Amish theological beliefs

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I’m wondering what the Amish believe in terms of theology. Not lifestyle - I am very familiar with all of that - but on issues like salvation, the Sacraments, and so on. Googling “Amish beliefs” brings up zilch on that score…
 
Look up the “Dordrecht Confession”, the original and the restatement from 1963.
 
Royaleisia said:
I’m wondering what the Amish believe in terms of theology. Not lifestyle - I am very familiar with all of that - but on issues like salvation, the Sacraments, and so on. Googling “Amish beliefs” brings up zilch on that score…
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They are Anabaptists. Think of them as a more radical form of Mennonites.
 
ltwin said:
They are Anabaptists. Think of them as a more radical form of Mennonites.
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I don’t think that they accept sola fide. They have more of an Orthodox form of salvation doctrine (“do God’s will and keep up your relationship and faith”). They do not have, like some other Protestants do, an idea that we know if we are saved. Only God can know that. They also have a form of Tradition called (some word in Dutch or German…) that varies from community to community maintaining old and modest morality.
 
Okay, I did some research. I found some things that set the Amish apart from other Protestants and some other unique things (I included a little of their culture, too, but that’s very important here).

Rejection of Sola Fide
Many reject the belief common to other Protestant denominations that anyone can be certain that his salvation is guaranteed. They consider such certainty to be arrogant.
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Passive evangelization
Most Christians see spreading the word of God as a central responsibility of their faith. Many Amish, on the other hand, feel no obligation to evangelize, preferring tolet their faith show by the way they live. In fact, the Amish rarely accept converts.
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Amish oral tradition (Ordnung)
The Ordnung is an oral tradition of rules and expectations that govern every aspect of Amish life, private, public and ceremonial. Rather than being a written set of rules that must be memorized, the Ordnung is taught by living it, much like children absorb and learn their native tongue by living it. It’s a code of conduct that evolved over decades, and it differs slightly from one Amish congregation to another.
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Source for the above: newsmax.com/t/newsmax/article/635785

Wikipedia has a separate article on Amish religious practices: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish_religious_practices
 
Are you referring to the Ordnung? I have some links that might be of interest: lancasterpa.com/amish/amish-faith/, religioustolerance.org/amish.htm, amishvillage.com/lancaster-county-amish/pa-amish-religion/. The Amish Church is firmly entrenched in the Anabaptist tradition, having been started by a man named Jakob Ammann, who thought that the parent Mennonite Church was too lenient on the issues of shunning groups.etown.edu/amishstudies/religion/amish-origins/, which he thought should accompany excommunication exploring-amish-country.com/amish-shunning.html. They still use their form of Pennsylvanian German dialect among themselves and they seek to keep their lifestyle as plain as possible lancasterpa.com/amish/, discoverlancaster.com/towns-and-heritage/amish-country/amish-religious-traditions.asp. They accept converts after a trial period, as do other Christian churches amish-heartland.com/features/2007/09/04/so-you-think-you-want-to-become-amish. This might interest certain site members: americamagazine.org/issue/470/faith-focus/catholic-among-amish.
 
Their ecclesial theology is based on the HOME as the church, father as pastor. Anything or anyone else is really a supplement to that.
 
commenter said:
Their ecclesial theology is based on the HOME as the church, father as pastor. Anything or anyone else is really a supplement to that.
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The father is the head of the home which is scriptural. The Amish are organized into districts and governed by a Bishop in each district. Membership is completely voluntary.
 
An interesting tidbit is that they use Luther’s German translation of the Bible which includes the 7 deuterocanonical books of the Old Testament. Readings from Tobit are used in their marriages. They even have a concept of Purgatory although they don’t have a word to describe it or use a word to define it. It’s just loosely understood. In many ways they are closer to Catholics than many other denominations. They have more of a sacramental view of communion and baptism rather than merely a symbolic view.

However, depending upon the individual community, there may be a wide variety of beliefs. Within the same community, you may have some church groups that will have inter-communion with other Amish groups. And other church groups that will not have inter-communion with these same groups. Yet they all profess to be “one” in doctrine. The community is divided into church groups (not sure what they call that- perhaps district as mentioned in above post) with a bishop in each territory, same idea as a diocese. When the church group gets too big to meet at a persons house, they split in two and create a new “diocese”.
 
There is a website that I often reference to read about the Amish called Amish America now it does give some things about lifestyle but it also gives things about religious beliefs for instance, some Amish actually celebrate St. Michael’s day, and it explains their doctrines on communion baptism Etc. It is actually a website that I love very much I don’t go to it as much as I used to. By the way if anyone can tell me of an Amish convert to Catholicism go ahead and call Marcus Grodi. I know of a few Mennonites that have converted to Catholicism but that’s a different post. Anyway but like I said Amish America is a really good source and that’s the one I use
 
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