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of the Mennonite Privilegium’s requirements and community mission as “model colonists” was as a fixed, unchanging and withdrawn community; however for Cornies it was a dynamic responsibility requiring “model colonists” to innovate and adapt to changing state policies and economic needs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.

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History of the Russian Mennonites

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