Amish

The Amish are a Christian (Anabaptist) group active in the USA, Canada and Argentina that live in small, self-sufficient rural communities famous for their simple dress, sober and hardworking culture and rejection of electricity. There are about 342,000 Amish in the world and have often been described as resembling an anarchist culture, although anarchists are critical of the group.

Decision-Making

The Amish are divided into small, independent groups of people that live together in communities.

The leaders of the Amish churches, their ministers, are chosen by a process that combines nomination and lot. In some Amish communities, at the end of a communion service, men and women file past a deacon and each whispers the name of a nominee. Any man who is nominated by three or more people is included in the drawing. Each of the nominees is then handed a song book, one of which contains a slip of paper bearing a Bible verse. The man who opens his book to discover the verse is overwhelmed to realize that the Lord has chosen him for a life-long added responsibility of service to the community. While the details of the procedures may vary in different congregations, the process of having divine choice of their leaders prevents quarreling with the leadership selection process and reaffirms the unity, stability and authority of their community.

The Amish continue to use older technologies such as the buggy that serve to define them and separate them from the dominant culture, but they are sometimes bothered by conflicts over whether or not to adopt new technologies. Any new device or convenience that some members desire is carefully examined by the entire community to see if it would foster differences between families, create tensions, or produce undue dependence on the outside world. As they consider proposals for change in the light of their historic values, they resolve the conflicts and try to preserve unity in their congregations.

Foreign Policy

Amish communities are often exempt from various laws and taxes in the US.

Anti-Amish Discrimination

The Amish have, on occasion, encountered discrimination and hostility from their neighbors. During World War I and World War II, Amish nonresistance sparked many incidents of harassment, and young Amish men conscripted into the services were subjected to various forms of ill treatment. In the present day, anti-Amish sentiment has taken the form of pelting the horse-drawn carriages used by the Amish with stones or similar objects as the carriages pass along a road, most commonly at night. One Amish person was killed after being hit by a bottle in the head in 1987. Amish are also frequent targets of kidnapping.

Crime

Young people sometimes get in trouble with the law, but otherwise the Amish experience almost no violence or crime. They live in a society, where harmony, passivity, and quiet discipline are the norm rather than aggression and hostility. However, marital rape and sexual abuse of wives is a rampant problem in Amish communities.

Economy

Their economy has traditionally consisted of farming, though many have branched out into rural businesses, such as their bed and breakfast operations as well as carpentry and leatherworks. Amish business people interact easily with non-Amish customers and business associates, understand the competitive, market-driven, profit system, and can formulate effective strategies for managing their operations. However, they cannot grow too large because of potential criticism from within their communities that they’re abandoning traditional values. As a news story put it in 2010, they have to cope with religious issues that outsiders don’t face. However, because they like to work hard and don’t spend money on consumer goods, their non-Amish competitors tend to resent them.

Public Services

Education

The competition that exists in the Amish schools is group-centered and not individually oriented. Children will compete against their group’s previous records—to have a better spelling score than the previous month, for instance—and they thus encourage one another to perform well so that the whole class or school will do better. The Amish typically operate their own one-room schools and discontinue formal education after grade eight, at age 13 or 14. Until the children turn 16, they have vocational training under the tutelage of their parents, community, and the school teacher. Higher education is generally discouraged, as it can lead to social segregation and the unraveling of the community. However, some Amish women have used higher education to obtain a nursing certificate so that they may provide midwifery services to the community.

Culture

Childrearing

Children learn to respect the authority of their parents and older people. Parents teach through firmness and consistency—they may use corporal punishment, though not harshly. Children are expected to work at tasks that are within their capability, and young children of both sexes may help (or accompany) their fathers and mothers around the farm and perform useful errands. The young children are sheltered from the outside world and raised in a protective community of people who know and care for them. Traditional Amish schools try to fuse religion, morality and education as their one goal.

Gelassenheit

The key to understanding Amish culture is the German word Gelassenheit, “submission,” a belief that includes simplicity, humility, thrift, obedience, and accepting the will of higher authorities. The Amish ideal is humility, in contrast to the modern ideal of personal fulfillment. The Amish person serves others, is guided by the will of the group, and talks, acts, and dresses modestly. Gelassenheit implies abandoning one’s will in favor of following divine will, as the Amish perceive Christ to have done. It suggests loving one’s enemies, praying for them, and never taking revenge—as Christ commanded. They adhere to Christ’s command to not resist evil, which prevents them from employing force in any human relationship. They cannot file lawsuits, a belief that puts them at a serious disadvantage when trying to sign contracts with unscrupulous businesses such as those in the fracking industry. Also, they cannot serve on a police force or a jury, hold a political office, or engage in competition. They also believe in volunteering to help those outside their own community when they feel they can be of assistance.

Gender and Marriage

Amish culture is fairly patriarchal. The man is the head of the family and responsible for all the heavier farm work; the woman follows his leadership in major decisions and is responsible for child-raising, cooking, cleaning, washing, and housekeeping. Their relationship is more one of mutual respect than romantic love: they rarely express affection openly. When a spouse is irritated about something, he or she will express feelings by gesture, tone of voice, or just by being silent—perhaps for several days.

Pacifism

The Amish are forbidden, they believe, by Christ to become involved in any warfare or violence. They do not defend themselves if attacked, and when faced with hostile neighbors or governments they simply abandon their farms and move. Military service is an absolute contradiction to the spirit of Amish Gelassenheit.

Sense of Self

If modern people are preoccupied with finding themselves, the Amish focus on losing themselves. They demonstrate proper humility in various subtle ways: an un-aggressive handshake, a thoughtful, deliberate way of speaking, a refined smile, and a gentle chuckle rather than cocky laughter. They are highly conscious of the danger of pride, the manifestation of individualism, and they try not to call attention to themselves. They are as eager to avoid taking personal credit for achievements as outsiders are eager to take credit. Their distinctive, plain clothing is designed to diminish pride, though traces of it can be seen at times in fancy harnesses on their buggies or trimmings around their homes.