Quaker product

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As Quäkerzeugnis or "testimonies of Quakers" the conduct of members is Quaker called, which brings their convictions. It is therefore used in the sense that “testimony is given of one's own convictions towards the outside world.” The term testimony is also used in other religions and denominations .

Theological background

From the beginning, Quakers were not defined by a creed , but by their way of life. It should be an expression of their beliefs and be consistent with what they believe and teach. The early Quakers understood their community as a visible sign of the kingdom of God and believed that it was possible to live in a perfect way while still alive. Hence the orientation of the Quakers towards this world is to be understood. The idea of ​​posthumous human perfection - for example through purgatory  - is expressly denied. B. Holme wrote:

“Or, if you believe that there is a purgatory or a place where you can be cleansed of your sins after death, what wonder then, when you lead a life to the fulfillment and satisfaction of your carnal desires and inclinations enough. "

In these views they were very close to radical pietism . A number of well-known German converts came from this area, for example Johann Georg Ludwig Seebohm , founder of the Friedensthal settlement . The taking of the oath and military service were also rejected by both radical pietists and Quakers.

Testimony of Integrity

The testimony of integrity is usually called the testimony against the swearing - or - the oath. The Quakers refused to take oaths and refused to swear, because they wanted to be truthful in their speech and behavior at all times (according to ( Mt 5,34-37  EU ): Prohibition of oaths and request for clear speech: “Let your speech yes, yes; no, no. What is above it is evil ”).

This testimony served the opponents of the Quakers as a welcome target, especially in the first few years. All you had to do was bring a Quaker to court for a trifle and ask him to give his testimony under oath - which he always refused to do - and shortly thereafter to have him jailed for disobeying the court.

The hypocrisy of the court is illustrated by documented cases in which the courts have called Quakers to trial without asking for bail and relied solely on the word that the Quakers promised to appear for the trial. This is z. B. in the diary (The Journal) by George Fox described.

Refusal to take the oath also meant that Quakers were excluded from public office for a long time. On the other hand, it also contributed to their economic success. Because they were very respected as business and trading partners because of their honesty.

Peace Testimony

The peace certificate is divided into a so-called historical peace certificate and a general or practical peace certificate, in which z. B. the refusal of military service is determined. However, there are also two works under the name “Historical Peace Certificate”: The first was immediately confiscated when printing , and only the second attempt was successful. “The print was solemnly presented to King Charles II on January 21, 1661, but without taking off his hat, but he hardly reacted to it and continued to persecute the Quakers;” as Claus Bernet wrote in 2007. In the old calendar, the year ended in March, so January 1660 is 1661 according to our calendar. This historic peace certificate was initially hardly accepted. The Quaker Margaret Fell is considered to be the author, but she did not sign herself, but rather twelve male Quakers.

The draft for the present and future peace in Europe, written by William Penn in 1693, is not only a testimony against the war, but also an active “For Peace”.

In 1742, a general obligation for male Quakers to conscientious objection was introduced. From then on, membership was withdrawn from every conscript; but after the military service they could be resumed. In this way, around 20% of young men were regularly excluded.

A Quaker Gun near Centerville , Virginia , in March 1862, behind the Confederate Wall position during the Civil War

During the American Revolutionary War , General George Washington deceived a loyalist position by building mock artillery pieces from tree trunks. The dummies were so convincing that this position surrendered without a single shot being fired. Such dummies, called Quaker Guns , have since been used repeatedly in the 18th and 19th centuries, including during the Civil War . They have nothing to do with the Quakers directly, but allude to their pacifist stance.

During the War of Independence, however, some Quakers actually took part, directly or indirectly, in the war against England and were excluded from their meetings. Later one of these Quakers ( Samuel Wetherill ) founded the Free Quakers and, with the support of u. a. Washington and Benjamin Franklin built their own meeting house on 5th and Arch Streets in Philadelphia in 1783 . As a matter of principle, the Free Quakers did not exclude anyone from their community, either for theological or moral reasons. In 1834, after no one had attended devotions for a few years, the house was closed.

AFSC logo

In the 19th century, the peace certificate was somewhat forgotten or no longer considered. Rufus Jones rediscovered the peace certificate in the 20th century . He saw in it the strength to unite the fragmented Quakers and thus created a renaissance of Quakerism. The sociologist of religion Thomas C. Kennedy assumes that Quakerism would have perished without the second peace certificate.

Quaker vigil in front of the British Embassy in Berlin on March 18, 2007

In any case, the image of the Quakers in public today is decisively shaped by the peace work after and during the two world wars. The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) should also be mentioned. In the interwar period , the Quakers were staunch supporters of the League of Nations and the maintenance of world peace .

In Germany, during the Nazi era , the Berlin Quaker Office sought the help of those persecuted politically and racially (and saved some lives); from 1941 the work had to be continued from the underground. On April 5, 2006, a street in Berlin was named in honor of the pedagogue and resistance fighter against National Socialism, Elisabeth Abegg (1882–1974). With the help of British friends in particular, the Rest Home project was run.

Tom Fox

Today, a goal of the Quakers is an international community service for conscientious objectors on grounds of faith and conscience, as well as a peace tax, which enables taxpayers who wish to prevent their taxes from being used for military conflicts. Many individual activities only come to the public consciousness through a tragic death like that of Tom Fox in Iraq. Other activities are also viewed with great skepticism, such as the renewed meeting of Quakers with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, among others .

Popular fallacies

According to a seemingly ineradicable legend, George Fox is said to have once said to William Penn "carry your sword as long as you can". The story is fictitious (see William Penn → Legends ).

Another mistake is the assumption that the Quakers reject state authority as a whole and therefore do not take on sovereign tasks. The reason the early friends didn't go into civil service was because they had to take an oath of office that they couldn't take. Later, when the Quakers first came into power in the " Holy Experiment ", they were also part of state power. However, they never waged war with other countries or Indians. The following is a short passage from a letter from George Fox to the authorities:

“The authorities should not bear the sword, which is said to terrorize evildoers, for nothing; Just as the authorities who bear the sword for free are no terror to evildoers, so there is no sign of praise for those who do right; God has now raised up a people by his power, which the priests, the authorities and the people in their anger call 'Quakers'. This cries out against drunkenness and swearing; But the drunkards, to whom the sword of the authorities should be a horror, go about freely, as we see; but many of those who struggle against this vice go to prison for testifying against pride, impurity, fraudulent trade in markets, debauchery and carelessness, playing with skittles, dice and cards and others and sinful pleasures […] The sword of government, as we see, is worn in vain, while the evildoers are free to do evil; but those who are jealous against evil are punished for it by the authorities who turn their sword against the LORD [...] "

Testimony of Simplicity and Testimony of Equality

It is not easy to separate the two certificates. The fact that the Quakers did not take off their hats to greet them, did not bow or use an honorary title, is on the one hand a testament to simplicity and rejection of decadence , on the other hand it could also be justified by the fact that no difference is made in the reputation of the person. As expected, this led to conflicts, especially when dealing with higher-ranking personalities. William Penn explains :

“We like to admit that our way of showing honor is in a sense as hidden as our religion, and that both are just as indistinguishable as comfortable to worldly minds. Our simple and straightforward behavior strikes them as peculiar and peculiar and goes completely against the grain, so to speak. "

German Quakers in Friedensthal , in the 18th century, with their then typical "Quaker uniforms"

The so-called Quaker uniform , which slowly established itself from the 18th century, was intended as a testimony to simplicity and not as a testimony to uniformity . In this context it should be mentioned that there is the term Quaker Gray in English , in reference to the gray Quaker uniforms of the 18th to 19th centuries. By the way, during this time the manners that were used in the 17th century e.g. T. had caused violent reactions, has become a respectable identification mark. The following description can be found in the community chronicle of Friedrichstadt from 1713:

"Two officiers that evening in the summer went walking on the gaßen and in front of the door of the house [...] Vorbey [...] that the man So lived in the house. Before the Thur sat with [...] Claas S. An officer said to the others, brother sitting there, 2 Quakers, they won't thank you if you ask them good evening, and don't say good day or evening if you kill them on the spot, the other officer answered, brother, I bet you they should Say good evening or thank me [.] Then the bet went on, you turned back and stopped in front of the two of them, the one officer took off his hat and said good evening, but no one answered him, then he told her Don't thank an officer even if he asks good evening, but they kept quiet, then the officer pulled down from the leather put his sword on the Quaker's chest and said good evening or I'll chase you through, but he sat calmly, didn't speak a word. Claas Schneider, however, jumped up and ran away, but was dismissed by the Quaker because he did not want to recognize it as a mistake that he had admitted, but when the other Quaker asked nothing about the officer, they both began to laugh [n ], and one of them put his sword back on, and the other said, brother, I have won, one of them wasn't a real Quaker, but this one is one who doesn't speak and doesn't run either. "

The Quaker meetinghouses also have no jewelry. The reason is that this could distract from what is essential - the Christ within - and thus prevent a revelation or "visitation".

Social certificate (Testimony of Equality)

Occasionally in modern times there is talk of a social witness . Or the need among Quakers to want to formulate such a thing. What you find on this, however, mostly corresponds to what can already be deduced from the testimony of equality and / or the peace certificate. The following activities fall into this area.

Quaker help

Friends Ambulance Unit , Wolfsburg, Germany, 1945

As early as 1813, German and English Quakers founded an aid fund for the victims of the Napoleonic War in Saxony, and from 1870 onwards Quakers began to coordinate their aid for the population during and after wartime and put it under a logo: the Quaker star. The "Quaker Aid" is the umbrella term for the work of the relief organizations that the Quakers founded (as associations or other legal forms) and that work independently.

In the USA it is the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC, founded 1917), the Canadian Friends Service Committee (CFSC) has existed since 1931. Quaker Peace & Social Witness (QPSW) comes from Great Britain.

From 1919 to 1926 people were saved from starvation all over Europe, but especially in Germany, France, Serbia and Russia, and after the Second World War Quaker Aid was active in Germany. In addition to feeding the Quaker , she also provided refugee aid and reconciliation work, for example with neighborhood and student homes.

In particular, the so-called CARE packages ( C ooperative for A merican R elief to E urope), of which eight million were sent from August 1946 to June 1960 to Germany, the Quakers made after the Second World War in Germany known again. CARE was an amalgamation of 22 organizations (Quakers, Mennonites , Salvation Army , trade unions).

In 1947 the two main organizations of aid after World War II, the Friends Service Council (FSC) in London and the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) Washington, DC received the Nobel Peace Prize .

In 1963, Quäker-Hilfe e. V. founded. For some years now, the non-profit, charitable Quaker Aid Foundation established by the German and the American (AFSC) Quaker Aid has been responsible for financing the projects carried out by the aid organizations.

All aid organizations have one thing in common: the projects are based on partnership, encourage personal initiative and help as sustainably as possible. In addition, the causes are to be tackled by strengthening democratic structures and reducing prejudices. The Quakers often have comparatively little financial means at their disposal.

See also article: Quaker Peace and Social Witness

Religious freedom

Since the beginning of their existence, the Quakers have campaigned for tolerance and religious freedom , although or precisely because they for their part suffered for a long time from the persecution of other religious (and political) rulers. The US state of Pennsylvania , which was founded by the Quaker William Penn, granted all citizens of all creeds absolute freedom of religion as early as the 17th century. This practiced tolerance also included living with the Indians.

Women's and human rights

Lucretia Mott
Susan B. Anthony

Likewise, some Quakers were pioneers for the abolition of slavery as early as the 17th century . North American Quakers ( Benjamin Lay , John Woolman , Anthony Benezet , Levi Coffin and many others) have been involved since 1688 ("Germantown protest", Franz Daniel Pastorius ) in the movement for the abolition of slavery, abolitionism , although there were also Quakers for a long time who had slaves themselves. Quakers played a key role in the organization of the so-called “Underground Railroad”, a network of supporters who gave shelter and help to slaves who had fled the southern states on their flight north and to Canada.

When the American women's rights movement was founded in Seneca Falls in 1848 (Declaration of Sentiments) , the Quakers Lucretia Mott and Susan B. Anthony were the main participants.

Prison labor

Elizabeth Fry

The Quaker Elizabeth Fry (1780–1845) was one of the first to advocate the rights and dignity of prisoners and subsequently to reform the English prison system.

In 1975, inmates of New York State Prison asked the Quakers for help in finding ways to reduce the incarceration's propensity for violence within the prison. The resulting project PAG (Project Alternatives to Violence) has also been working in Germany since 1994.

criticism

The Quakers' testimonies are understood in the sense of “You shall recognize them by their fruits.” (Matthew 7:16) The Quakers see their way of life as a testimony to their faith and - at least in the beginning - also as a testimony to their orthodoxy. This brought them on the part of the Lutherans the accusation of " work righteousness ".

glossary

For the technical terms used in the article, see also article Glossary Quakerism .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Ludwig Seebohm: About the Kingdom of God. In: Notes on Various Subjects of Christianity , 1794; Printed in: Deutsche Quäkerschriften des 18th Century , ISBN 978-3-487-13408-6
  2. ↑ B. Holme: Serious reputation . 1795
  3. ^ Claus Bernet:  Seebohm, Johann Georg Ludwig. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 23, Bautz, Nordhausen 2004, ISBN 3-88309-155-3 , Sp. 1342-1361.  ( Article / beginning of article in Internet archive )
  4. ↑ Claus Bernet dealt with this in a detailed treatise in the 6/2007 issue on pages 282 to 286 of the Quäker magazine . ISSN  1619-0394
  5. ↑ John A. Gallery: A Perspective on the Peace Witness . In: Quäker , 4, 2003, p. 163. In the research literature and in the publications of the DJV you can find both dates, depending on which calendar you refer to.
  6. ↑ Text in the original sound in the Quaker magazine Friends Journal .
  7. ^ German as: William Penn's Peace Plan for Europe . Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), Bad Pyrmont 1991, ISBN 3-929696-02-9 (reprint of the German first edition from 1920)
  8. ^ Claus Bernet:  Samuel Wetherill. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 30, Bautz, Nordhausen 2009, ISBN 978-3-88309-478-6 , Sp. 1555–1557.
  9. ↑ qhpress.org
  10. ^ Claus Bernet: Conscientious Objection in the 19th Century. A contribution to the cliché of the military state of Prussia . (PDF; 2 MB) 2008, pp. 204–221, here p. 218.
  11. ^ Thomas C. Kennedy: British Quakerism, 1860-1920 . Oxford 2001, p. 414.
  12. ↑
  13. ↑ Quaker issue Sep./Oct. 2010, in the editorial by Davoka and Uwe, page 174. And in the next issue of Quäker Nov./Dec. 2010, Volume 84 ( ISSN  1619-0394 ) on pages 231–231, by Dr. Paul Oestreicher .
  14. ↑ George Fox - Notes and Letters of the First Quaker . Translator: Margrit Stähelin. Verlag JCB Mohr (Paul Siebeck), Tübingen 1908, p. 102 f.
  15. ↑ William Penn: Without cross no crown (1669), German translation by Georg Uslar, Pyrmont 1826, p. 186 (digitized by SUB Göttingen , by Wikisource )
  16. ↑ Sünne Juterczenka: About God and the World - End Times Visions, Reform Debates and the European Quaker Mission in the Early Modern Age . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008, ISBN 978-3-525-35458-2 , p. 101.
  17. ↑ The term social testimony comes from B. J. Lamps: Waiting in the light - George Fox's religious experience . 1986, p. 59, first paragraph above.
  18. ↑ project alternatives to violence , pag.de .