October 2001 In This Issue

IN THIS ISSUE

James Beck opens this issue
of The Mennonite Quarterly Review with an investigation
into the Jewish roots of the Worms Prophets (Wormser
Propheten)-a 1527 German translation of the Old Testament Prophets
by Ludwig Hätzer and Hans Denck. Already in 1530 Martin Luther claimed
that Htzer and Denck’s text betrayed a heavy Jewish influence; but to
date no careful textual study has been done to assess that argument. In
his essay, Beck concludes that the two Anabaptist scholars did indeed
draw heavily on the expertise of local rabbis and on the rabbinic tradition
in their work. The result was a translation more linguistically precise
than anything previous and a work that muted Christological themes traditionally
emphasized in scholarship on the prophetic literature of the Old Testament.

The standard reading of sixteenth-century
Anabaptism has typically highlighted the stalwart, even stubborn, character
of its early adherents. Yet Anabaptism in later centuries frequently proved
itself capable of considerable flexibility and adaptation, particularly
when confronted with relentless pressure from authorities in the form
of interrogations, beatings, imprisonment, fines, expulsions and execution.
Based on his systematic work in Swiss archival sources, independent scholar
Mark Furner has identified a creative range of responses
by the Swiss Brethren in the Emmental to the efforts of Bernese authorities
to eradicate them in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. In
a previous MQR article (October, 1997) historian John Oyer
opened up the question of Nicodemism among the Anabaptists in Württemberg.
Here Furner takes the theme a step further by outlining in detail various
strategies employed by the Swiss Brethren in their struggle for survival
in the Emmental. We have chosen to retain large blocks of archival transcriptions
in the footnotes of Furner’s article, thereby giving readers a clearer
sense of the source materials that form the basis for his rich descriptions
of Swiss Brethren life.

In a somewhat related vein, historians
Michaela Schmölz-Häberlein and Mark Häberlein
of Freiburg, Germany probe local archival records to reveal new
insights about Amish Mennonites living in the upper Rhine territory of
Baden-Durlach in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In a pattern
repeated throughout southwestern Germany, descendents of the Anabaptists
found refuge in isolated hamlets and estates of the margravate largely
because they had gained a reputation for being skillful and productive
farmers. The price of their economic success, however, often came in the
form of resentment by local guilds, corporations and villagers who resisted
them less as religious deviants than as unwelcome economic competitors.
In their essay, the Häberlein’s track the influx of Amish Mennonite
families into the region during the course of the eighteenth century and
offer new insights into the mobility of various Anabaptist groups during
the early modern era.

A great deal has been written about the
attitudes of the major Protestant reformers vis-a-vis the Anabaptists
during the opening decades of the sixteenth century. The positions of
such luminaries as Luther, Melancthon, Bucer, Zwingli, Bullinger and Calvin
are now relatively well-established. But very little has been published,
by contrast, on the thought of the Scottish reformer John Knox in regards
to the radical reformation. In this issue, historian Richard G.
Kyle takes up that challenge. In his essay, Kyle reviews the various
encounters Knox had with Anabaptists-most of them rather indirect-and
summarizes the theological substance of his polemical writings against
them.

Finally, we conclude the issue with a research note by John Derksen and an interesting range of book reviews. Derksen, who has written several earlier essays for MQR on the Anabaptists in Strasbourg, highlights the importance of the villages surrounding the city as a safe haven for religious dissidents when political and religious pressures in the city of Strasbourg became too intense. The book reviews that follow offer a sampling of the many rich and eclectic directions Anabaptist-Mennonite scholarship continues to take in the opening years of the twenty-first century.

We trust that this issue of MQR will offer something of interest to all of
our readers.

– John D. Roth, editor

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406
The Mennonite Quarterly Review
407
In Memoriam: John A. Hostetler
403