Church of the Brethren Historical Roots

The Church of the Brethren was born out of the religious chaos following the Reformation in Germany. For thirty years during the late 17th century, three denominations struggled for power in Western Europe. These three were the Roman Catholic, the Lutheran, and the Reformed churches. Under the protection of various principalities, these three denominations became the official churches vying with one another and persecuting all who dared to profess any other faith.

 The Brethren movement began in August, 1708, in Germany, when five men and three women took a covenant of "good conscience with God, to take up all the commandments of Jesus Christ as an easy yoke, and thus to follow the Lord Jesus even unto a blessed end." This covenant was solemnized that year when they baptized each other in the Eder River as adult believers.

 Coming from a background in the Reformed Church, these eight individuals had been influenced by the radical wind of pietist renewal (Radical German Pietism). Through a study of the Scriptures, the reading of church history, and many discussions of the doctrines, their view of the church developed in a similar vein as that of the 16th century Anabaptists, with whose descendants, the Mennonite, they had close contact. Thus the major influences upon the Brethren have been a combination of basic Protestantism, pietist reform, and an anabaptist understanding of the church.

 The church grew and flourished in Germany, but due to continued harassment by the mainline churches the movement was eventually forced to emigrate to the " New World." The first group left for Philadelphia in 1719 followed by a second group in 1729. By the mid 1730s almost all members of the church had left Europe.

 For more information on the church and its history and development, see:
Meet the Brethren, edited by Donald F. Durnbaugh, printed by the Brethren Press for the Brethren Encyclopedia, Inc., 1984, Elgin, IL (from which source much of this information was drawn).