Plain people

An Amish family.

Plain people are Christian groups characterized byseparation from the world and simple living, includingplain dress. Most Plain people have an Anabaptist back-ground with the exception of the Old German BaptistBrethren and Old Order River Brethren. All but the OldOrder River Brethren are of German, Swiss German andDutch ancestry.

1 Plain groups

Notable Plain groups are:

• Old Order Amish

• New Order Amish

• Beachy Amish Mennonites

• Old Order Mennonites

• Conservative Mennonites

• Conservative Mennonite Conference

• Reformed Mennonites

• Orthodox Mennonites

• Old Colony Mennonites

• Hutterites[1]

• Old German Baptist Brethren

• Old Order River Brethren

A small number of Quakers still practice plaindress.[2][3][4] The Shakers also dressed plain, buttoday there are almost no Shakers left.[5]

2 Plain customs

Customs of Plain people include:

• Plain clothes, usually in solid, normally dark colors.

• Plain church buildings, or no church buildings what-soever.

• A utilitarian view of technology, similar to theprecautionary principle of technology in that un-knowns should be avoided, but the emphasis was onthe results in the eyes of God. If they were unsure ofhow God would look upon a technology, the leadersof the church would determine whether it was to beavoided or not.[6] The degree to which this principlewas supported varied among the congregations, butin general, the Amish people believed that the Men-nonites had not done enough to separate themselvesfrom the rest of the world.

3 Origins

The Mennonite movement was a reform movement ofAnabaptist origins begun by Swiss Brethren and soonthereafter finding greater cohesion based on the teachingsof Menno Simons 1496–1561, and the 1632 DordrechtConfession of Faith. The Amish movement was a reformmovement within theMennonite movement, based on theteachings of Jacob Ammann, who perceived a lack of dis-cipline within the Mennonites movement by those tryingto avoid prosecution. Ammann argued that Romans 12:2prohibited that.

1

2 7 SEE ALSO

William Penn, having experienced religious persecutionas a Quaker, offered asylum to others who were sufferingreligious persecution, an offer that many followers of Ja-cob Ammann accepted, starting with the Detweiler andSieber families, who settled in Berks County, Pennsyl-vania, in 1736. Many of them settled near Lancaster,Pennsylvania, which offered some of the most produc-tive non-irrigated farmland in the world. By 1770, theAmish migration had largely ceased.

4 Religious practices

Plain groups typically have a bishop presiding over onecongregation (Amish) or over a district (group of con-gregations) (Old Order Mennonites). Mennonites mostlymeet in church buildings, but most Amish meet in mem-bers’ homes. Services among Amish and Plain Mennon-ites are mostly held in Pennsylvania German, a languageclosely related to Palatinate German, with extra vocabu-lary. Bishops are commonly chosen by lot as a reflectionof God’s will. While the Bishop tends to be influential, hetends to rule by building consensus rather than by issuingedicts.Most Plain groups have an Ordnung that among otherthings regulates clothing. The Ordnung is a largely un-written code of behavior, covering such items as clothing,vehicles, and the use of technology. The Ordnung variesslightly from congregation to congregation, though is inessence the same. Violations are not considered sins, al-though wilfulness is considered to be a serious violationof the faith. The congregation can change the Ordnungif there is am majority to do so. Exemptions to the Ord-nung can be provided. In one instance, one farmer wasgranted permission to buy a modern tractor since he hadarthritis and no children to help him harness horses.

5 Trends

Amish women at the beach, Chincoteague, Virginia.

The Old Order Amish are among the fastest-growingpopulations in the world. They prohibit the use ofcontraception and have low infantmortality rates. The av-erage Amish woman can expect to have at least seven livebirths.[7] Other Plain sects with the same or similar doc-trines can be expected to have similarly explosive growth.

Despite this, the Pennsylvania Dutch, which includesAmish, Old Order Mennonite, and Conservative Men-nonites are expected to become a smaller percentage ofthe population as the sects respond to high prices of farm-land by spreading out all over the United States and inter-nationally, and the English population spreads out fromPhiladelphia into suburban and rural areas. Donald Kray-bill believes there are Plain sect communities in 47 states.Among people at least five years old living in LancasterCounty in 2000,

• 89% spoke English at home;

• 7% spoke Pennsylvania Dutch;

• 4% spoke Spanish.[8]

Most Plain sects do not admit children to their church,and impose no sanctions on those who do not join, butshun those who fall away from the church once becominga member. Among some groups of Old Order Amish,teenagers who are not yet baptized are not bound by therules and go through a period of rumspringa, often withcertain amount of misbehavior that would not otherwisebe tolerated.

6 Health

The Pennsylvania Dutch generally do not proselytizeand discourage intermarriage. Because of closeconsanguinity, certain genetic problems occur more fre-quently. Dr. D. Holmes Morton has established theClinic for Special Children to study and treat familieswith these problems.[9]

The Plain sects typically prohibit insurance, and they as-sist each other charitably in case of sickness, accident,or property damage. Internal Revenue Service Form4029[10] allows one to claim exemption to Social Secu-rity taxes under certain very restrictive conditions, andmembers of the Plain groups neither pay these taxes norreceive death, disability, or retirement benefits from so-cial security.

7 See also

• Christian headcovering

• Fancy Dutch

• Haredi Judaism

• Peace Churches

• Testimony of Simplicity

• Tolstoyan movement

3

8 References

[1] Hostetler, John (1997). Hutterite Society. The Johns Hop-kins University Press. p. 105. ISBN 0-8018-5639-6.

[2] Savage, Scott (2000). A Plain Life: Walking My Belief.Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-43803-5.

[3] Cooper, Wilmer (1999). Growing Up Plain Among Con-servative Wilburite Quakers: The Journey of a PublicFriend. Friends United Press. ISBN 0-944350-44-5.

[4] Quaker Jane website

[5] The Shaker Manifesto. N. A. Briggs, Publisher. 1878.

[6] Zimmerman, Diane (2000). Holding the Line: The Tele-phone in Old Order Mennonite and Amish Life. JohnsHopkins University Press. ISBN 0-8018-6375-9.

[7] Meyers, Thomas J. (1990). “Amish”. Global AnabaptistMennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 2008-07-20.

[8] United States Censues, 2000, Population and HousingProfile: Lancaster County, Pennsylvania

[9] Kate Ruder, Genomics in Amish Country Genome NewsNetwork, July 23 2004

[10] Internal Revenue Service Form 4029; Application for Ex-emption From Social Security and Medicare Taxes andWaiver of Benefits

9 Further reading

• Donald B. Kraybill, Carl Desportes Bowman. Onthe Backroad to Heaven: Old Order Hutterites, Men-nonites, Amish, and Brethren. Baltimore: The JohnsHopkins University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8018-7089-5.

• Donald Kraybill, Puzzles of Amish Life. ISBN 1-56148-001-0.

• Stephen Scott, Why Do They Dress That Way?.ISBN 1-56148-240-4.

• Amelia M. Gummere, Quaker: A Study in Costume.ISBN 0-405-08585-0.

• Stephen Scott, An Introduction to Old Order andConservative Mennonite Groups. ISBN 1-56148-101-7.

• Margaret C. Reynolds, Plain Women: Gender andRitual in the Old Order River Brethren. ISBN 0-271-02138-1.

• Charles D. Thompson Jr., The Old German BaptistBrethren: Faith, Farming, and Change in the VirginiaBlue Ridge. ISBN 0-252-07343-6.

10 External links• GAMEO: Plain People

4 11 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

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