What were Molotschna Mennonites reading in the early 1840s?

Johann Cornies expanded his Agricultural Society School library in Ohrloff to become a lending library “for the instruction and better enlightenment of every adult resident.” The library was overseen by the Agricultural Society; in 1845, patrons across the colony paid 1 ruble annually to access its growing collection of 355 volumes (see note 1).

The great majority of the volumes were in German, but the library included Russian and some French volumes, with a large selection of handbooks and periodicals on agronomy and agriculture—even a medical handbook (note 2).

Philosophical texts included a German translation of George Combe’s The Constitution of Man (note 3) and its controversial theory of phrenology, and the political economist Johann H. G. Justi’s Ergetzungen der vernünftigen Seele—which give example of the high level of reading and reflection amongst some colonists.

The library’s teaching and reference resources included a history of science and technology with an accompanying volume for students by Carl P. Funke; natural science text for children (note 4); an elementary school Russian reader for German pupils; Russian-German, Turkish-German (note 5), and Latin-German dictionaries; encyclopedia; many songbooks; pedagogical journals; the St. Petersburgische Zeitung (conservative Baltic-Russian German newspaper); a Prussian newspaper (Preußische Staats-Zeitung; note 6) many travelogues (an English original; note 7); a biography of Peter the Great, and a church history for use in schools.

German Pietism had a strong impact on Molotschna Mennonite spirituality in the first half of the nineteenth century; Cornies’ 1843 lending library gives ample evidence of this. The library’s many tools for preachers and religion classes included biblical commentaries, biblical word-studies, a prayer books, a selection of Protestant catechisms, as well as religious-devotional texts especially for youth. Mennonite theology and history books are fewer in number but included selections of Menno Simons’ writings curated by the Mennonite Pietist Johann Deknatel (note 8), Menno’s larger Foundation of Christian Doctrine (note 9), Confession of Faith of Mennonites in Prussia, and Reiswitz and Wadzeck’s volume on Mennonites in Europe and America (note 10).

German Pietist writings however dominate the collection’s religious materials, with song books, sermon collections, biblical studies, historical letters from the Moravian “Herrnhut” community, children’s stories (from Hernnhut; note 11), and resources for family worship by Johannes von Albertini (sermons from Herrnhut; note 12), Johann Arndt, Samuel Elsner, Christian Gottlieb Frohberger (letters from Herrnhut; note 13), August Spangenberg, Gerhard Tersteegen, and Johann G. Uhle among others. The latter materials complemented the Pietist influences incorporated into important eighteenth-century Prussian Mennonite publications, and would be the dominant theological influence—together with the later sermons of Pietist preacher Ludwig Hofacker (note 14) on the Russian Mennonite tradition as a whole, with the exception of the Kleine Gemeinde.

Other traditions were also represented in the Cornies library, including the medieval classic Imitation of Christ by Thomas à Kempis, a history of the Friends/Quakers (English; note 15), a German-language Russian Orthodox theology (note 16), and works by J. F. W. Jerusalem, whose enlightenment, non-dogmatic theological writings echo those of German Mennonite Abraham Hunzinger (note 17), plus a few philosophical-apologetic texts, as well as a work on the religion of Mohammed and the Koran (note 18).

In 1836, eighteen percent of the Agricultural Society's budget over three years was used for the acquisition of books, agricultural journals, newspapers, and to prepare topographic sketches and maps (note 19). Cornies made many of the acquisition decisions and book orders personally, in all cases with the dual purpose of improving the colony "morally and economically" with reading materials in the areas of religion, history and economic/agricultural matters--as he reported to the President of the Guardianship Committee for Foreign Settlers. With focus and commitment to broad, life-long education accessible for all in the colony, Cornies opened Mennonites to the larger world of ideas and best practices to remain a "model community," a light on a hill. This was his interpretation of the Mennonite call and purpose in Southern Russia.

---Arnold Neufeldt-Fast

---Notes/ Sources---

Note 1: Johann Cornies, “Catalogue of Books—1841 [actually 1845; German; handwritten] .” In Peter J. Braun Russian Mennonite Archive, file 797, reel 34. From Robarts Library, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON. Also see: Johann Cornies, “Ueber die landwirtschaftlichen Fortschritte im Molotschner Mennoniten Bezirke in dem Jahre 1845 (Fortsetzung),” Unterhaltungsblatt 1, no. 2 (May 1846) 10, https://www.hfdr.de/sub/pdf/unterhaltungsblatt/1846_Teil-1.pdf .

Note 2: https://books.google.ca/books?id=nNY_AAAAcAAJ&dq=medizinisches%20handbuch&pg=PR1#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 3: https://books.google.ca/books?id=D3sMAAAAYAAJ&dq=Combe%2C%20The%20Constitution%20of%20Man&pg=PR3#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 4: https://archive.org/details/naturgeschichte00raff/page/n3.

Note 5: https://books.google.ca/books?id=FAAtNtfUk7cC&dq=Theoretisch-Praktische%20T%C3%BCrkishe%20Sprachlehre%20f%C3%BCr%20deutsche&pg=PP7#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 6: ht,tps://digital.staatsbibliothek-berlin.de/werkansicht?PPN=PPN657064149&PHYSID=PHYS_0005.

Note 7: https://books.google.ca/books?id=yhZUAAAAYAAJ&dq=michael%20symes&pg=PR1#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 8: https://digital.staatsbibliothek-berlin.de/werkansicht?PPN=PPN657064149&PHYSID=PHYS_0005.

Note 9: In Menno Simons, The Complete Writings of Menno Simons, edited by J. C. Wenger (Scottdale, PA: Herald, 1984), https://archive.org/details/completewritings0000menn_b6u1/.

Note 10: Georg von Reiswitz and Friedrich Wadzeck, Beiträge zur Kenntniß der Mennoniten-Gemeinden in Europa und Amerika, Parts I and II (Berlin, 1821/1829), https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/009717700.

Note 11: https://books.google.ca/books?id=Sd4g3bnimbgC&dq=Einige%20Reden%20an%20die%20Kinder%2C%20gehalten%20in%20Herrnhut&pg=PA1#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 12: https://books.google.ca/books?id=1bU_AAAAcAAJ&dq=Albertini%2C%20Dreissig%20Predigten&pg=PP5#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 13: http://mdz-nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:12-bsb10449078-1.

Note 14: https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb10463596_00007.html.

Note 15: https://books.google.ca/books?id=aAxNAAAAcAAJ&pg=PP7#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 16: https://books.google.ca/books?id=My9fAAAAcAAJ&pg=PP5#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Note 17: See previous post, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/01/ideas-for-educational-reform-1832.html.

Note 18: See previous post on Cornies and Molotschna's Islamic Nogai neighbours, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/01/islamic-nogai-neighbours.html.

Note 19: Johann Cornies to Andrei M. Fadeev, January 28, 1837, in Transformation on the Southern Ukrainian Steppe: Letters and Papers of Johann Cornies, 1836-1842, vol. 2, translated by Ingrid I. Epp, edited by John R. Staples, Harvey L. Dyck and Ingrid I. Epp (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2020), no. 40, pp, 37f. See also pp. 156, 434, 598, https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/bitstream/1807/100164/1/Southern_Ukrainian_Steppe_UTP_9781487538743.pdf.

---

To cite this post: Arnold Neufeldt-Fast, “What were Mennonites reading in the early 1840s?,” History of the Russian Mennonites (blog), June 15, 2023, https://russianmennonites.blogspot.com/2023/06/what-were-molotschna-mennonites-reading.html.

Comments

Swiss and Palatinate Connections

Sometime after 1850 Andreas Plennert and his family immigrated to South Russia from the Culm Region of West Prussia. Though there was at least one Mennonite “Plehnert” who had already immigrated to Russia in 1793, it is not a very common Prussian-Russian Mennonite name. As such, however, it is easier to trace than many and offers a minority narrative and identity within the longer and broader Russian Mennonite story. The account below is adapted largely from information in Horst Penner, Die ost- und westpreußischen Mennoniten , vol. 1, though I have expanded upon his work to offer a slightly different narrative. In 1724 there was a group of Mennonites forced out of the Memel region in East Prussia for political and religious reasons and were given assistance to resettle back to West Prussia in areas populated by Mennonites. Among the 23 households that went to the Stuhm region there is one Plenert listed, namely Christian Plenert. We know that Mennonites entered the Memel region ...

Catherine the Great’s 1763 Manifesto

“We must swarm our vast wastelands with people. I do not think that in order to achieve this it would be useful to compel our non-Christians to accept our faith--polygamy for example, is even more useful for the multiplication of the population. … "Russia does not have enough inhabitants, …but still possesses a large expanse of land, which is neither inhabited nor cultivated. … The fields that could nourish the whole nation, barely feeds one family..." – Catherine II (Note 1 ) “We perceive, among other things, that a considerable number of regions are still uncultivated which could easily and advantageously be made available for productive use of population and settlement. Most of the lands hold hidden in their depth an inexhaustible wealth of all kinds of precious ores and metals, and because they are well provided with forests, rivers and lakes, and located close to the sea for purpose of trade, they are also most convenient for the development and growth of many kinds ...

The Selbstschutz (Self-Defence Units) and Benjamin H. Unruh

Abram Kröker, editor of the Molotschna (South Russia/ Ukraine) -based Mennonite Friedensstimme , wrote that Mennonites are “predestined to foreshadow … even in an imperfect way, the great peace among nations in the Thousand-Year-Reign [of Christ].” And among all denominations, “it has pleased God,” according to Kröker, to “present and manifest” through the Mennonites this “pearl of evangelical truth gained at great cost by our fathers” ( note 1 ). And it is because of this theological hope and inheritance that “our youth are raised differently,” Kröker reminded his readers; “not military bravery or fighting are presented as the highest civic virtues, but rather sacrifice, suffering and renunciation for the sake of others. In all our schools, non-resistance is explicitly taught and impressed [upon students] according to the Mennonite catechism” ( note 2 ). But taking up arms in self-defence was nuanced differently by his colleague and influential 37-year-old teacher and theologian Benja...

Quiet in the Land: Peter Fast, 1932-2010

My father Peter Fast passed away in January 2010. The years have given me many opportunities to reflect on his life and impact. He was a gentle and good person--and could work like horse. He was born into poverty in 1932 in Paraguay. His parents were pioneers, first in Fernheim and then (1937) in Friesland. He liked to tell me that he ate manioc root for breakfast, lunch and dinner. I was never sure if that was true, and it didn’t help to convince me to eat things I didn’t like. His mother died when he was fourteen; the basic medical aid she needed was out of reach. His new step-mother was a complex person who made life difficult for him and others. Dad only finished the 6th grade in Friesland. He was more than happy to get off the school bench and onto a horse. I don’t think I ever saw him write a complete sentence in my life, whether in English or in German. He had no interest in history, let alone reading—though over time he read the local city paper. Nothing I’ve written on...

Jews and Mennonites Together in Danzig's Suburbs

There has been very little reflection on the relationship of Jews and Mennonites in the suburb of Schottland (or Alt-Schottland or Stare Szkoty) where Mennonites first settled in the mid-1500s. Here Mennonites and Jews lived in the small community together for two centuries, quite literally on the margins outside the gates of the city of Danzig. Many historic maps that include Alt Schottland have become available in recent years ( note 1; pic ). H.G. Mannhardt’s book on the Danzig Mennonite church community plus some archival membership lists are our best sources for the Mennonite experience, while illustrations from the day bring many of those episodes of prosperity, repressions, war, plague, emigration, flooding etc. in an urban environment to life ( note 2 ). Peter J. Klassen’s writings on Mennonites in Poland and Prussia also present newer research on Mennonite life in and around Danzig in helpful ways ( note 3 ). There is one small sentence in Klassen’s larger volume that sugg...

"They are useful to the state." An almost forgotten Prussian view of Mennonites, ca. 1780s-90s

In 1787 Mennonite interest for emigration was extremely strong outside the quasi independent City of Danzig in the Prussian annexed Marienwerder and Elbing regions. Even before the land scouts Johann Bartsch and Jacob Höppner had returned from Russia later that year, so many Mennonite exit applications had flooded offices that officials wrote Berlin in August 1787 for direction ( note 1a ). Initially officials did not see a problem: because Mennonites do not provide soldiers, the cantons lose nothing by their departure, and in fact benefit from the ten-percent tax imposed on financial assets leaving the state. Ludwig von Baczko (1756-1823), Professor of History at the Artillery Academy in Königsberg, East Prussia, was the general editor of a series that included a travelogue through Prussia written by a certain Karl Ephraim Nanke. Nanke had no special love for Mennonites, but was generally balanced in his judgements and based his now almost forgotten account of Mennonites on perso...

Mennonite-Designed Mosque on the Molotschna

The “Peter J. Braun Archive" is a mammoth 78 reel microfilm collection of Russian Mennonite materials from 1803 to 1920 -- and largely still untapped by researchers ( note 1 ). In the files of Philipp Wiebe, son-in-law and heir to Johann Cornies, is a blueprint for a mosque ( pic ) as well as another file entitled “Akkerman Mosque Construction Accounts, 1850-1859” ( note 2 ). The Molotschna Mennonites were settlers on traditional Nogai lands; their Nogai neighbours were a nomadic, Muslim Tartar group. In 1825, Cornies wrote a significant anthropological report on the Nogai at the request of the Guardianship Committee, based largely on his engagements with these neighbours on Molotschna’s southern border ( note 3 ). Building upon these experiences and relationships, in 1835 Cornies founded the Nogai agricultural colony “Akkerman” outside the southern border of the Molotschna Colony. Akkerman was a projection of Cornies’ ideal Mennonite village outlined in exacting detail, with un...

A-Cases and O-Cases. After the Trek, 1944

Some 35,000 Mennonites evacuated from Ukraine by the retreating Reich German military in 1943-44 applied for naturalization /citizenship once in German-annexed Poland (mostly Warthegau). The applications made through the “EWZ” ( Einwandererzentralstelle ) are easy to attain today ( note 1 ). Much information may be new and useful for families; however just as much is disturbing, including the racial assessments, categorization, and separation of so-called “A-cases” from “O-cases.” What are they? The EWZ files contain the application for naturalization made by the head of a family unit, the certificate of naturalization, and sometimes correspondence/ claims regarding property and possessions left behind in Ukraine. Each form contains information about the applicant’s spouse and children, as well as a genealogy listing parents and grandparents, and those of their spouse as well; racial background is calculated by percentage (!). Applicants were asked about their citizenship, their e...

The Politics of Map-Making: A "Mennonite Map"

Maps are political artifacts. Russia or Ukraine? A late nineteenth-century map of “German Settlements and Presence throughout History” offers a good example from the Mennonite settlements ( note 1 ). It was based on the German Colonial Atlas of Paul Langhans ( note 2 ). Langhans was the most important mapmaker and promoter of German settlements around the globe; he continued this work of “pan-Germanism” well into the Nazi era ( note 3 ). Already in the nineteenth century, more than one Russian journalist claimed that Russian Germans—including Mennonites in Russia—promoted pan-Germanism in their schools and spread hatred against Russia ( note 4 ). The consequences on the ground were harsh: Johannes H. Janzen—a geography instructor in the Mennonite high school in Ohrloff—who was known “to love the Russian people and Fatherland more than most of his contemporaries,” was placed under “serious suspicion of treason” for an instructional map ( note 5 ) he made of the Molotschna Mennoni...

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...

History of the Russian Mennonites

Search This Blog