Bethel. Near Kapunda. The ruins of Moravian Brethren Pastor Schondorf. When the community split Moravian church servcies werr held here. Built around 1856.
Bethel and the Moravians.
The Czech Moravian Brethren of Bethel near Tarlee were one of the unique religious groups to settle in this “Paradise of Dissent”. Moravia is a province of the Czech Republic (around Prague) which was from 1850 part of Bohemia. The origins of the Brethren go back to John Huss a Catholic heretic who in 1415 was burned at the stake by the Catholic Church. Heretic followers of Huss formed a breakaway group from the Catholic Church in 1467 including some forerunners of the Moravian Brethren. Martin Luther created the big break from the Catholic Church in Germany in 1517. Eventually during the Counter Reformation and the Thirty Years War (1618-48), a new group of Moravian Brethren moved to Saxony in 1722 to the town of Herrnhut. A new spiritual awakening and the founding of a Moravian Church occurred in 1727 led by Count Zinzendorf (1700-1760). In 1735 many Moravians went to America and founded the church there in the colonies of Georgia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. About 825,000 people worldwide are today members of the Moravian Brethren (Unitas Fratrum). They base everything on the Bible and bishops are selected and elected from the most spiritual members. They pursue missionary work, especially in Africa, and the largest concentration of Moravians today is in Tanzania! They allow members lots of freedom and members can be members of other churches, such as the Lutheran or Presbyterian Churches with which they maintain close links. The Moravian Church is part of the Lutheran World Federation. In Australia Moravians settled in the Western Districts of Victoria from 1850 as well as at Bethel near Tarlee from 1854. Bethel is a German word meaning “place of God.” The Moravians formed “utopian like” communities with communal lands here at Bethel and also at Herrnhut near Hamilton in Western Victoria. Their purpose in forming a farming commune in South Australia was fuelled by the desire for freedom and independence to follow their Christian beliefs and traditions.
The Moravian Brethren came from Saxony although the sect was originally Czech. So they spoke German and usually had German names. They are perhaps best known for their system of houses or “choirs” whereby they maintained separate seating in church for women, men, and single sisters and widows who were separated from the rest of the community. Virgins and single women were usually required to live in one large house together so that their spiritual needs could be dealt with separately. When a girl turned sixteen she was obliged to always wear some pink, usually a scarf or shawl but for church she might wear a pink blouse. Married women would always wear a rich red scarf or shawl. This practice of separating men and women carried over to the cemetery as well, with women being buried on one side and men on the other. You can see this today in the old part of the Bethel cemetery.
In 1854 a pastor by the name of Schondorf was sent out by the parent church at Herrnhut in Saxony to establish a traditional Moravian Christian commune. Schondorf bought up 1,912 acres near Tarlee. The centre of the commune was to be one hundred acres of church property which initially was to be governed and managed by the community for the welfare of the church and pastor alike. A church and school were built and families allocated land which they thought they were buying. The Moravians worked harmoniously together to build their homes, clear their land, and establish a little village in which the focal point was the Church. The Band Hall was for their music performances as these people had a great culture of fine German and European music and they regularly staged performances and concerts, and those musicians in their commune would practice together. They saw their musical talents as perhaps their greatest possession. The Moravians also had a number of different ceremonies, one was the coming of age, or debut, for the girls at sixteen and also the young men attaining their majority at 21 years of age. There were many other functions and ceremonies mostly attached to their worship, Christmas and Easter taking pre-eminence.
All went well for the first twenty years until families discovered they were not buying land, they were only renting it. The community wrote to the mother church in Herrnhut asking for a new priest. In the early 1870's a number in the church members, mainly the younger generation, felt Schondorf was getting too old (he was 60) and they could do with someone with more fluency and style. So they wrote to Herrnhut in Bohemia asking for a younger pastor - without telling Pastor Schondorf. When he found out he objected, refusing to move from the church house because it had been legally signed over to him some years before. The governing committee took him to court but they lost the case and then they took it to the Supreme Court of South Australia where they lost it again. This brought about a permanent rift in the community. However when the new pastor (Jacobi) arrived in 1876 Schondorf had to move out to a cottage he had built for himself about half a mile from the church. Some of the commune members went to his home for services, but in 1877 Schondorf retired a broken man. He died in 1898 and was buried in Kapunda. A few of the community had stayed loyal to Schondorf and they built another church by Schondorf’s cottage 1876. The ruins of the Schondorf properties can be seen from Bethel.
The new Moravian Brethren pastor named Jacobi arrived in 1876. Pastor Jacobi continued until 1891 when he died. Herrnhut then sent out another man, Pastor Buch, but just a few years later in 1895 the Lutherans built a large church at Bethel adjacent to the community. Most of the remaining Moravian Brethren began to attend the Lutheran Church. Pastor Buch was recalled to Bohemia in 1906 so the community severed their connection with Herrnhut in Bohemia and joined a Lutheran Synod. Many of the Moravians were not happy with the new arrangement as the Lutheran pastor (Benman) progressively brought in the practices of the Lutherans including robes, fees for weddings and funerals etc. Not far away from Bethel other Lutherans and Wends ( now called Sorbs) built another Lutheran Church only a kilometre away at Steinthal. The Moravians continued in SA with an offshoot community at South Kilkerran on Yorke Peninsula as the Moravians practised their missionary with the Narrunga people of Yorke Peninsula at Point Pearce Aboriginal Mission. The ruins of Schondorf’s second house, church and graveyard can be seen from the Bethel Lutheran Church. The Moravian church and large school has now been demolished. The Lutheran manse next to the Lutheran Church was built in 1908. The Moravian burials are numbered chronologically, with men and women separated.
As well as the Moravian Brethren there were a number of people of Wendish origin living in the Bethel district. They were from Lusatia, a small area in Germany and had struggled for centuries to maintain their own culture, language and worship although over-ruled by Saxony and Prussia for most of the time. This group had come out to South Australia in 1848, settling at near Riverton, Ebenezer and St Kitts. But some Wends like Peter and George Doecke took up land at Bethel in 1856. Soon others of their family followed. They joined in worship with the Moravians and their children attended the Bethel school, (German being spoken) but by 1860 this influx was over-crowding both the school and the Moravian church. Peter Doecke decided to erect a room on his property for a school and a bit later another to be used as a church which they called "Steinthal". It had an altar and a pipe organ (donated by Peter Doecke who was the organist) and a choir of six! Most of the congregation were Peter Doecke's relatives, and pastors came from neighbouring areas to preach there. They remained on good terms with Pastor Schondorf (he was often a guest preacher) and there was a lot of inter-marrying between the Wends and the Moravians. Both practised infant baptism. In 1906 Peter Doecke died and as numbers at Steinthal had declined the Wendish group asked to be amalgamated with the Moravian Church which amalgamated with the Lutheran Church at that time.
Bethel. Near Kapunda. The ruins of Moravian Brethren Pastor Schondorf. When the community split Moravian church servcies werr held here. Built around 1856.
Bethel and the Moravians.
The Czech Moravian Brethren of Bethel near Tarlee were one of the unique religious groups to settle in this “Paradise of Dissent”. Moravia is a province of the Czech Republic (around Prague) which was from 1850 part of Bohemia. The origins of the Brethren go back to John Huss a Catholic heretic who in 1415 was burned at the stake by the Catholic Church. Heretic followers of Huss formed a breakaway group from the Catholic Church in 1467 including some forerunners of the Moravian Brethren. Martin Luther created the big break from the Catholic Church in Germany in 1517. Eventually during the Counter Reformation and the Thirty Years War (1618-48), a new group of Moravian Brethren moved to Saxony in 1722 to the town of Herrnhut. A new spiritual awakening and the founding of a Moravian Church occurred in 1727 led by Count Zinzendorf (1700-1760). In 1735 many Moravians went to America and founded the church there in the colonies of Georgia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina. About 825,000 people worldwide are today members of the Moravian Brethren (Unitas Fratrum). They base everything on the Bible and bishops are selected and elected from the most spiritual members. They pursue missionary work, especially in Africa, and the largest concentration of Moravians today is in Tanzania! They allow members lots of freedom and members can be members of other churches, such as the Lutheran or Presbyterian Churches with which they maintain close links. The Moravian Church is part of the Lutheran World Federation. In Australia Moravians settled in the Western Districts of Victoria from 1850 as well as at Bethel near Tarlee from 1854. Bethel is a German word meaning “place of God.” The Moravians formed “utopian like” communities with communal lands here at Bethel and also at Herrnhut near Hamilton in Western Victoria. Their purpose in forming a farming commune in South Australia was fuelled by the desire for freedom and independence to follow their Christian beliefs and traditions.
The Moravian Brethren came from Saxony although the sect was originally Czech. So they spoke German and usually had German names. They are perhaps best known for their system of houses or “choirs” whereby they maintained separate seating in church for women, men, and single sisters and widows who were separated from the rest of the community. Virgins and single women were usually required to live in one large house together so that their spiritual needs could be dealt with separately. When a girl turned sixteen she was obliged to always wear some pink, usually a scarf or shawl but for church she might wear a pink blouse. Married women would always wear a rich red scarf or shawl. This practice of separating men and women carried over to the cemetery as well, with women being buried on one side and men on the other. You can see this today in the old part of the Bethel cemetery.
In 1854 a pastor by the name of Schondorf was sent out by the parent church at Herrnhut in Saxony to establish a traditional Moravian Christian commune. Schondorf bought up 1,912 acres near Tarlee. The centre of the commune was to be one hundred acres of church property which initially was to be governed and managed by the community for the welfare of the church and pastor alike. A church and school were built and families allocated land which they thought they were buying. The Moravians worked harmoniously together to build their homes, clear their land, and establish a little village in which the focal point was the Church. The Band Hall was for their music performances as these people had a great culture of fine German and European music and they regularly staged performances and concerts, and those musicians in their commune would practice together. They saw their musical talents as perhaps their greatest possession. The Moravians also had a number of different ceremonies, one was the coming of age, or debut, for the girls at sixteen and also the young men attaining their majority at 21 years of age. There were many other functions and ceremonies mostly attached to their worship, Christmas and Easter taking pre-eminence.
All went well for the first twenty years until families discovered they were not buying land, they were only renting it. The community wrote to the mother church in Herrnhut asking for a new priest. In the early 1870's a number in the church members, mainly the younger generation, felt Schondorf was getting too old (he was 60) and they could do with someone with more fluency and style. So they wrote to Herrnhut in Bohemia asking for a younger pastor - without telling Pastor Schondorf. When he found out he objected, refusing to move from the church house because it had been legally signed over to him some years before. The governing committee took him to court but they lost the case and then they took it to the Supreme Court of South Australia where they lost it again. This brought about a permanent rift in the community. However when the new pastor (Jacobi) arrived in 1876 Schondorf had to move out to a cottage he had built for himself about half a mile from the church. Some of the commune members went to his home for services, but in 1877 Schondorf retired a broken man. He died in 1898 and was buried in Kapunda. A few of the community had stayed loyal to Schondorf and they built another church by Schondorf’s cottage 1876. The ruins of the Schondorf properties can be seen from Bethel.
The new Moravian Brethren pastor named Jacobi arrived in 1876. Pastor Jacobi continued until 1891 when he died. Herrnhut then sent out another man, Pastor Buch, but just a few years later in 1895 the Lutherans built a large church at Bethel adjacent to the community. Most of the remaining Moravian Brethren began to attend the Lutheran Church. Pastor Buch was recalled to Bohemia in 1906 so the community severed their connection with Herrnhut in Bohemia and joined a Lutheran Synod. Many of the Moravians were not happy with the new arrangement as the Lutheran pastor (Benman) progressively brought in the practices of the Lutherans including robes, fees for weddings and funerals etc. Not far away from Bethel other Lutherans and Wends ( now called Sorbs) built another Lutheran Church only a kilometre away at Steinthal. The Moravians continued in SA with an offshoot community at South Kilkerran on Yorke Peninsula as the Moravians practised their missionary with the Narrunga people of Yorke Peninsula at Point Pearce Aboriginal Mission. The ruins of Schondorf’s second house, church and graveyard can be seen from the Bethel Lutheran Church. The Moravian church and large school has now been demolished. The Lutheran manse next to the Lutheran Church was built in 1908. The Moravian burials are numbered chronologically, with men and women separated.
As well as the Moravian Brethren there were a number of people of Wendish origin living in the Bethel district. They were from Lusatia, a small area in Germany and had struggled for centuries to maintain their own culture, language and worship although over-ruled by Saxony and Prussia for most of the time. This group had come out to South Australia in 1848, settling at near Riverton, Ebenezer and St Kitts. But some Wends like Peter and George Doecke took up land at Bethel in 1856. Soon others of their family followed. They joined in worship with the Moravians and their children attended the Bethel school, (German being spoken) but by 1860 this influx was over-crowding both the school and the Moravian church. Peter Doecke decided to erect a room on his property for a school and a bit later another to be used as a church which they called "Steinthal". It had an altar and a pipe organ (donated by Peter Doecke who was the organist) and a choir of six! Most of the congregation were Peter Doecke's relatives, and pastors came from neighbouring areas to preach there. They remained on good terms with Pastor Schondorf (he was often a guest preacher) and there was a lot of inter-marrying between the Wends and the Moravians. Both practised infant baptism. In 1906 Peter Doecke died and as numbers at Steinthal had declined the Wendish group asked to be amalgamated with the Moravian Church which amalgamated with the Lutheran Church at that time.