The Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College Spring 2012 Center plans conference on Alexander Mack Jr. To commemorate 300th birthday of important Brethren leader he Young Center will host “Pietist and Anabaptist election to ministry, Sander Mack gave pastoral lead- TIntersections in Pennsylvania: The Life and Influ- ership from 1749 until his death in 1803. He wrote ence of Alexander Mack Jr.” on June 6, 7, and 8, several doctrinal and devotional works, and his 2012. The conference will focus on the life of poetry expanded the body of Brethren hymn texts. Alexander Mack Jr., the most significant Brethren One goal of the conference is to expand the minister in the eighteenth century. understanding of Sander Mack’s influence on the Born in Schwarzenau, Germany, in 1712, Sander Brethren. Although he was an important minister in Mack, as he preferred to be called, lived with the the eighteenth century, little has been written about group from Schwarzenau during their temporary stay him in comparison to his father, the first minister of in the Netherlands and moved with them to Pennsyl- the Brethren. In 1912 Samuel Heckman published a vania in 1729, settling in Germantown. He became a book of many of Mack’s German poetic texts and member of the Ephrata Cloister, and then returned to prose translations, but he provided little commen- Germantown in 1748. He settled in Chestnut Hill, tary on the texts. Donald F. Durnbaugh and Edward married Elisabeth Neis and had a family of eight Quinter translated Mack’s daybook, which was pub- children, making his living as a weaver. After his lished with both German and English texts in 2004. Otherwise, little research on Mack has appeared. The conference will take an interdisciplinary approach in its exploration of the significance of Mack’s life. Marcus Meier, a Young Center Fellow in 2006 and recipient of the Brown Book Award in 2009, will give the opening address. Hedda Durn- baugh, also a Young Center Fellow, will give a major address on the hymnody of Mack. Other speakers include Dale R. Stoffer, Stephen Longe- necker, Denise Kettering Lane, and William Kostlevy. Paper topics include Sander Mack’s the- ological views and spirituality, his career in the con- text of religion in Pennsylvania and early America, and his connection to Ephrata. Conference registration will begin at 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday, June 6, followed by a reception at 5:00 and the opening address at 7:00.Thursday’s schedule includes breakout sessions, Durnbaugh’s address on hymnody, and a program and dinner in the evening. Additional breakout sessions will be held on Friday, and the conference will conclude at One of the last Bibles that Alexander Mack Jr. owned, with his name inscribed in his hand 4:00, following a wrap-up panel discussion. and dated 1802, a year before he died. The Bible is on loan from the Brethren Church Archives, Ashland, Ohio, and will be in the Young Center exhibit on Mack’s life. (continued on page 3) 1 FROM THE DIRECTOR Jeff Bach n June we will host a conference on the opportunities, as it has with the arrival religious tolerance, and how Anabaptist Ilife and work of Alexander Mack Jr., this year of a new college president, Carl and Pietist groups embody these values the most important Brethren minister of Strikwerda, and a college-wide strategic in a changing, complicated yet intercon- the eighteenth century because of his planning process. Change will continue nected world. ministry, his writing, and the length of as we plan for the future of the Young As change comes in our times, the his career. By the time he died in 1803, Center’s research and teaching mandate, Young Center will continue to take Brethren had gone through many as well as the mission to interpret our advantage of the new opportunities it changes. The church had spread as far as research to the general public. We will brings. We will also hold on to the values eastern Missouri. Ritual practices had also hold on to healthy habits of scholar- that serve as well us a research center, a standardized and annual meeting became ship that serve the Center well. place of learning, and a forum where the a regular expectation. Brethren main- As we welcome fellows this spring general public and specialists can min- tained their opposition to slavery. They from Israel, Germany, and Slovenia, gle, ask questions, and learn. I invite you upheld their peace witness through two studying topics related to the Amish and to be a part of that learning at our pro- major wars. The Brethren changed some to German Pietism, we maintain our grams and conferences. I am grateful for patterns of worship and organization, commitment to excellent research and those who have journeyed with us for while maintaining important commit- expand our international connections. As several years, and look forward to wel- ments. we welcome visitors from afar, like the coming new friends to join us. Hope- Change seems to be a constant in groups from Nigeria and Bulgaria, or fully we can all find ways to hold on to these times. The speed of change seems host Sunday school classes or retirees, what is good and to explore good oppor- dizzying at times. Change can bring new we find new ways to talk about peace, tunities that can come with change. Visitors call at the Young Center he Young Center welcomed numer- Other guests in September included a Jeff Bach and Steve Scott the role of reli- Tous groups of visitors in recent group of over fifty Old German Baptist gious toleration and religious minorities months, including several international Brethren (New Conference) members in Pennsylvania and in America. The con- guests. In September, a group from the from across the country on a Brethren versation also turned to the tensions Church of the Brethren in Nigeria heritage tour in Virginia, Maryland, and between religious tradition and cultural (EYN) visited the Center for discussions Pennsylvania. Director Jeff Bach met secularism. Their visit was part of a pro- about peace making in the midst of reli- with them and spoke about the influ- gram sponsored locally by the Interna- gious conflict in Nigeria. They also ences of Pietism and Anabaptism on the tional Visitors Council of Philadelphia brought their unique insights to the con- Brethren. The visitors showed great under the auspices of the U.S. Depart- ference on the power of forgiveness. bravery as the Young Center gave them a ment of State’s International Visitor soggy welcome on a Leadership Program. day when remnants of The Young Center will welcome other tropical storm Lee visitors in coming months, including a brought heavy rains to group from Germany that is touring sites eastern Pennsylvania. related to the impact of German Pietism In October, a group in America. Led by Dr. Hans-Jürgen of five Muslims from Schrader, an expert on Radical Pietism, Bulgaria and their the group will visit the Ephrata Cloister translators stopped at and Moravian Church Square in Lititz the Center after a day before a presentation by Director Jeff of touring the Amish Bach on Radical Pietism in America. community in Lan- Through connections with visitors caster County. They and friends, the Center extends the reach Visitors from Bulgaria and their translators visited the Young Center in Octo- discussed with Young of its scholarship and mission to continue ber 2010 during a tour of Amish country in Lancaster County. Center staff members building bridges of understanding. 2 Wolfgang Breul to serve as 2012 Kreider Fellow Center Fellows and Doctoral Fellow pursue varied research interests olfgang Breul has been named the Maja Stekovic WKreider Fellow for Spring 2012. will travel from Breul is a professor at Johannes-Guten- Slovenia to Eliza- berg-University in Mainz in Germany, bethtown to serve where he teaches church history with a as the Center’s focus on Reformation studies. He has also doctoral fellow for specialized in Pietist studies during his Spring 2012. Ste- doctoral studies in Marburg under Hans kovic is a Ph.D. Schneider, the foremost authority on Rad- student at the Uni- Wolfgang Breul Maja Stekovic Benyamin Neuberger ical Pietism. versity of Ljub- Among Breul’s recent books are Rad- ljana, where she is studying English Benyamin Neuberger, professor of ical Pietism: Perspectives and Research, language and literature. The specific focus political science and African studies at the co-edited with Marcus Meier and Lothar of her academic research is the Amish in Open University of Israel, will arrive at Vogel (2011), and Love, Sex and Mar- American literature and culture. the Young Center in April to serve his riage, co-edited with Christian Soboth While at the Young Center, she plans to delayed residency as Snowden Fellow. (2011), both published in German. Breul make use of books and other resources He holds a Ph.D. in political science from is working on a new handbook on that are not available in Slovenia. “Being Columbia University and has taught at Pietism to be published in the fall of 2012 at the Young Center is of crucial Tel Aviv University, the University of in German. His current research interests importance for my research, since it is Pennsylvania, Haverford College, the include the role of social nonconformity otherwise virtually impossible to put University of Cape Town, and the among Pietists in Germany in work and together a balanced picture of how the University of Swaziland. recreational settings. Amish are represented,” she says. “Not Neuberger is currently working on a During his time as the Kreider Fellow, only will I be able to meet leading comparative study of the Amish and the Breul plans to study the ways that noncon- researchers in the field and access reliable Israeli ultra-Orthodox and their respective formity was expressed among Pietists.