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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Are pentecostals anabaptists?
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Og: Thread Killer
Ship's token CN Mennonite
# 3200
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sure, Mennonites pre-date evangelicalism in its contemporary form which is largely a product of the 18th and 19th centuries and a predominantly Anglophone base.
A lot of evangelicals would be unaware of other reformed or radical reformation movements across continental Europe and over into North America, nor of Mennonite mission in Africa and South America and elsewhere.
Oh I'm not saying Mennonites/Anabaptists are claiming any sort of "we began this tradition of evangelicalism" thing. The mindset about being the catholic of anything isn't important (although there is quite a bit of what WWJD & what did the early church do)
But, they do see themselves as Evangelicals. I find it very difficult to recall a large group beyond the plethora of quietists groups, the Old Order, Old Order Amish (there are modern groups that have developed out of the Amish), Hutterites, Old Colony, that doesn't consider itself Evangelical.
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I wish I was seeking justice loving mercy and walking humbly but... "Cease to lament for that thou canst not help, And study help for that which thou lament'st."
Posts: 5025 | From: Toronto | Registered: Aug 2002
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Sure, I wasn't suggesting you were claiming the Anabaptists to be the 'UR-group' as it were or the 'Q-Text' and so on ...
Rather, I was simply making the observation that the Anabaptists were around before the kind of evangelicalism most people associate with Evangelicalism had developed.
I'm saying that the Anabaptists and indeed Baptists more generally, are pre-evangelical in that sense.
What tends to be regarded as Evangelicalism in its Bebbington Quadrilateral sense is largely a product of the 18th century - from around the 1730s onwards. Of course, it drew on earlier antecedents and influences, such as Lutheran pietism, Puritanism in England and Scotland and, in Wesley's case, forms of 'Non-Juror' and High Church Anglican piety (without the bells and smells that later became associated with that end of the Anglican spectrum) ...
What people tend to associate with Evangelicalism these days either derives from the more Calvinistic and Puritan strand on the one hand or the Wesleyan holiness strand on the other.
The Anabaptists predate that and arguably developed in a different kind of way. Of course, there were cross-currents and influences and some groups were more separatist and communal than others - but although I would class Anabaptists as Evangelical in the continental European sense, I'm not sure all of them could be classified as 'evangelical / Evangelical' in the Bebbington Quadrilateral and more 'Anglophone' evangelical sense ie. the way evangelicalism developed in North America and in the UK and its Colonies after the Great Awakenings of the mid-19th century and after the US gained its independence.
As far as I am aware, the Anabaptists weren't particularly influenced by the Holiness movement and the various eschatological speculations and 'adventist' influences that shaped UK and US evangelicalism in the 19th century.
Much popular conservative evangelicalism here in the UK was influenced by 19th century 'Muscular Christianity' and missionary movements and mission societies.
I get the impression that Anabaptist missionary activity took place in a different kind of way and largely unknown or overlooked by evangelicalism within Anglicanism and the various Presbyterian and more 'mainstream' Baptist groups.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
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Posted
Well I guess it depends who you read. I'm not trying to pretend that I'm any kind of expert, but it is easy to find examples of Mennonites who are talking about the relationship between Mennonites and Evangelicals, the overlaps and differences.
For example this essay in Mennonite World Review.
quote:
Exploring the post-World War II journeys of American Mennonites and evangelicals — sometimes intersecting, sometimes diverging — offers some much-needed context for the contemporary moment.
<snip>
For a time, these trajectories converged. Neo-Anabaptist Mennonites continued to see religious faith as a life of discipleship, while neo-evangelical fundamentalists — shaped by a starkly Reformed theology — continued to affirm the inerrancy of Scripture as a guide for Christian conduct.
<snip>
Yet on the whole, Anabaptists and evangelicals chose different paths in the late twentieth century. Progressives won the day within the major Mennonite denominations, concluding a decades-long theological move from nonresistance to justice and smoothing out the historic differences between Mennonites and the secular social-justice left.
Also this interesting essay from a Mennonite Brethren perspective:
quote:
The starting point for any exploration of the interaction between evangelical Protestants and Mennonites in North America is the observation that there is no other Christian tradition with which Mennonites in North America have had more affinity and interaction, and which has exercised more influence on Mennonites than evangelical Protestantism. At the same time, neither has there been a religious tradition from which some Mennonites in North America have tried harder to differentiate themselves than evangelical Protestantism.
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arse
Posts: 10697 | Registered: Sep 2002
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Og: Thread Killer
Ship's token CN Mennonite
# 3200
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Posted
Ah yes....the Mennonite identity paradigm. Big in certain intellectual circles but not shared by the masses of people. (given there's only 2 million of us, not that many masses)
I stand by my analysis based on my experience from within.
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I wish I was seeking justice loving mercy and walking humbly but... "Cease to lament for that thou canst not help, And study help for that which thou lament'st."
Posts: 5025 | From: Toronto | Registered: Aug 2002
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