In , a Mennonite leader named Jacob Amman wanted to revive shunning and practice footwashing. Disagreement over these two issues led Amman and his followers to form a new group which took the name Amish. Amish men and women migrated to the United States in the early 18th century. Many of them settled in Lancaster County, Penn. Other groups settled in Indiana, Iowa, Missouri and Ohio.
The American Amish have attempted to preserve their distinctive culture, dress, language and religion, including the practice of adult baptism. Adult baptism, as practiced by the Amish, occurs after teenagers who want to join the church attend special instruction classes. People from outside the faith can also go through this process, but about 90 percent of all new members descend from Amish parents.
The Amish baptism process has several steps. First, candidates, usually between the ages of 18 and 22, are considered each fall and spring. Those selected attend classes and meet with church leadership for 18 weeks.
The day before the baptism ceremony, candidates have a final chance to change their mind. The ceremony itself takes place after the regular church sermon.
Then he or she is given a holy kiss by the bishop. More traditional groups will go hiking, play volleyball, have a picnic or meet for "singings". Some Amish groups do not practice Rumspringa. Apart from posing, families and churches vary in how much they will cooperate with picture taking. Of course, they cannot prevent long-distance shots; as long as members do not actually pose for the photo, the church places the moral burden on the photographer.
Although some adult Amish appear in the film as they work, none of them are face-on poses. The film shows a lot of diversity. Can you explain this? What are the Amish rules? There are some 40 different subgroups of Amish. There is not a common "Amish Rule Book" of regulations that applies to all groups. So the color of buggies, width of hat brims, style of dress, and use of inline skates, plush chairs and refrigerators, among dozens of other issues, varies from one community to another.
All this diversity makes it risky to generalize about "the Amish," as though they were pressed from the same cultural cookie cutter. Nonetheless, all groups use horse and buggy transportation, require plain dress for members and beards for married men, meet in homes for worship, ordain lay leaders, and live in rural areas. Amish people end formal education at the eighth grade, do not hold political office, restrict involvement with outsiders, selectively use modern technologies, and are conscientious objectors to war.
Do the Amish reject all modern technology? Some people have electricity and others don't. Some use tractors in the field and others horses. Amish people selectively use technology -- choosing what will serve their community and rejecting what may harm it.
Although each church makes its own decisions about technology all of them reject television, computers in their homes, and the ownership of cars. All of them permit the use of volt electricity from batteries, and some permit home-generated volt current for special equipment, but the vast majority reject tapping into the public grid.
Solar power is popular in many communities. Most Amish use horses to pull field equipment, but a few communities permit tractors. A few groups allow cell phones, but most do not. Most communities modify technology to fit their cultural values, such as placing steel wheels on tractors, installing battery-powered turn signals on buggies, and running refrigerators with propane gas.
Although car ownership is taboo, many churches allow members to hire vehicles and a non-Amish driver for long distance and business travel. Do the Amish believe in using modern medicine? What happens when they get sick, give birth, or need emergency treatment? One of the purposes of Rumspringa is to find a mate. Amish youth dating activities vary by community. Amish youth may be discreet about their dating.
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