibid, 14-16.

1 I Balthasar Hubmaier, "On The Sword", Translation in Pipkin and Yoder, 494-523.

12 This is the title of a book by Tom Sine (London: MARC Europe, 198 1) which documents a wide range of grassroots Christian social action.

AT 20: Interactive Preaching

by Jeremy Thomson
Originally Published by Anabaptism Today, Issue 20, Spring 1999

Preaching sermons lies at the heart of church life in the Protestant tradition. For Luther, the preaching of the Word virtually constituted the church, while much of Calvin’s output consisted of sermons. Many books on the theory and practice of preaching continue to flow from the religious and academic publishers. In recent years, The Proclamation Trust has been set up to encourage quality expository preaching in Britain. For most evangeli­cal church leaders, preparing to preach sermons is a major, regular responsibility. In choosing a new minister, most churches look for someone who can deliver good sermons (however “good” might be defined).

Since I left ordained Anglican ministry in 1988, I have listened to many more sermons than I have preached, in Anglican, United Reformed, Free and now Baptist churches. A sizeable proportion of them have been, frankly, appalling: apparently biblical, but actually a string of references merely following hackneyed themes, frequently boring and sometimes arrogantly delivered. But even if they had helped me to understand and apply the Scriptures, challenged my discipleship, or renewed my vision for the church, I would still be left with doubts about the high profile of the conventional sermon in the life of the church. Before I became immersed in the Anabaptist tradition, I wrote an essay which questioned the preoccupa­tion with sermons in several church traditions, and this was published by Grove Books in December 1996.

That essay challenged the common equation of preaching with the delivery of monologue sermons. It sought to understand the high estimation that sermons enjoy in Lutheran and particularly Reformed theologies of preaching, and offered an alternative theology for a more dialogical kind of preaching. Three years ago, I became convinced by John Howard Yoder’s writings that conventional Protestant ways of understanding the church inhibited a proper appreciation of human community at the centre of church life. Since then, I have sought to understand Yoder’s doctrine of the church and have developed several further considerations about preaching and sermons. Here I will summarise my earlier argument from the New Testament and then outline three of these new considerations.

The Argument from the New Testament

In the New Testament, the word “preach” translates several different Greek words which mean to bring good news, proclaim, speak, and so on. It is used in Acts and the Epistles for situations which we might call evangelis­tic, rather than teaching committed Christians. Preaching appears to vary in format and setting from a fairly formal monologue (e.g. Acts 13:16-41) to a Bible study in a chariot (Acts 8:35). Many other terms are used which indicate considerable verbal interaction between preacher and hearers: argue, persuade, dispute, discuss, converse.

When the activity is geared to teaching the committed, the same variety is to be found. There are some blocks of teaching, like Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, but he might also ask questions of his disciples and interact with them in houses or on the road. At Troas, Paul spoke to the believers through the night (Acts 20:7-12), but we should not think of this as a monologue, interrupted only by Eutychus’ fall from the window; the Greek words imply verbal interaction between Paul and his hearers.

The early history of the Christian sermon is not clear, but it seems that there was at least some congregational participation in patristic homilies. Over the years, the formal sermon has developed and the congregation has come to expect to listen in silence. Pastoral ministry may include some more interactive teaching, and some valuable learning takes place in Bible study/ discussion groups. But for most preachers, the real business happens in church on a Sunday, from a pulpit. And there would be shock, indignation, reprimand even, should a member of the congregation ask a question of the preacher in mid-sermon!

Now interpretation of the New Testament cannot separate what is said from how it is said. The manner of preaching and teaching in the Bible conveys significant attitudes concerning human nature and ways of learning. So I conclude that there remains a place for formal presentation of the gospel or teaching of believers, but that the monologue must not be overvalued, since it is only one form among many, and the informal and interactive are no less important.

The Relationship between God and his People

Defenders of the traditional sermon sometimes accuse those who would challenge it of wanting to undermine the authority of God’s word or of having no message to proclaim. But I would counter this by arguing that we have become so used to the great doctrine of the word of God that we confine to the realm of prayer the less well known doctrine of the listening of God. Here we need to do some biblical theology, starting with the Old Testament.

The non-negotiable heart of the Law was not given by human mediation at all (Exodus 20:1, 18f). It is true that Moses (and later prophets) had a vital role in conveying and interpreting God’s word, priests taught the law, and sages emphasised listening to and obeying instruction (Proverbs 6:20). So we might conclude that communication between God and human beings was unidirectional, with certain figures acting as mouthpieces. However, it is clear (from passages like Genesis ??: 17-32, Exodus 3:4-4:17, and several places in the prophets) that God wanted an interactive relationship with certain people in the Old Testament. Even more significantly, it is not only with certain key people that God formed an interactive relationship, but with the people of Israel as a whole. Their ancient confession, the Shema, (“Hear”, as in Deuteronomy 6:4) reflected on God’s original command at Sinai (Exodus 20:2-3). But before God spoke to the Israelites, he had heard their cry for help (Exodus 2:23-25; 3:7-9). This was because God had previously committed himself to Israel in a relationship of love(Deuteronomy 7:7-11; Hosea 11:1-4), and love listens as well as speaks. Speech is only part of a relationship: listening is “The Other Side of Language”.55 This is the title of Gemma Corradi Fiumara’s philosophy of listening, (Routledge, London, 1990). Perhaps it is significant that a woman should write such a book, since men generally find listening more difficult than women. In fact, I wonder whether the historical domination of preaching by men has been a factor in the careful guarding of its monologue format. The lament or complaint psalms were uttered on the premise that God listens and responds to his people. The psalms of praise and thanks-giving were vehicles for the people to express their response to and confidence in God.

I would argue that the conversational or interactive relationship which God sought with Israel (though it was frequently compromised by Israel), as well as with certain key people in Israel, begins to shift the role of the prophet or other leader away from that of mouthpiece (as in conventional religious views of revelation), and the role of the people away from that of passive recipients. It is only the beginning of a shift, since Moses realises the limitations imposed upon the people by restricted access to God’s Spirit (Numbers 11:29) and Joel must look forward to a pouring out of the Spirit on all (Joel 2:28). But, of course, the Spirit was given to the church on the Day of Pentecost, and now no human being plays an exclusive or unques-tionable role in the reception of God’s word. While there are various gifts and ministries, it is through the church as a community that God’s word is perceived66 Yoder expounds this brilliantly in his essay, “The Hermeneutics of Peoplehood”, in The Priestly Kingdom (University of Notre Dame Press, 1984), pp 15-44..

I am claiming that the great variety of means of communication employed in the Gospels and Acts77 Of course many of the Epistles were also part of an ongoing dialogical relationship between the writers and churches. Several letters passed between the Corinthians and Paul., involving speak-ing and listening, initiative and response, bears witness to the relational nature of human beings and to the way God communicates with the church. Having made us this way, and enlivened us by his Spirit, God communi­cates with us accordingly. The fact that Jesus and his followers encouraged dialogue, entered debate, and conversed with people does not mean that they had nothing to communicate or lacked authority. It means that their communication was richly relational; they respected their interlocutors to the extent of listening as well as speaking. Only by the recognition of the particularity of their conversation partners could Jesus and the apostles match the expression of their message to its recipients and communicate effectively. Only by involving the receivers of their communication at the level of linguistic self-expression could they help them to articulate their own mistaken assumptions, or doubts, or growing faith.

The Issue of Modelling

I would suggest that the dominant monological preaching paradigm can be traced to a master/slave model of God’s relationship to human beings, characterised by commands or issuing instructions, as it were, by mega-phone. We have seen that this paradigm is partly present, but partly undermined in the Old Testament. While there is a proper reverence before God’s word, and it is true that we are “unworthy servants” (Luke 17:10), this emphasis is balanced in the New Testament by Jesus calling his disciples “no longer servants but friends” (John 15:15). Thus, although there should be significant times for a church to listen to God’s word in humble submission in the form of conventional preaching (or prophecy or other ministry), a church needs to see modelled other ways in which God speaks with the church. The use of more interactive forms of preaching would have a significant modelling function.

The image of the preacher, “six feet above contradiction”, is at least partly derived from the supposed authority of the clergy over the lay congregation. There is no need for me to argue that the abusive clergy-laity divide should come to an end, since Alan Kreider has ably presented the case88 “Abolishing the Laity”, in Paul Beasely-Murray (ed.): Anyone for Ordination (Tunbridge Wells: MARC, 1993) pp 84-111.. I believe that church leaders are worthy of respect, but that they must actively look for ways to break down the conventional religious expectations which keep recurring in churches. Here is a key practice with which preachers and teachers can undermine the clergy-laity mind-set. We can model a way of communicating which reflects God’s own way if we stimulate more questions and allow more interaction.

Ordering Systematic Theology

Those who set great store by the sermon often emphasise the doctrine of the word of God. The doctrine of the church comes much further down their list of priorities. This is understandable because the Reformation definition of the church was usually in terms of “where the Word of God is properly preached and the sacraments properly administered”. Such a definition placed the emphasis upon the one who exercised ordained ministry, not on the community who made up the church. But if the focus were to be moved from the leaders of the church to the congregation as a whole, as Yoder argues99 The Royal Priesthood (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994) pp 76ff., a more convincing definition of the church could be given. The church is made up of those whose basic personal posture is to confess Jesus as Lord110 Yoder, The Royal Priesthood, p 171.0. Now I would suggest that our thinking about the ministry of the word in the church should come logically after our thinking about the church.

Here we need to consider more carefully the recipients of preaching and teaching. In the New Testament, preaching the good news was aimed at unbelievers, whereas believers were taught about growth in discipleship. Many contemporary sermons aim at converting unbelievers, even when most present have some Christian faith and the rest of the “service” assumes they are (creed, prayers, hymns). An Anabaptist view of the church would suggest that in the gathering of Christians the assumption can be made that Christian faith is shared and the emphasis can be on teaching disciples. This is not to say all are disciples, but those who are not are most likely to be challenged by such teaching. It is outside the church gathering that evangelism goes on; largely informally, but sometimes more formally, preaching the gospel occurs. Thus, evangelistic preaching builds the church in the sense of adding to its number those who are being saved. But teaching disciples builds the church in the sense of developing maturity and deepening community.

This view of things is clearly reflected in I Corinthians 14. Yoder points out that this chapter was an important in the discussions of church life all across the Reformation movement in its early years111 John Howard Yoder: Body Politics (Nashville: Discipleship Resources, 1992) pp 64-67.1. It is a chapter which submits the spiritual gifts of prophecy and tongues to the criterion “what builds the church?” (vv.-5, 12, 26) and which allows to the whole church an importantt weighing function as to what constitutes God’s word (v26-32). Of course, the magisterial reformers had subsequently to distance themselves from such a revolutionary understanding of how God speaks to the church, since it relativised their authoritarian role as preachers. But the Anabaptists were able to able to embody it in a style of church life which allowed much more participation to the church community (at least, to begin with).

Common usage of the term “preaching” seems to reflect not only the confinement of the ministry of the word to the monologue given by a select few, but also confusion about the identity of the church. It should be clear by now that I believe an Anabaptist view of preaching depends upon an Anabaptist ecclesiology. Anabaptists can ask searching questions concern-ing the effectiveness of preaching more easily than can our mainstream Protestant friends simply because preaching is less of an icon of our identity.

A Personal Reflection and Conclusion

In my own experience, I would say that God has spoken to me through some sermons, but these are but one channel among many, including group Bible study, talks followed by questions, reading books and conversations with friends. When it has been a question of God’s word to the church, again the sermon has sometimes been effective, but more often than not this has been a means of avoiding grappling with the real issues at stake, or of imposing a leadership view.

I do not deny that some people have been richly taught, helped and encouraged by great sermons. But I want to maintain that many people who insist stridently on the central importance of the sermon have a one-dimensional understanding of the way God speaks and a limited vision of the church. I believe that teachers and preachers should be looking for ways to break old models of dependency and remodel their ministries around the flexibility and adaptability of Jesus and the apostles, looking for more interactive relationships with their hearers.

So, while I would not argue that conventional sermons should cease, I do believe that they should be viewed as one of a number of ministries of the word. From time to time, a conventional sermon will be appropriate, but at other times a sermon might be followed by a time of questions from the congregation, a talk might lead into guided discussion, or other forms of educational activity might be adopted to enable people to hear and learn from God’s word what discipleship in today’s world means112 For further explorations of the practical implications, see the penultimate section of Preaching as Dialogue. If you want to pursue the subject further, I can recommend David Norrington’s To Preach or not to Preach? (Paternoster Press, 1996), which examines the historical origins of the sermon and argues that it fails to foster the maturity which New Testament writers envisage for disciples.2.

NOTES

Jeremy Thomson is a theological educator and relationship counsellor, currently completing a doctorate in the ecclesiology of John H Yoder at King’s College, London. He is the author of Preaching as Dialogue: Is the Sermon a Sacred Cow?

AT 20: Is a Peace Church Possible?: The Church’s “Domestic” Life

The second in a series of articles by Alan Kreider
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 20, Spring 1999

Developing the Reflexes of Peacemakers

Growing up in a Mennonite church family, I often saw a picture – a seventeenth-century engraving of a man, on the edge of cracking ice, reaching down to save another man who had fallen through and was in danger of drowning. As a child, I didn’t understand much about the story. I knew it had taken place long ago in Holland – there was a windmill in the background – and I knew the rescuer’s name, Dirk Willems. But I didn’t know what religious persecution was, or that the man whose life was being saved would be forced to arrest Dirk, leading to his burning for heresy; I didn’t think about the unfairness of the situation, or why God hadn’t protected the life of his servant. I didn’t ask whether Dirk did the right thing; should he have run away so he could survive, even if it meant his pursuer drowning? Above all, I didn’t ask why Dirk did it. Why did he, instead of running to safety, turn back?

Since then I have heard, and told, Dirk’s story many times – it, and the engraving by Jan Luyken, have become a kind of Anabaptist icon. And the question of “why” has become ever more powerful in my mind. Why did Dirk turn back? It wasn’t that he spent much time thinking about what he should do. People who drown in icy waters don’t sink slowly; they go down fast. So when Dirk heard his pursuer’s cry, he didn’t have time to calculate outcomes or weigh ethical options. He had to react. Dirk’s response was absolutely reflexive. And so my question has become: what shaped Dirk’s reflexes? How did he develop the reflexes and habits that enabled him to respond to his enemy’s need?

Reflexes are important. We all, like Dirk, have reflexes – spontaneous responses under pressure. Conventionally these are fight and flight. But Dirk responded differently, in a surprising and question-posing way. Dirk’s reflexes had been trained, probably by two things. One was his decision to follow Jesus. As an Anabaptist Christian he had pondered Jesus’ life and teachings. He knew that he, as a follower of Jesus, was called to love his enemies. He may have prayed that when under pressure he would do what Jesus had taught. The other thing shaping Dirk’s reflexes was the life of his Christian community. Reflexes like Dirk’s are possible in individuals, but they are shaped in a group of people among whom habits are formed and norms become normal. I suspect Dirk responded as he did because he came from a particular kind of church, in which loving the enemy was an expres­sion of loving the Lord who had taught Dirk to love his enemies.

Reflecting on Dirk’s life and death can help us become a peace church. For, at the deepest level, the kind of church we are – a peace church or another kind of church – is the product of our reflexes. Our reflexes, like our values and our deep convictions, are shaped by the people with whom we share at the deepest level and with whom we have the deepest ties.

Who shapes you? Who trains your reflexes? Your church? Your family and friends? Or commercials on TV, films, soaps? If it is your church, does your church shape you to demonstrate – in your individual reflexes as in your common life – the teachings and way of Jesus to the world?

The Church as a Culture of Peace

The church is called to be a culture shaped by the God we worship and the story we tell. We are not called to be against culture; our life and witness will inevitably take cultural form. But we have an exciting destiny – to become not a moral majority but a prophetic minority. Christians cannot dominate the world any more. In a multicultural situation in which no culture can force others to do things in its way, we have the opportunity to develop a distinctive cultural identity – growing out of our life in fellowship with Jesus Christ; the opportunity to develop distinctive practices in keeping with his teachings and way.

We can become a “contrast society”.¹ Whether Catholic or Baptist, Anglican or New Church, we can become “nonconformists”, who are not conformed to other cultural options because we seek to be conformed to Jesus Christ. We can develop new reflexes; we can find new things to be possible or worth working on. It’s this kind of church, worshipping this kind of Lord, that enables the term “peace church” to make sense.

For the church to make a contribution to the healing of the world, we must allow God to change us, its members. God longs for us to be a people who believe that the Gospel is true, and hence who are becoming a people of peace and forgiveness. God invites us, in Christ, to accept his peace and to learn how to be peacemakers. Richard Chartres, Anglican bishop of London, writes: “At the top of the agenda of every human society is going to be the question of how we relate, how we live peacefully together, and the church as a school of relating...is very well placed to make a contribution.”²

We won’t do this by avoiding conflict. We will do it by developing, as Dirk did, reflexes that enable us to deal with conflict positively and hopefully. Through Christ God has made peace with us; and he wants to equip us to make peace with each other – and through this to become peacemakers in the world. The church has nothing to offer to the world other than what it has learned to live in its own “domestic” life.

But how does this happen? How can we become such a “school of relating?” How can we become apprentices who are learning the craft of peacemaking? How can we become a prophetic minority whose reflexes are enemy-loving and peacemaking? How can we become a peace church?

The Disciplines of Peacemaking

Jesus, in Matthew 18:15-20, gives us a clue: we cannot make peace in the world until we have learned to make peace within the church.³ The passage deals with a situation in which “another member of the church sins against you”, and establishes a procedure for dealing with this. Jesus assumes there will be problems in the church. In verse 15, Jesus gives instructions about what to do “if a brother/sister sins”. He does not indicate that this is surprising. People sin. Indeed, sins in relationships happen when people share their lives on more than a superficial level. In the church people sin; sometimes they sin against us. Of course, we also sin against others – in Matthew 5:23 Jesus reminds us that our brother/sister may “have something against us”. There will always be sin and conflicts in the church. The question is: how do we handle them?

Jesus’ instruction is not to make peace but to make conflict. Don’t avoid the conflict, Jesus says; face into it. Don’t talk to someone else, but go directly to the person to point out the fault privately. Don’t gossip. Jesus admonishes his disciples to confrontation – but confrontation of a particular kind. Jesus-style confrontation is marked by good speaking and good listening. Three times he emphasises that the other person listens. Jesus invites his disciples to engage in a process of give and take. When this process begins, we don’t know what will happen. By speaking we may discover a new clarity in our view of the situation; as the other listens she may find a new understanding of herself – and may repent. But we may also discover that the other person has a truth, perspective or pain that transforms our understanding. We may even discover that we have sinned against her, and thus that we need to repent.

If this one-on-one conversation doesn’t lead to right relationships, a process ensues. At every stage, Jesus emphasises listening. We are to take one or two others along, to confirm what is said by listening well, with the goal that the other party will “listen”. If they refuse, then we are to “tell it to the church”. But if the offender “refuses to listen” even to the church? Then the offender is to be to us “as a Gentile and a tax collector”. Jesus is clear that listening is a core value of the community; so that by not listening, the brother or sister has shown that they are outside the commu­nity. They do not honour its core values; they will not allow their reflexes to be shaped by its reflexes. So, says Jesus, treat them as outsiders; treat them as well as Jesus treated Gentiles and tax collectors (with love and hope); but recognise that they are not participants in the new culture of the Messianic community.

Jesus is present in this peacemaking through confrontations: “there am I among them” (v 20). Jesus has promised to be present when his disciples are practising the art of loving confrontation, when we are developing the skill of good listening. So when we are about to speak directly to someone whom we have offended, or who has offended us, we can pray: “Jesus, you promised to be among us; please be with us now as we differ and seek your way.”

This is teaching for forgiven sinners. It is not for a pure church, but for a church of people whom God has forgiven. Immediately after this passage in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus reminds Peter that the members of his community are to forgive without limit – seventy times seven (18:21-22). Jesus is telling his disciples: when you go into conflict, go as forgiven people to other forgiven people. You are all debtors; your peacemaking is rooted in grace! So go with humility – but go, because truth in relationships is what the church is all about.

Jesus’ teaching about conflict and peacemaking in the church is basic to being a peace church. He does not promise that this will always lead to “success”. Sometimes a direct approach to someone who has offended us will lead to healing self-disclosures and a wonderful repair of relationships. At other times people may refuse to “listen”, or we ourselves may abort the process. There are situations in which a power imbalance can make a direct approach difficult. But note that Jesus has constructed a process (“take one or two others along with you”) which seems designed to deal with power imbalance. It was clearly immensely important to Jesus that his disciples would not be deflected from practising the craft of peacemaking, so that their communities would be cultures of peace in a world of war.

Conflict Is Normal

How revolutionary Jesus was being! He didn’t sweep conflict under the carpet; he was clear that conflict is normal. Jesus’ own peacemaking activities led him into conflict (“I have not come to bring peace but division” [Luke 12:51]). And his disciples after the resurrection also had conflict. The composition of their groups led to problems and conflict; it was bound to, for God was drawing together astonishingly different people – people who didn’t belong together – to be members of communities of peace. And, in any event, new religious movements such as the early church always have conflict. It seems a rule that where people are serious about life and issues, differences are inevitable. Conflict was present in the Christian movement from the outset. But the biblical accounts make it clear that this conflict was often important and useful.

A sample of this is Acts 6:1-7, a story of conflict in the Jerusalem church between the “Hebrews” and the “Hellenists”. The church’s system of feeding people was not working, and the weakest people in the community – widows among the immigrants (Hellenists) – were being neglected. This led to conflict, and a fascinating process ensued. The leaders called the commu­nity together, reminded them of their holistic vision (feeding people as well as proclaiming the word), and established an interactive decision-making process in which people were full participants. The result was heartening: they chose men from the weaker community to help with the distribution, so everyone got fed and the word continued to be proclaimed. Here it is clear that friction between differing groups can be productive. God’s Spirit works, not just through prophetic words, but through good process. Conflict can be good. And a warning: where conflict is not acknowledged, where people fear conflict or think it is wrong, things will get very unhealthy. The results will be thoroughly unpleasant: anger, depression, explosions, broken relationships, people damaged and alienated from the church…

Our Society Has Trouble with Conflict

We have trouble receiving Jesus’ teaching and putting it into practice. We live in an environment that is not conducive to good conflict or peacemaking – a world of polarisation, of adversarial thinking and acting, of winners and losers. The House of Commons has a classic confrontational format, people facing each other across a void and heckling each other. Law courts are as confrontational as Parliament. And churches unfortunately function much like the rest of society.

Our Churches Can Learn to Handle Conflict Well

The culture of our churches is notorious for poor conflict. Non-Christians, insofar as they know of us, often make fun of us for strife and hypocrisy. But it doesn’t need to be so. Our churches can become Christian cultures, in which conflict is handled well and is an aspect of peacemaking. The basic skills for handling conflict well are not difficult to understand; but it takes time to learn to practise them well – and this is an ongoing challenge. Learning to be peacemakers will be a task for our churches until the end of time. To work at this our churches need visionary leaders who will teach Jesus’ way of peacemaking conflict to all church members. I think of one church – Oxford Road Church in Mexborough, South Yorkshire – where this has happened. In this church there has been severe conflict. But in recent years there has been extensive, practical teaching about how Jesus’ Matthew 18 process can be put to work. On the wall of the church are posters reminding members what is involved in peacemaking. One begins: “THE STEPS TO TAKE. One to one. Tell no one else. If this fails, take someone else…” This is not a perfect church. Perfect churches don’t exist. It is rather a church which is using Jesus’ means of dealing with the inevitable imperfections and is finding unity in its life and witness.

Most congregations need not less conflict but more. They need to recognise that the absence of apparent conflict is not the same thing as peace. God hates false peace. The prophets regularly denounced places of worship that proclaimed “shalom, shalom” where there was no shalom (e.g. Ezekiel 13:10). When Jesus went to church (the temple) he disturbed the peace – he upset tables and exposed injustice – in the cause of true peace (Mark 11:15-18). God longs for the peace of right relationships, rooted in justice and an expression of truth.

Four Attitudes of Peacemakers

We can be transformed as God teaches us the attitudes and skills that enable us to make peace by having good conflict.

• Humility: we expect to hear something of value from the other, who like us is a sinner, but is loved, forgiven and equipped with insight and vision. God’s truth is bigger than we have yet seen, and we cannot see it without the other.

• Commitment to the “safety” of others: we observe that people function best when they feel safe in expressing their views without being made fun of. If someone adopts a position that we dislike, we will not call them “liberal”, “fundamentalist” or “dinosaur”. We will try not to wound people even when they are our enemies, because we believe God’s business is building friendship out of enmity.

• Acceptance of conflict: we learn that conflict is a part of life, in the church and outside it. It indicates that people have real concerns, that they feel passionately about things, and that power issues are involved.

• Hope: we believe God is at work making peace, especially in situations of conflict; we believe the Holy Spirit is at work, and that all kinds of creativity can break loose – if we pray trustingly and vulnerably open ourselves to the Spirit’s work.

Four Skills of Peacemakers

• Truthful Speech: peacemakers are called to learn to communicate truthfully but lovingly, passionately but humbly. This is more than a matter of words. Ephesians 4:15 urges its readers to “aletheuein in love”. This is often translated to “speak the truth in love”, but its meaning is broader; it means to “truth in love”, to communicate truth with the total loving person, with our body language, facial expressions, actions, decisions as well as our words. Truthful communication will involve being confrontational

when necessary; being vulnerable with one another, expressing our needs, worries and longings; and encouraging one another. As we learn to “truth in love”, we will grow up into Christlikeness; and our churches will become cultures in which good communication is taught and modelled.

• Expectant Listening: peacemakers are called to learn to listen well. People in conflict care passionately about things, and they want to be heard. So we will develop the skill of really paying attention to what the other is saying. We will want to make sure we understand the other person, that we enter into the thought world and experience of the other. And as we listen, we will want to convey to the other person that we are listening – by our body language, by eye contact, by our reluctance to interrupt. In his book, Exclusion and Embrace, Croatian theologian Miroslav Volf, whose family and friends have suffered in the Yugoslav wars, writes: “We enlarge our thinking by letting the voices and perspectives of others, especially those with whom we may be in conflict, resonate within ourselves, by allowing them to help us see them, as well as ourselves, from their perspective, and if needed, readjust our perspectives as we take into account their perspective.”⁴

• Alertness to Community: peacemakers learn in community about the complex interweavings of human experience. Peacemakers are aware of the importance of differing generations. These are people, like Dirk Willems, whose reflexes have been sanctified by their friendship with the Prince of Peace. They have so much to teach simply by what they are. Their wise sayings and stories are also important. Peace churches must provide set-tings for elders to mentor “youngers”. Younger Christians, on the other hand, will have much to contribute to their elders – excitement, a lively memory of what it was like not to be a Christian, a willingness to question and test. It is through this intergenerational sharing that the wisdom, skills and attitudes of peacemaking are taught. Furthermore, peacemakers must not forget that justice and peace are interrelated, that the shalom of a community will depend on its willingness to face economic questions. From Acts 6 and 1 Corinthians 11 onwards, church leaders have recognised that it strains fellowship and distorts peace when some Christians are wealthy and others are struggling. Some churches sensitive to economic need are committed to experimenting with radical measures to lessen inequality and to meet need. Where these things do not happen, it is probable that relation­ships will be ultimately superficial and that economics will undermine the peace of the church.

• Good Process: peacemakers contend that a peace church is one which makes decisions in a way that is truthful, just and corporate. I believe that the church meeting – a Baptist and Quaker institution which it has been fashionable to belittle – can be central to the development of a peace church. Of course, church meetings are often scenes for point-making, power plays, and displays of parliamentary prowess. But the distortions are the product of the church being too much like the world – its failure to develop its own distinctive culture. It can be otherwise, when Christians learn to realise “the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3) as they make decisions together. Leaders must believe that the Holy Spirit, who works among the people as well as the leaders, may produce something wiser than they could have anticipated. And when people know that their views matter, they respond with a quality of enthusiasm and ownership that can be breathtaking.

On the Journey: Becoming a Peace Church

It’s not clear what it will mean for a church to decide to become a peace church. The changes required will be numerous: new attitudes and reflexes that enable a constructive handling of differences; good listening; truthing in love; expecting God to bring insight through the other’s experience; believ­ing that the Holy Spirit is at work to bring about the Jesus way of peace on earth – now. There is no master plan for learning these things. Each church will learn things in its own order, in its own time. But any church that sets out to learn them will be on a journey. Woe to the church that arrives! It will not be a peace church. But in greeting the Messiah, Zechariah was surely right. God’s mercy was at work “to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, [and] to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Luke 1:79). And this way will transform not only the church’s “domestic” life; it will transform its “foreign relations” – its life and witness in the world. To this I shall turn in my third article.

Alan Kreider is director of the Centre for the Study of Christianity and Culture at Regent’s Park College, Oxford. He travels widely to speak on topics of discipleship, worship, mission and peacemaking. He and his wife Eleanor were the resource persons for the November 1998 Anabaptist Network conference on peacemaking.

Notes

AT 21: Is a Peace Church Possible? The Church's "Foreign Policy"-Worship

Third article in a series by Alan Kreider
Originally Published in Anabaptism Today, Issue 21, Summer 1999

“Grace and peace to you.” What difference does it make to our churches, and to the world, when we take peace as seriously as grace? What differ-ence does it make when we allow “the God of peace [to] sanctify us”, not just as indi­vidu­als or in bits of our lives, but “wholly” – making us peaceful, holy, in all the dimensions of our life (1Thess 5.23)?

In the two earlier articles in this series, I have argued that it makes a big difference when we allow “peace” to help shape our identity as churches. It changes the way we think. Furthermore, there is a “peace dividend” for our churches. This transforms our churches’ common life; it helps build communi­ties of people who are learning the skills and disciplines of peacemaking. It also – as I want to demonstrate in this article and in the next issue of Anabaptism Today – changes our church’s witness, our way of living in the world and reaching out to others; it transforms our “foreign policy”.

Living in a World of Multidimensional Conflict

Twenty years ago, many people in the West were frightened. They were living in a polarised world of Cold War, divided between two power blocs, both of whom had nuclear arms. Now, post-Cold War, nuclear weapons still loom over our world, but the conflicts of the world seem more complex than they did. It’s not a world divided between vast alliances or among nation states. Rather it’s a world divided among intermingling cultures, tribes, ethnic and religious groups. Throughout the Cold War this multi-cultural world was there, but it had been suppressed; now it has emerged, with cultural identities that fragment nation-states and that ignore political borders. These cultural groupings – the Serbs and the Albanians, the Palestinians and the Israelis, the Kurds and the Turks – often elicit immense passion and lethal violence. And it is not “out there”; for many of us, it characterises and enriches our own neighbourhoods. Ours is a multicul-tural world, and it won’t go away. We have to learn to live with it, and that means living with complexity and conflict.

So this is the setting for our churches’ witness – our “foreign policy”. And my belief is this: as we discover how to be a peace church, we can have an impact for God and for good on our world. In this article I show how this will deepen our worship; in a final article I shall show how this will trans-form our approaches to areas of work, war and witness.

Peacemaking Worship

Is worship a part of the church’s “foreign policy”? Isn’t worship an intra-mural activity of the Christian family? Granted, worship services often do have nothing to do with the world. Worship services at times remind me of the first astronauts, just back from the moon, who were put into quarantine. Nobody wanted the moon to contaminate the earth. That’s how it often is with our churches’ services; the world is quarantined; we don’t want it to contaminate what happens in the church. This leads to unreality, and to phoney worship. The worship of the church should be a truthful encounter with the God who loves the world and who wants to empower his people to participate in his mission to the world. God is a personal God, and he is eager to meet with us. But God is also Lord of history, and he is serious about being Lord of all peoples and nations, principalities and powers. Furthermore, worship is a meeting with other people in God’s presence. Through this meeting with God and with each other, we see the world in a new light – and things happen. We change; adoration transforms us, so we are ready to do God’s work in a difficult situation. And somehow, mysteri­ously, things change too on the earth and in the heavenlies. Worship is the motor of history; it is an engine of peacemaking.

1. We acclaim Jesus as Lord. When we gather to worship God, we gather “in Jesus’ name” to confess that “Jesus is Lord”. This is powerful. We are asserting that – although there a