Amish

The Amish are a denomination of Anabaptists and noted for their restrictions on the use of modern devices such as automobiles and electricity. The Amish are a tight-knit cultural and ethnic group, descending from predominately Swiss German immigrants. Most Amish speak at home a distinctive High German dialect (Deitsch or "Pennsylvania Dutch)", although the so-called "Swiss Amish" speak an Alemannic dialect which they call "Swiss". Note that the Amish are just one group of the "Pennsylvania Dutch," who are generally of German descent; the word "Dutch" being an archaism. Finally, more "progressive" Beachy Amish, especially those who were born roughly after 1960 tend to speak predominately in English at home.

Lifestyle

Amish lifestyle is dictated by the Ordnung of the community. Ordnung differ from community to community, and within a community from district to district. What is acceptable in one community, may not be acceptable in another community. No resume of Amish "lifestyle" can be totally adequate because there are few generalities which are true for all Amish.

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Many Amish, especially the Old Order are renown for their avoidance of modern technologies. The avoidance of items such as automobiles and electricity is largely misunderstood. The Amish do not view all technology as evil. Technologies can be petitioned for acceptance into the Amish lifestyle. In some communities the church leaders meet twice to review items for admittance. In others it is done whenever necessary. Because the Amish, like other Mennonites, do not have a top-down governing structure like the Catholic or Anglican Churches, differing communities often have different ideas as to which technological items are acceptable.

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Electricity, for instance, is viewed as a connection to the "World", the "English" or "Yankees" (the outside world). The use of electricity also could lead to the use of household appliances that would complicate the Amish tradition of a simple life. However, in certain Amish groups electricity can be used in very specific situations. In some groups, for example, it has to be produced without access to outside power lines. Twelve-volt batteries are acceptable to these groups. Electric generators can only be used for welding, recharging batteries, and powering milk stirrers. The reasoning behind the twelve-volt system is that it limits what an individual can do with the electricity and acts as a preventive measure against potential abuses. Most twelve-volt power sources can't generate enough current to power what is viewed as worldly, such as modern appliances such as televisions, light bulbs, and hair dryers.

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Most Amish families speak a version of German known as Pennsylvania German (Deitsch) at home. The commonly-used term "Pennsylvania Dutch" comes from the original use of the word Dutch, which referred to all people who spoke one of the many German-Dutch dialects and not just people from the Netherlands.

Related Topics:
Pennsylvania German - Pennsylvania Dutch - Netherlands

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Dress code for some groups includes prohibitions against buttons, allowing only hooks and eyes to keep clothing closed; other groups allow members to sew buttons onto clothing. In some groups certain articles can have buttons, and others can not. The Amish are noted for the quality of their quilts and for their farming efficiency. Some Amish have enthusiastically adopted genetically engineered crops for their efficiency. Buttons were once associated with the military and it is for this that the Amish have resisted their use.

Related Topics:
Dress code - Quilt - Genetically engineered crops

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An Amish man will typically be clean-shaven as long as he is single. Upon getting married he will grow a beard. In some communities however, a man will grow a beard after he is baptized. Mustaches are generally not allowed since they are seen as symbols of the military. This is due to religious and political persecution in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries. The nobility and upperclass men, who often served as military officers, wore mustaches but not beards.

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The Amish and other Anabaptists do not believe that a child can be meaningfully baptized - this is, in fact, reflected in the name Anabaptist (which means "rebaptizer", as the Anabaptists would baptize adults). Amish children are expected to follow the will of their parents in all issues, but when they come of age they may lead a lifestyle of their own choice. In fact, in some communities parents may turn their back as their children try out the "English" lifestyle of the outside world for a few years (the period of rumspringa, or running-around) so that they can make an "informed" choice to be baptized and join the church for life. Some choose not to join the church but live the rest of their lives in the society at large. Some communities will actively shun those who decide to leave the church, even those going to a different Amish congregation with different interpretations of how things are supposed to be done. Still other communities practice hardly any shunning, keeping close family and social contact with those who leave the church.

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Some communities have split in the last century over how they will apply the shunning, as in the case of the Holmes County and area Amish settlement.

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Amish communities may be slightly or even drastically different from each other. These differences can appear from district to district even within the same community. When describing details of dress codes, lifestyles, etc., a careful writer will note the specific community being discussed. These differences range from profound (such as groups like the "black bumper Amish" (Beachy Amish) who have come to accept chromeless automobiles and are widely seen as non-Amish by other groups) to what we may consider trivial (such as the disagreements between "one suspender" and "two suspender" groups or how many pleats there are in a bonnet). Groups with similar policies are held to be "in fellowship" and consider each other members of the same Christian church. These groups can visit and intermarry between one another, an important consideration to avoid problems with inbreeding. Thus minor disagreements within communities over dairy equipment or telephones in workshops can become splinter churches and divide multiple communities.

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The Amish as a whole feel the pressures of the modern world. Child labor laws, for example, are seriously threatening their long-established ways of life. Amish children are taught at an early age (by modern 21st century standards) to work hard. Amish parents will supervise the children in new tasks to ensure that they learn to do it effectively and safely. The modern child labor laws conflict with allowing the Amish parents to decide whether or not their children are competent in hazardous tasks.

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Like many Mennonites, many Amish also shun insurance, relying on their church and community for support. An example of such support is barn raising, in which the entire community gathers together to replace a barn, which has been destroyed by fire or some natural disaster, in a single day.

Related Topics:
Mennonites - Insurance - Barn raising

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As almost all of the current Amish descend from the same few hundred founders in the 18th century they have been plagued by heritable genetic disorders. Some of these disorders are quite rare, in some cases even unique, and some are very serious. These disorders affect the children and have led to a higher mortality rate among them. The majority of the Amish accept these as "Gottes Wille" (God's will) and reject any use of genetic tests prior to the marriage to prevent the appearance of these disorders and refuse genetic tests to the fetus to discover if a child has any genetic disorder. Physically and mentally disabled children are given the same loving care as unaffected children. However, there is sometimes genetic diversity from one community to another if the historical relationships between these communities are distant enough. So, genetic diseases which are common in one community, will often be absent in another. For example, although within the Lancaster County Amish, there are only a few founding families, these founding families are quite distant to the founding families of the Perth County Amish community in Canada.

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Many parents are using modern technology to care for their children. The large majority received special dispensations for the use of some electric appliances from their religious leaders but in some cases it was impossible to obtain and has led to some parents to leaving the traditional lifestyle and subsequently being "banned" by their community.

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Although the Amish do pay taxes, they are exempt from Social Security under a provision of the Medicare bill enacted in 1965. As part of shunning insurance, the Amish do not accept government welfare, such as Medicaid/Medicare, and food stamps. So, although the Amish do not pay into Social Security, they do not take from it either. Also, the Amish pay school taxes for schools they do not use, and for many other services which they do not use.

Related Topics:
Tax - Social Security - Medicare - Medicaid - Food stamps

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