Religious Toleration in New Russia and the "Warkentin Affair," 1842

The document below is from the "Peter J. Braun Archives Russian Mennonite Archive"-- a veritable treasure trove of yet-to-be-read primary documents. To date this document has not yet been used in the telling of the "Warkentin Affair." While it does not add new information per se, it brings out well the dynamics and tone of official engagements of government actors with "their" Mennonites and the Mennonite church leaders.

In the early 19th century, there was no question that Russia was among the most religiously tolerant nations that side of the Atlantic. But there was a framework with policies for that to work. How it played out was not always pretty. Here is an example and a helpful primary text.

In 1842, Pure Flemish Elder Jacob Warkentin complained to the President of the Guardianship Committee for Foreign Settlers Eugen von Hahn about Johann Cornies’ “dictatorial” manner and disregard of the church’s approach to discipline and reconciliation in accordance to Matthew 18.

Von Hahn knew of Warkentin’s opposition to Cornies’ reforms and leadership—it had started with Warkentin’s reaction against Cornies’ introduction of more attractive, brick building material (note 1). Warkentin’s interpretation of the Mennonite Privilegium’s requirements and community mission as “model colonists” was as a fixed, unchanging and withdrawn community; however for Cornies it was a dynamic responsibility requiring “model colonists” to innovate and adapt to changing state policies and economic needs (note 2)–and von Hahn stood with Cornies.

Von Hahn personally dismissed the interfering elder from his church office, and forbade him to speak or participate in community events (note 3). Other elders, moreover, were not to acknowledge him as a ministerial colleague, and his congregation was to be divided into three, with three newly elected elders.

When von Hahn returned from the capital to Odessa in August 1842, he learnt that his warnings and personal reprimands had been ignored by certain members of the former “Warkentin congregation,” and that the congregation chose to tarry with their election. Here’s his letter to the elders of the Molotschna churches, which I have transcribed and translated (note 4; pic).

To the Church Elders of the Molotschna Mennonite District

From the reports by local colony officials provided to me upon my return from St. Petersburg, I noted with great regret that, notwithstanding all warnings and personal reprimands, some members of the former “Warkentin Congregation” acted disobediently and rebelliously during the recent election for district chair, especially Fürstenwerder’s village mayor Thun, who with his highly illegal and punishable acts displayed before subordinate residents enticed them to disobey, thereby wreaking disorder and harm in the community.

Respectively I have built upon the influence of the church elders, and thus until know have had the confident hope that the latter would not fail to use every means possible to ensure that peace and quiet develop on their own. Now I feel compelled to use the most severe measures in order to bring this scourge to a complete halt, and to put the guilty ones into a position that will render them completely innocuous in the future. It is very hard for me to come as one who must judge and punish, when with all my heart I want only to be father and guardian to you. My duties are above all sacred to me, and I would sin against my authority if I were to put up any longer with the spirit reigning in some of the Mennonite colonies [villages].

Accordingly, in very short order I will personally arrange a local investigation of everything that has occurred, and the guilty may then only blame themselves if they have brought misfortune upon themselves.

Once again I declare officially that Warkentin has been irrevocably discharged, and likewise, that Peter Toews of Tiege cannot become head of the District Office, and that every act which is or will yet be directed against these orders will be punishable.

Insofar as I hereby publicize this notice to the church elders, whose good sentiments for the well-being of their congregations are sufficiently known to me, I also request of you, that you mobilize all of your available church resources, so that through your cooperation not only will the scourge be removed, but also that what is good and the best generally will be promoted. This cooperation could not be demonstrated any better than if the church elders would leverage their total influence not only to bring any new growth [of the scourge] in the congregations to a complete halt, but also to bring those who are already guilty to genuine repentance; for only deep, openhearted contrition can bring into motion a softening of the deserved punishment.

[Signed] Vice-Chair of the Guardianship Committee, v. Hahn, Odessa, 26 August, 1842.

“Cornies’ men” duly informed the Large Congregation’s leaders that Warkentin would be exiled and subject to corporal punishment by the military should they not comply by a certain date (note 5).

Von Hahn’s reluctant intervention in colony religious and political affairs for “disobedience” or “rebelliousness” towards authorities was not unique in the Warkentin case. Similar occurrences are documented in the Lutheran, Pietist Separatist and Catholic colonies as well (note 6), and were entirely consistent with Russia’s otherwise broad protections and freedoms within its self-understanding and mission to serve and rule nobly over many peoples (note 7).

While the principle of complete religious toleration was inviolable, this was balanced by a second principle: “upon the interference of religion in the affairs of the state, the latter not only may, but must itself interfere in the affairs of the church and indicate to [that church] its true purpose and limits” (note 8).

Local administrators judged which acts of faith had political content “in accordance with the particular spirit of each” (note 9), and they were authorized to intervene.

---Arnold Neufeldt-Fast

---Notes---

Note 1: Cf. Delbert Plett, Golden Years: The Mennonite Kleine Gemeinde in Russia, 1812–1849 (Steinbach, MB: Self-published, 1985), 286 https://www.mharchives.ca/download/1216/. See also John Staples, “Afforestation as Performance Art: Johann Cornies’ Aesthetics of Civilization,” in Minority Report: Mennonite Identities in Imperial Russia and Soviet Ukraine Reconsidered, 1789–1945, edited by Leonard G. Friesen, 61–81 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018), 73. Also Staples, “Religion, Politics, and the Mennonite Privilegium in the Early Nineteenth Century: Reconsidering the Warkentin Affair,” Journal of Mennonite Studies 21 (2003), 72–88, https://jms.uwinnipeg.ca/index.php/jms/article/view/886/885.

Note 2: Cf. Staples, “Afforestation as Performance Art: Johann Cornies,” 70; 74.

Note 3: Heinrich Neufeld, “Report Regarding the Exile of Jakob Warkentin, Altona, Molotschna,” 1 [1/2]. Translated by Ben Hoeppner. From Mennonite Library and Archives, Bethel College, SA. 2, 1171, https://mla.bethelks.edu/archives/sa_2_1171/.

Note 4: Evgenii von Hahn, “An die Kirchen-Aeltesten des Molotschner Mennonniten Bezirks,” in Peter J. Braun Russian Mennonite Archive, file 805, reel 31, translated by Arnold Neufeldt-Fast. From Robarts Library, University of Toronto. On von Hahn, cf. the helpful piece by David H, Epp, "Hahn, Eduard von (19th century)," Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online (1956), https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Hahn,_Eduard_von_(19th_century)&oldid=145375.

Note 5: H. Neufeld, “Report Regarding the Exile of Jakob Warkentin, Altona, Molotschna,” 5 [6/7]; 7 [9]; 11 [13].

Note 6: Cf. Evgenii von Hahn, “An den Oberschulzen des Berdjanschen Kolonisten-Bezirks Friedrich Prinz Nr. 3031” (May 13, 1843), in Jakob Stach, ed., Grunau und die Mariupoler Kolonien (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1942), viii–ix, fn. 24; https://chortitza.org/Buch/Grunau.pdf. Cf. also Paul Werth, The Tsar’s Foreign Faiths, Toleration and the fate of religious freedom in imperial Russia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 108f.

Note 7: Cf. “Memorandum des Ministers des Innern (1804),” in Josef A. Malinowsky, Die Planerkolonien am Asowschen Meere (Stuttgart: Ausland und Heimat Verlag, 1928), Anhang III; https://chortitza.org/kb/malinows.pdf. See also Robert Crews, For Prophet and Tsar: Islam and Empire in Russia and Central Asia (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009), 10.

Note 8: This implicit or operational principle was in a Special Commission Memorandum in 1866; cited in Werth, The Tsar’s Foreign Faiths, 108.

Note 9: According to instructions by the empire’s police chief, Aleksandr Benkendorff, to subordinates in 1837; cited in Werth, The Tsar’s Foreign Faiths, 110.

Comments

Invitation to the Russian Consulate, Danzig, January 19, 1788

B elow is one of the most important original Mennonite artifacts I have seen. It concerns January 19. The two land scouts Jacob Höppner and Johann Bartsch had returned to Danzig from Russia on November 10, 1787 with the Russian Immigration Agent, Georg von Trappe. Soon thereafter, Trappe had copies of the royal decree and agreement (Gnadenbrief) printed for distribution in the Flemish and Frisian Mennonite congregations in Danzig and other locations, dated December 29, 1787 ( see pic ; note 1 ). After the flyer was handed out to congregants in Danzig after worship on January 13, 1788, city councilors made the most bitter accusations against church elders for allowing Trappe and the Russian Consulate to do this; something similar had happened before ( note 2 ). In the flyer Trappe boasted that land scouts Höppner and Bartsch met not only with Gregory Potemkin, Catherine the Great’s vice-regent and administrator of New Russia, but also with “the Most Gracious Russian Monarch” herse...

Why study and write about Russian Mennonite history?

David G. Rempel’s credentials as an historian of the Russian Mennonite story are impeccable—he was a mentor to James Urry in the 1980s, for example, which says it all. In 1974 Rempel wrote an article on Mennonite historical work for an issue of the Mennonite Quarterly Review commemorating the arrival of Russian Mennonites to North America 100 years earlier ( note 1). In one section of the essay Rempel reflected on Mennonites’ general “lack of interest in their history,” and why they were so “exceedingly slow” in reflecting on their historic development in Russia with so little scholarly rigour. Rempel noted that he was not alone in this observation; some prominent Mennonites of his generation who had noted the same pointed an “extreme spirit of individualism” among Mennonites in Russia; the absence of Mennonite “authoritative voices,” both in and outside the church; the “relative indifference” of Mennonites to the past; “intellectual laziness” among many who do not wish to be distu...

The Tinkelstein Family of Chortitza-Rosenthal (Ukraine)

Chortitza was the first Mennonite settlement in "New Russia" (later Ukraine), est. 1789. The last Mennonites left in 1943 ( note 1 ). During the Stalin years in Ukraine (after 1928), marriage with Jewish neighbours—especially among better educated Mennonites in cities—had become somewhat more common. When the Germans arrived mid-August 1941, however, it meant certain death for the Jewish partner and usually for the children of those marriages. A family friend, Peter Harder, died in 2022 at age 96. Peter was born in Osterwick to a teacher and grew up in Chortitza. As a 16-year-old in 1942, Peter was compelled by occupying German forces to participate in the war effort. Ukrainians and Russians (prisoners of war?) were used by the Germans to rebuild the massive dam at Einlage near Zaporizhzhia, and Peter was engaged as a translator. In the next year he changed focus and started teachers college, which included significant Nazi indoctrination. In 2017 I interviewed Peter Ha...

"Between Monarchs" a lot can happen (like revolt). A Mennonite "Accession" Prayer for the Monarch

It is surprising for many to learn that Russian Mennonites sang the Russian national anthem "God save the Tsar" in special worship services ... frequently! We have a "Mennonite prayer" and sermon sample for the accession of the monarch ( Thronbesteigung ) or its anniversary, with closing prayer-- and another Mennonite sampler of a coronation ( Krönung ) prayer, sermon and closing prayer ( note 1 ). After 70 years with one monarch, the manual is made for a time like this--try sharing it with your Canadian Mennonite pastor ;) Technically there is no “between” monarchs: “The Queen is Dead. Long live the King!” But there is much that happens or can happen before the coronation of the new monarch. Including revolt. Mennonites in Molotschna had hosted Tsar Alexander I shortly before his death in 1825. Upon his death in December, Alexander's brother and heir Constantine declined succession, and prior to the coronation of the next brother Nicholas, some 3,000 rebel (mos...

Mennonite Literacy in Polish-Prussia

At a Mennonite wedding in Deutsch Kazun in 1833 (pic), neither groom nor bride nor the witnesses could sign the wedding register. A Görtz, a Janzen, a Schröder—born a Görtzen – illiterate. “This act was read to the married couple and witnesses, but not signed because they were unable to write.” Similarly, with the certification of a Mennonite death in Culm (Chelmo), West Prussia, 1813-14: “This document was read and it was signed by us because the witnesses were illiterate.” Spouse and children were unable to read or write. Names like Gerz, Plenert, Kliewer, Kasper, Buller and others. 14 families of the 25 Mennonite deaths registered --or 56%--could not sign the paperwork ( note 1 ; pic ). This appears to be an anomaly. We know some pioneers to Russia were well educated. The letters of the land-scout to Russia, Johann Bartsch to his wife back home (1786-87) are eloquent, beautifully written and indicate a high level of literacy ( note 2 ). Even Klaas Reimer (b. 1770), the founder t...

1871: "Mennonite Tough Luck"

In 1868, a delegation of Prussian Mennonite elders met with Prussian Crown Prince Frederick in Berlin. The topic was universal conscription--now also for Mennonites. They were informed that “what has happened here is coming soon to Russia as well” ( note 1 ). In Berlin the secret was already out. Three years later this political cartoon appeared in a satirical Berlin newspaper. It captures the predicament of Russian Mennonites (some enticed in recent decades from Prussia), with the announcement of a new policy of compulsory, universal military service. “‘Out of the frying pan and into the fire—or: Mennonite tough luck.’ The Mennonites, who immigrated to Russia in order to avoid becoming soldiers in Prussia, are now subject to newly introduced compulsory military service.” ( Note 2 ) The man caught in between looks more like a Prussian than Russian Mennonite—but that’s beside the point. With the “Great Reforms” of the 1860s (including emancipation of serfs) the fundamentals were c...

Ukrainian Famine and Genocide (Holodomor), 1932-1933

In 2008 the Canadian Parliament passed an act declaring the fourth Saturday in November as “Ukrainian Famine and Genocide (‘Holodomor’) Memorial Day” ( note 1 ). Southern Ukraine was arguably the worst affected region of the famine of 1932–33, where 30,000 to 40,000 Mennonites lived ( note 2 ). The number of famine-related deaths in Ukraine during this period are conservatively estimated at 3.5 million ( note 3 ). In the early 1930s Stalin feared growing “Ukrainian nationalism” and the possibility of “losing Ukraine” ( note 4 ). He was also suspicious of ethnic Poles and Germans—like Mennonites—in Ukraine, convinced of the “existence of an organized counter-revolutionary insurgent underground” in support of Ukrainian national independence ( note 5 ). Ukraine was targeted with a “lengthy schooling” designed to ruthlessly break the threat of Ukrainian nationalism and resistance, and this included Ukraine’s Mennonites (viewed simply as “Germans”). Various causes combined to bring on w...

Village Reports Commando Dr. Stumpp, 1942: List and Links

Each of the "Commando Dr. Stumpp" village reports written during German occupation of Ukraine 1942 contains a mountain of demographic data, names, dates, occupations, numbers of untimely deaths (revolution, famines, abductions), narratives of life in the 1930s, of repression and liberation, maps, and much more. The reports are critical for telling the story of Mennonites in the Soviet Union before 1942, albeit written with the dynamics of Nazi German rule at play. Reports for some 56 (predominantly) Mennonite villages from the historic Mennonite settlement areas of Chortitza, Sagradovka, Baratow, Schlachtin, Milorodovka, and Borosenko have survived. Unfortunately no village reports from the Molotschna area (known under occupation as “Halbstadt”) have been found. Dr. Karl Stumpp, a prolific chronicler of “Germans abroad,” became well-known to German Mennonites (Prof. Benjamin Unruh/ Dr. Walter Quiring) before the war as the director of the Research Center for Russian Germans...

Four-Part Singing in Mennonite Schools and Church in Russia

The significance of singing instruction may seem trite, but it became a key vehicle in the Mennonite school curriculum for fostering a basic appreciation of the arts and for faith formation. In Johann Cornies’ circulated guidelines for teachers, singing was recommended as a means “to stimulate and enliven pious feelings” in the children—a guideline he copied directly from a German Catholic pedagogue and circulated freely under his own name ( note 1 ). On January 26, 1846 Cornies distributed a curriculum regulation to all schools that mandated “singing by numbers ( Zahlen ) from the church hymnal” ( note 2 ). Attention to singing instruction in the schools precipitated significant and controversial changes in Mennonite liturgy. An 1854 visiting observer to the Bergthal Colony—a Chortitza daughter colony outside of Cornies’ purview—wrote: “Endlessly long hymns from the Gesangbuch (hymnal) were begun by the Vorsänger (song leader) of the congregation, and sung with so many flo...

Becoming German: Ludendorff Festivals in Molotschna, 1918

During the friendly German military occupation of Ukraine at the end of WWI, patriotic “Ludendorff Festivals” were encouraged by German forces to raise funds to support injured German soldiers. A first such festival in the Molotschna was held on June 25, 1918 in Ohrloff, and was attended by “a great many German officers, soldiers and colonists with music, [patriotic] speeches and social interaction” From the perspective of the German army press, the event was “extremely enjoyable;” it was accompanied with music by a 30-piece regiment orchestra, and beer, sausage, sandwiches, ice-cream, raspberries and cherries were sold. It closed with a “small dance,” raising 7,387 rubles or 9,850 German marks in donations ( note 1 ). Later that summer, a Ludendorff Festival in Halbstadt began with Sunday worship, followed by an early concert, games and performances by the Selbstschutz , as well as “entertainment and merriment of every kind,” with short plays and dancing into the morning ( note ...

History of the Russian Mennonites

Search This Blog