Some splits were over matters of religion, and some over Garrison's peculiar perfectionist ethos and notions of nonresistance.
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And the theology it espoused — while allegedly one of love and nonviolence — in practice was also one of nonresistance: one that ascribed no responsibility to President Trump for his role in stoking racialized violence.
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Ballou traveled around New England lecturing and debating on Practical Christianity, Christian nonresistance, abolition, temperance, and other social issues.
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Practitioners of nonresistance may refuse to retaliate against an opponent or offer any form of self-defense. Nonresistance is often associated with particular religious groups. Sometimes non-resistance has been seen as compatible with, even part of, movements advocating social change. An often-cited example is the movement led by Mohandas Gandhi in the struggle for Indian Independence.
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Some similarities include adhering to the Dordrecht Confession of Faith and practicing varying degrees of Anabaptist practice, such as nonresistance, separation from the state, and adult baptism.
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Advocates of non-resistance view pacifism as a more liberal theology since it advocates only physical nonviolence and allows its followers to actively oppose an enemy. In the 20th century, there have been differences of opinion between and within Amish and Mennonite churches, as they disagreed on the ethics of nonresistance and pacifism. Nonresistance played a prominent role in the abolitionist movement in the nineteenth-century United States.David Blight, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, Simon and Schuster, 2018.
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The attempt to defend the villages departed from the traditional Mennonite teaching of nonresistance and was disapproved of by many colonists. Others regarded the collapse of effective governmental authority as sufficient justification for the creation of self-defense units. This sentiment was reinforced by horrific atrocities committed by anarchist bands against Mennonite communities. While Selbstschutz units had some success in protecting Mennonite communities from further atrocities and in providing time for the civil population to flee to areas held by White Russian forces, the abandonment of nonresistance proved to be highly divisive.
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Perhaps the oldest recorded statement of nonresistance philosophy is that of Socrates around 399 BC. An influential ancient Greek philosopher, Socrates was sentenced to death by the Athenian democracy for teaching his students to question authority and think for themselves. Socrates accepted his fate on reasons of morality and justice, rather than accept help from his supporters to flee Athens and escape execution. The term nonresistance was later used to refer to the Established Church during the religious troubles in England following the English Civil War and Protestant Succession. In the Anabaptist churches, the term is defined in contrast with pacifism.
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It contains 24 articles ranging from the more general Christian theologies of God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit to the more distinct Foot Washing; Truth and the Avoidance of Oaths, Peace, Justice, and Nonresistance; and The Church's Relation to Government and Society.
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During the 20th century, in the two most populous countries of Asia, two dramatically different political philosophies took shape. Mahatma Gandhi gave a new meaning to Ahimsa, and redefined the concepts of nonviolence and nonresistance. During the same period, Mao Zedong's communist philosophy was crystallized.
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Stone began to increase her reform activities back to a normal level after the Civil War had ended.Million, 2003, pp. 257-275 As a lifelong believer in nonresistance, Stone could not support the war effort as so many of her friends did.Million, 2003, pp.
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The Emmanuel Association's holiness standards are codified in the text titled "Principles of Holy Living". The denomination is opposed to warfare, thus falling into the Holiness Pacifists subgroup of the holiness movement. It advocates for the principle of nonresistance: The Emmanuel Association is based in Colorado Springs.
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According to this interpretation the passages call for total nonresistance to the point of facilitating aggression against oneself, and since human governments defend themselves by military force, some have advocated Christian anarchism, including Leo Tolstoy who elucidated his reasoning in his 1894 book The Kingdom of God Is Within You.
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His views were now something like deism. In 1851 he moved with his family to Central Ohio. In the United States he joined the anti-slavery party, and associated with William Lloyd Garrison, Wendell Phillips Garrison, Henry C. Wright, and other leading abolitionists. From Wright he accepted the principle of nonresistance.
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Ammon Hennacy was a pacifist, a Christian anarchist, and an advocate of anarchism and nonresistance. He was extremely critical of what he described as the "institutional church". He did not drink or smoke and was a vegetarian. Much of his activism was anti-war, anti-nuclear proliferation, and against the death penalty.
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Jesus taught turning the other cheek during the Sermon on the Mount. Turning the other cheek is a phrase in Christian doctrine from the Sermon on the Mount that refers to responding to injury without revenge and allowing more injury. This passage is variously interpreted as commanding nonresistance, Christian pacifism, or nonviolence on the part of the victim.
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Tolstoyans identify themselves as Christians, but do not generally belong to an institutional Church. They attempt to live an ascetic and simple life, preferring to be vegetarian, non-smoking, teetotal and chaste. Tolstoyans are considered Christian pacifists and advocate nonresistance in all circumstances. They do not support or participate in the government which they consider immoral, violent and corrupt.
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Throughout his work, Hershberger maintained a strict biblicalism. It was in part due to Jesus' call to love one's enemies that Hershberger made one of his most foundational distinctions. He called for Mennonites to practice nonresistance, which is separate from nonviolent resistance. While some would argue for pacifism as a method of combating injustice, Hershberger thought that most nonviolent resistance went too far.
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Nonresistance (or non-resistance) is "the practice or principle of not resisting authority, even when it is unjustly exercised".Oxford English Dictionary, online edition, accessed 8 April 2011. At its core is discouragement of, even opposition to, physical resistance to an enemy. It is considered as a form of principled nonviolence or pacifism which rejects all physical violence, whether exercised on individual, group, state or international levels.
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Erodability (or erodibility) is the inherent yielding or nonresistance of soils and rocks to erosion. A high erodability implies that the same amount of work exerted by the erosion processes leads to a larger removal of material. Because the mechanics behind erosion depend upon the competence and coherence of the material, erodability is treated in different ways depending on the type of surface that eroded.
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They are to be supported by the church, but must also be disciplined if they sin. ;The Sword (Christian pacifism) - nonresistance: Violence must not be used in any circumstance. The way of nonviolence is patterned after the example of Christ who never exhibited violence in the face of persecution or as a punishment for sin. A Christian should not pass judgment in worldly disputes.
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In 1921, Hennacy and Melms hiked around the United States passing through all 48 of the contiguous states. He settled down in 1925, buying a farm and raising his two children. In 1931, he began social work in Milwaukee and organised one of the first social worker unions. He refused to use force or self-defense even when threatened during his work, preferring instead to use nonresistance.
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Moreover, Zhang himself was not in Manchuria at the time, but was in a hospital in Beijing to raise money for the flood victims. However, in the Chinese newspapers, Zhang was ridiculed as "General Nonresistance" (). Chinese delegate addresses the League of Nations after the Mukden Incident in 1932. Because of these circumstances, the central government turned to the international community for a peaceful resolution.
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345 During winter, the Bolshevik government approached the Central Powers for a peace deal, but the negotiations stalled when the Bolsheviks were confronted with the enemy's demands. Sadoul was enthusiastic about peace through nonresistance, but later switched to supporting partisan warfare against the Germans.Ducoulombier, pp. 43–44 Trotsky used his services to send out parallel offers to the Entente, in exchange for international recognition.
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Another distinct attribute of his philosophy based on Christ's teachings is nonresistance during conflict. This idea in Tolstoy's book The Kingdom of God Is Within You (full text of English translation available on Wikisource) directly influenced Mahatma Gandhi and therefore also nonviolent resistance movements to this day. Tolstoy believed that the aristocracy was a burden on the poor, and that the only way to live together is anarchism.
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Most Amish do not buy commercial insurance or participate in Social Security. As present-day Anabaptists, Amish church members practice nonresistance and will not perform any type of military service. The Amish value rural life, manual labor, and humility, all under the auspices of living what they interpret to be God's word. Members who do not conform to these community expectations and who cannot be convinced to repent are excommunicated.
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He was one of the most influential thinkers of the Bohemian Reformation. His published works critiqued the immorality and violence of the contemporary church and state. He proposed a number of Bible-based improvements for human society, including nonresistance, which influenced such luminaries as Tolstoy, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. Paradoxically, the main part of the Hussite movement rejected his teachings of nonviolence, which eventually led to much violence among the Hussite movement.
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Sattler was charged with defying the emperor, rejecting the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, rejecting infant baptism, rejecting extreme unction, dishonoring the saints, teaching against oaths, practicing the love feast, marrying, and advocating nonresistance. Sattler denied that he had defied the imperial edicts or dishonored the saints, but defended the remaining charges as moral and biblical. He also denied that courts should have jurisdiction in religious doctrine. Sattler was convicted.
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A pacifist, he actively participated in establishing peace societies, speaking out against the death penalty, and advocating nonresistance. He practiced this last belief to the extent of rejecting self-defense. He became a leader in the temperance movement, believing it to be a form of abolitionism, since he saw men as "slaves" to drink. He was perhaps most renowned for his work in education reform, as he sought to improve facilities, teachers, and curriculum in public elementary schools.
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Articles include the "Holy Life", "Courtship and Marriage", "Nonresistance", "Separation from the State", "Types and Places of Employment", "Uniformity Within the Church" and "Nonconformity to the world".Markham Waterloo Mennonite Conference Report and General Recommendations, January 2010, edited 2011 It is also expected that members primarily drive black vehicles. Members cautiously use technologies like mobile phones, computers, and the Internet, but do not own televisions or radios. The MWMC has its own parochial school system, which began in 1973.
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Bishop Benjamin Eby was a Canadian minister, schoolteacher, farmer, author, and community leader. He was a pioneer of the Mennonite community in Canada and a strong proponent of nonresistance. Born in 1785, he emigrated to Upper Canada in 1806 and purchased a large tract of land in what would later become Kitchener, Ontario. Plaque 21 He became a Mennonite preacher in 1809, and by 1811 or 1813 had built a log Mennonite meeting house used as a school house and for religious services.
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As Civilian Public Service started to wind down in 1946, MCC began exploring a peacetime service program that would continue the types of projects performed by CPS. The new program, Voluntary Service, had several aims.MCC Headquarters Letter, No. 90, November 1946 as quoted by Haury pp. 13-14. It would provide young people with a way to voluntarily perform Christian service for up to a year as a means of testifying more widely to the gospel and its way of love and nonresistance.
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The Brethren are a Christian denomination of Anabaptist origin that practiced baptism by triune immersion and exercised nonresistance. Triune immersion consists of dipping a new believer into water three times, once for each of the entities of the Holy Trinity. Brethren adherents believed only in the New Testament, and professed no other creeds. The interior of Old Pine Church, which consists of a single common space for all worshippers, also illustrates the building's connection with the Brethren and the denomination's beliefs regarding slavery.
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Passive obedience is the doctrine espoused by Bishop Berkeley in 1712 that people have "a moral duty to observe the negative precepts (prohibitions) of the law, including the duty not to resist the execution of punishment." Although Berkeley made exceptions to this the exceptions did not cover tyranny, and therefore would not have excuse revoking "old principles" and changing allegiance. Bray clearly thinks this is "a joke". The term nonresistance was used to refer to the Established Church during the religious troubles in England following the English Civil War and Protestant Succession.
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To illustrate how nonresistance works in practice, Alexandre Christoyannopoulos offers the following Christian anarchist response to terrorism: Author James R. Graham wrote, "The Christian is not a pacifist, he is a non-participationist."Graham, James R., Strangers and Pilgrims, The Church Press, Glendale, California n.d., p. 35 In addition to conscientious objection, nonresistant practices of Old Order Mennonites, Amish, and Conservative Mennonites include rejection of the following civil practices: sue at law, lobby the government, hold government office, use the force of the law to maintain their "rights".
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The conclusion seems to me inescapable that, if Illinois can bar this petitioner from the practice of law it can bar every person from every public occupation solely because he believes in nonresistance, rather than in force. Black concluded that the Illinois Constitution's requirement was essentially a "test oath," an oath designed to test one's loyalty before any illegal act had actually occurred. But, relying on Cummings v. Missouri, 71 U.S. 277 (1867) and Ex parte Garland, 71 U.S. 333 (1866), Black said that test oaths were anathema to the Constitution.
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The concept of nonviolence (ahimsa) and nonresistance has a long history in Indian religious thought and has had many revivals in Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, Jewish and Christian contexts. Gandhi explains his philosophy and way of life in his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth. Some of his other remarks were widely quoted, such as "There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for."James Geary, Geary's Guide to the World's Great Aphorists (2007) p.
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Historian Ruth Feldstein claims that in her adaptation of "Go Limp", "Simone mocked, but did not quite reject, the value of passive nonresistance as a means to improve race relations."Ruth Feldstein, "'I Don't Trust You Anymore'; Nina Simone, Culture, and Black Activism in the 1960s," Journal of American History 87, no. 4 (2005): 1365 Author Nadine Cohades describes "Go Limp" as a "sing-along folk song and a benign if mischievous tribute to the young protesters," Nadine Cohades, Princess Noire: The Tumultuous Reign of Nina Simone (New York: Pantheon, 2010), 151.
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Reformed Mennonites see themselves as true followers of Christ's teachings and of the teachings of the New Testament. They have retained the name taken from Menno Simons as they believe what he practiced and wrote are in the true Spirit of Christ and the teachings in the New Testament. They have no church rules, but they rely solely on the Bible and a prayerful appeal to Christ and His Spirit as their guide. The Reformed Mennonites practice nonresistance and therefore do not go to war, practice self-defense, or sue at the law.
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The German language is used for Bible reading and singing in worship services and Pennsylvania German is used in worship services for preaching and is spoken at home and with other Old Orders.Groffdale Old Order Mennonite Conference at Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. They meet in plain church buildings to worship, but do not have Sunday schools. Practicing nonresistance like other traditional Mennonite groups, during World War II they advised young men not qualifying for a farm deferment to accept jail terms instead of Civilian Public Service, the alternate used by other Anabaptist conscientious objectors.
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Louis Sylvester Bauman (November 13, 1875 – November 8, 1950) was a Brethren minister, writer, and Bible conference speaker, holding influential leadership in the Brethren Church and the "Grace Brethren" movement which evenly divided the denomination in 1939. He served in several pastorates, in particular the First Brethren Church of Long Beach, California where he was pastor for thirty-four years (1913–1947). Bauman held to traditional Brethren views regarding baptism, communion, and nonresistance, but also held to evangelical convictions regarding missions, and premillennial dispensationalism, with the latter views becoming foundational beliefs of Grace Brethren.
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Christian nonresistance is based on a reading of the Sermon on the Mount, in which Jesus says: Members of the Anabaptist (Mennonite, Amish, Hutterite and Schwarzenau Brethren/German Baptist) denominations and other peace churches like the Quakers have interpreted this passage to mean that people should do nothing to physically resist an enemy. According to this belief, only God has the right to execute punishments. Nonresistant Christians note that sacrificial love of Jesus resulted in his submission to crucifixion rather than vengeance. A main application of this theology for Anabaptist groups is to teach conscientious objection of military conscription to their youth.
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The Church of the Brethren is a Christian denomination with origins in the Schwarzenau Brethren ( "Schwarzenau New Baptists") that was organized in 1708 by Alexander Mack in Schwarzenau, Germany, as a melding of the Radical Pietist and Anabaptist movements. The denomination holds the New Testament as its only creed. Historically, the church has taken a strong stance for nonresistance or pacifism—it is one of the three historic peace churches, alongside the Mennonites and Quakers. Distinctive practices include believers baptism by trine immersion; a threefold love feast consisting of feet washing, a fellowship meal, and communion; anointing for healing; and the holy kiss.
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This decision of the Communist Party of China differed sharply with Chiang Kai-shek's policy of first defeating the Communists before challenging Japan directly. In December 9, 1935, students and other citizens (dubbed the “December Niners”) held a demonstration on the Tiananmen Square in Beijing (renamed as Beiping then) to protest Chiang Kai-shek's continued “nonresistance” against the Japanese. City police used violence to suppress the students, turning the fire hoses on them, in the near-freezing weather. However, this demonstration became a potent symbol of anti-Japanese resistance and led to patriotic groups sprouting around the country.
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Some Christian anarchists resist taxes in the belief that their government is engaged in immoral, unethical or destructive activities such as war, and paying taxes inevitably funds these activities, whilst others submit to taxation. Adin Ballou wrote that if the act of resisting taxes requires physical force to withhold what a government tries to take, then it is important to submit to taxation. Ammon Hennacy, who, like Ballou also believed in nonresistance, eased his conscience by simply living below the income tax threshold.“Ammon Hennacy” in Gross, David M. (ed.) We Won’t Pay: A Tax Resistance Reader (2008) pp.
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As a denomination within the peace church movement, it still holds strongly to its pursuit of peace, but within the denomination there are many different interpretations of how this peaceful lifestyle should be lived out. Twentieth-century Brethren continue to uphold the ideal of peace, but the church embraces persons of opposing convictions concerning the role and means of "peacemaking". The Brethren Church is also the only Anabaptist denomination currently with a history of supporting non- combatant military chaplains. According to their website, > On the one hand, some Brethren understand peacemaking as a practice of > nonresistance or nonviolence.
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They also believe in nonresistance and thus "forbid Christians to shed blood." With regard to baptism, many Radical Pietists hold "that the original and apostolic form of baptism was to immerse the candidate forward into the water three times (once in the name of the Father, once in the name of the Son, and once in the name of the Spirit)." Radical Pietists also practice the lovefeast (which includes footwashing and the holy kiss), as well as closed communion. The Radical Pietistic communities do not believe in the swearing of oaths and also resolve problems at the congregational level under church councils presided by elders, rather than in civil courts.
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More than any other Bible source, the Sermon on the Mount is used as the basis for Christian anarchism. The foundation of Christian anarchism is a rejection of violence, with Leo Tolstoy's The Kingdom of God Is Within You regarded as a key text. Tolstoy takes the viewpoint that all governments who wage war, and churches who in turn support those governments, are an affront to the Christian principles of nonviolence and nonresistance. Christians have interpreted Romans 13:1–7 to mean they should support the state and wield the sword when requested, as God has sanctified the state to be his main tool to preserve social order.
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Backus tells McEvoy that they'll set a trap for Walling and then takes him to a remote location—where Backus drugs McEvoy into nonresistance. Backus admits that he himself is both Eidolon and The Poet, because the room mistakenly billed to Thorson was actually the one in which he stayed. He admits to all of the deaths and to his setup of Gladden as the "fall guy" for the murders. As Backus prepares to sodomize and then kill McEvoy, Walling (who was suspicious because of messages that she had received from both men) shows up and eventually saves McEvoy's life by knocking Backus out the window and down a long hill.
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Tolstoy sought to separate Russian Orthodox Christianity—which was merged with the state—from what he believed was the true message of Jesus as contained in the Gospels, specifically in the Sermon on the Mount. Tolstoy takes the viewpoint that all governments who wage war, and churches who in turn support those governments, are an affront to the Christian principles of nonviolence and nonresistance. Although Tolstoy never actually used the term Christian anarchism in The Kingdom of God Is Within You, reviews of this book following its publication in 1894 appear to have coined the term. Christian anarchist groups have included the Doukhobors, Catholic Worker Movement and the Brotherhood Church.
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Peace churches are Christian denominations explicitly advocating pacifism. The term "historic peace churches" refers specifically to three church traditions: the Church of the Brethren, the Mennonites (and other Anabaptists, such as the Amish and Hutterites), and the Quakers (Religious Society of Friends). The historic peace churches have, from their origins as far back as the 16th century, always taken the position that Jesus was himself a pacifist who explicitly taught and practiced pacifism, and that his followers must do likewise. Pacifist churches vary on whether physical force can ever be justified in self-defense or protecting others, as many adhere strictly to nonresistance when confronted by violence.
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Thompson was invited by Garrison to visit New England, and this proposal was not only accepted by his supporters in Glasgow but the Edinburgh Emancipation Society was formed so that it too could back Thompson's journey. From 1836 to 1847 he was active in every major anti- slavery debate in Britain, including the 1840 World Anti-Slavery Convention in London.The Anti-Slavery Society Convention, 1840, Benjamin Robert Haydon, accessed 19 July 2008 In 1847 he was elected to the House of Commons as a Member of Parliament (MP) for Tower Hamlets. Thompson was also an advocate of East Indian reform, free trade, Chartism, nonresistance, and the peace movement.
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Uncle Tom is the title character of Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin. The character was seen by many readers as a ground-breaking humanistic portrayal of a slave, one who uses nonresistance and gives his life to protect others who have escaped from slavery. However, the character also came to be seen, especially based on his portrayal in pro-slavery dramatizations, as inappropriately subservient to white slaveholders. This led to the use of Uncle Tom – sometimes shortened to just a Tom – as a derogatory epithet for an exceedingly subservient person or house negro, particularly one aware of their own lower-class racial status.
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After the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, Ma Zhanshan was appointed as Commander of the Northeastern Advance Force, in charge of the four northeastern provinces Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang and Rehe. Ma Zhanshan established a headquarters in Datong in August 1937, led his troops to fight the Japanese in Chahar, Suiyuan Datong and Shanxi, and cooperated with Fu Zuoyi's troops in the defense of Suiyuan and in the Yinshan War. Ma Zhanshan abhorred the nonresistance policy of the Kuomintang government and he sided with the Chinese Communist Party in its anti-Japanese policy. He visited Yan'an in 1939 in order reach an accommodation with the Eighth Route Army.
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The Church of the Brethren is one of the historic peace churches, which includes Quakers, Amish, Apostolic and the Mennonite churches. This is because two of the Brethren's fundamental beliefs are nonviolent resolution of conflict and Nonresistance to evil, which they combine with antiwar and peace efforts around the world. The church's commitment to love the enemy and use nonviolence is summarized in its phrase, "all war is sin" (Annual Conference, 1935), and the fact that many Brethren refuse to engage in voluntary or compulsory military service. However, some Brethren have been imprisoned for their ideals, while others have avoided the legal reprocussions of their refusal by agreeing to serve in the military as chaplains or medical personnel.
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Teachings of the New Testament are interpreted and applied literally, especially those in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7.) They have less rules than the German Baptist Brethren, preferring to let the Holy Spirit convict hearts and lead people to live holy lives, according to the Scriptures. Old Brethren are more plain in dress and more conservative in lifestyle than their parent group, the Old German Baptist Brethren; but are similar to them in many other aspects such as nonresistance, using the Trine Immersion mode of baptism and the three-part communion service including feetwashing and a love feast.Donald B. Kraybill, C. Nelson Hostetter: "Anabaptist World USA", Scottdale PA, 2001, page 155.
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Hutterites (), also called Hutterian Brethren (German: Hutterische Brüder), are an ethnoreligious group that is a communal branch of Anabaptists who, like the Amish and Mennonites, trace their roots to the Radical Reformation of the early 16th century. The founder of the Hutterites, Jacob Hutter, "established the Hutterite colonies on the basis of the Schleitheim Confession, a classic Anabaptist statement of faith" of 1527, with the first communes being formed in 1528. Since the death of Hutter in 1536, the beliefs of the Hutterites, especially living in a community of goods and nonresistance, have resulted in hundreds of years of diaspora in many countries. They embarked on a series of migrations through central and eastern Europe.
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Tolstoy sought to separate Russian Orthodox Christianity—which was merged with the state—from what he believed was the true message of Jesus as contained in the Gospels, specifically in the Sermon on the Mount. Tolstoy takes the viewpoint that all governments who wage war, and churches who in turn support those governments, are an affront to the Christian principles of nonviolence and nonresistance. Although Tolstoy never actually used the term Christian anarchism in The Kingdom of God Is Within You, reviews of this book following its publication in 1894 appear to have coined the term. Christian anarchists hold that the "Reign of God" is the proper expression of the relationship between God and humanity.
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L Tolstoy — On Life and Essays on Religion, 1934 Tolstoyans tend to focus more on following the teachings of Jesus, rather than on his miracles or divinity. They attempt to live an ascetic and simple life, preferring to be vegetarian, non-smoking, teetotal and chaste. Tolstoyans are considered Christian pacifists and advocate nonresistance in all circumstances. Tolstoy's understanding of what it means to be Christian was defined by the Sermon on the Mount and summed up in five simple propositions: # Love your enemies # Do not be angry # Do not fight evil with evil, but return evil with good (an interpretation of turning the other cheek) # Do not lust # Do not take oaths.
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The Amish have, on occasion, encountered discrimination and hostility from their neighbors. During the two 20th-century World Wars, Amish nonresistance sparked many incidents of harassment, and young Amish men forcibly inducted into the services were subjected to various forms of ill treatment. In the present day, anti-Amish sentiment has taken the form of pelting the horse-drawn carriages used by the Amish with stones or similar objects as the carriages pass along a road, most commonly at night. A 1988, made-for-TV film, A Stoning In Fulham County, is based on a true story involving one such incident, in which a six- month-old Amish girl was struck in the head by a rock and died from her injuries.
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The statement also affirms the traditional Anabaptist position of nonresistance toward enemies: "Under God's provision, the state uses the sword, which 'is ordained of God outside the perfection of Christ' and is a function contrary to the New Testament teachings for the church and the disciple of Christ." According to their mission statement: "The Conservative Mennonite Conference exists to glorify God by equipping leaders and congregations for worship, teaching, fellowship, service, and making disciples by providing resources and conference structures with an evangelical, Anabaptist, and conservative theological orientation." Women may engage in ministry, but leadership and ordination is restricted to men. Two meetings are held annually, one in February for the ministers, and another in August for the general public.
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Brethren annually reaffirm that historic > position as a nonresistant peace church and, as such, provides counsel and > support for those persons who, as a matter of personal conscience, hold a > conviction of nonresistance. On the other hand, some Brethren understand > peacemaking as the responsibility of the state to defend against and deter > evil. These Brethren affirm the role of the state to maintain peace and > deter aggression through a strong national defense by sanctioning chaplains > in all branches of military service and providing counsel and support for > those who, as a matter of personal conscience, hold to the conviction of > peace through a strong military defense or “resistance.” ...Our role as > peacemakers may be in dispute, but the goal of peace is undeniable.
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Herald Press, 1996 During the 1940s, Goshen was one of the Mennonite Central Committee's key places to form a "relief training school" that helped to train volunteers for unpaid jobs in the Civilian Public Service, an alternative to the Army. Many Mennonites chose the civilian service alternative because of their beliefs regarding Biblical pacifism and nonresistance. Although the young women pacifists were not liable to the draft, they volunteered for unpaid Civilian Public Service jobs to demonstrate their patriotism; many worked in mental hospitals.Rachel Waltner Goossen, Women Against the Good War: Conscientious Objection and Gender on the American Home Front, 1941–1947 (1997) pp 98-111 In 1980, the college was granted care of Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center, a nature preserve that now offers Goshen's master's degree in Environmental Science.
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The Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance also strongly opposed the 1931 Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Like many overseas Chinese, organization members denounced the nonresistance of the China's ruling Kuomintang Party (KMT) led by Chiang Kai-shek and actively engaged in "Save China" campaigns to raise money for the resistant efforts of the Manchurian Chinese. The CHLA sent letters and telegrams to American politicians urging them to support Chinese resistance and to take an anti- Japanese stance. CHLA members also appealed directly to the customers of their New York area laundries and published articles such as one (originally published in Chinese) in a 1937 edition of the Chinese Vanguard which describes their efforts in some detail: > The New York Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance has been extremely dedicated to > the work of resisting Japan to save our country.
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The doctrinal faith of the Mennonite Church Canada is set forth in The Confession of Faith in a Mennonite Perspective. This confession was adopted in 1995 by the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Mennonite Church at Wichita, Kansas. It contains 24 articles on the following: "God; Jesus Christ; Holy Spirit; Scripture; Creation and Divine Providence; the Creation and Calling of Human Beings; Sin; Salvation; The Church of Jesus Christ; The Church in Mission; Baptism; The Lord's Supper; Foot Washing; Discipline in the Church; Ministry and Leadership; Church Order and Unity; Discipleship and the Christian Life; Christian Spirituality; Family, Singleness, and Marriage; Truth and the Avoidance of Oaths; Christian Stewardship; Peace, Justice, and Nonresistance; The Church's Relation to Government and Society; and The Reign of God." The church ordains women as pastors.
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Eighth Route Army Commander Zhu De with KMT Blue Sky White Sun Emblem cap After the Mukden Incident in 1931, Chinese public opinion was strongly critical of Manchuria's leader, the "young marshal" Zhang Xueliang, for his nonresistance to the Japanese invasion, even though the Kuomintang central government was also responsible for this policy, giving Zhang an order to "improvise" while not offering support. After losing Manchuria to the Japanese, Zhang and his Northeast Army were given the duty of suppressing the Red Army of the Chinese Communist Party (CPC) in Shaanxi after their Long March. This resulted in great casualties for his Northeast Army, which received no support in manpower or weaponry from Chiang Kai-shek. On 12 December 1936, a deeply disgruntled Zhang Xueliang kidnapped Chiang Kai-shek in Xi'an, hoping to force an end to the conflict between KMT and CPC.
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Women belonging to the Old Order River Brethren, an Anabaptist denomination in the Radical Pietistic tradition The Old Order River Brethren are an Anabaptist group in the Radical Pietistic tradition who are distinguished by their practice of plain dress and abstaining from what they see as worldly entertainment, such as the television set. The Old Order River Brethren separated from other streams of the River Brethren (the Brethren in Christ and the United Zion Church) to herald the doctrines of nonresistance and nonconformity to the world; it is the most conservative in the River Brethren tradition. The River Brethren hold experience meetings, in which "members [are seen] testifying of God's work in their lives in bringing them to salvation and daily living." When a member has a conversion experience, he or she begins taking part in the experience meeting and then requests baptism.
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Some quitted their play they were before > engaged in, and came hovering round us, like so many cannibals, with such > devouring countenances, as if a man had been but a morsel with 'em, all > crying out, "Garnish, garnish," as a rabble in an insurrection crying, > "Liberty, liberty!" We were forced to submit to the doctrine of > nonresistance, and comply with their demands, which extended to the sum of > two shillings each.Ward, Edward, The London Spy Compleat. 1703. Certainly, the state of the prison was giving considerable cause for concern and, in 1804, an official report said the prison was: > in such a state of decay, as to become inadequate to the safe custody of the > debtors and prisoners therein confined, and extremely dangerous, as well to > the lives of the said debtors and prisoners as to other persons resorting > thereto.
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Amish children often follow in their faith's long- standing tradition of being taught at an early age to work jobs in the home on the family's land or that of the community. Contrary to popular belief, some of the Amish vote, and they have been courted by national parties as potential swing voters: while their pacifism and social conscience cause some of them to be drawn to left-of-center politics, their generally conservative outlook causes most to favor the right wing. They are nonresistant, and rarely defend themselves physically or even in court; in wartime, the Amish take conscientious objector status. Their own folk-history contains tales of heroic nonresistance, such as the insistence of Jacob Hochstetler (1704–1775) that his sons stop shooting at hostile Indians, who proceeded to kill some of the family and take others captive.
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On his return to the United States in January 2004, Zehr was stopped at the border and told that he had "self-deported" and could not return to the United States because he did not have a photo ID. As Zehr's religious beliefs prohibited photo images being taken, he stated he was willing to be fingerprinted and his lawyers argued that fingerprints are a better way to confirm a person's identity. Federal prosecutors refused the request and released a statement noting that a photo is crucial to Department of Homeland Security officials who do background checks of anyone seeking alien status or citizenship and denied such a request. In response to the denial, Zehr filed a lawsuit that argues that the photo requirement violates their religious freedom. Through filing his lawsuit against the photo requirement, Zehr risks being excommunicated from his Amish Sect for violation of their belief in nonresistance.
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The Service is in part a contrarian swipe at the many pacifist writers and lecturers whose teachings on "nonresistance" were then very much in vogue, in part thanks to Christian anarchist and pacifist Adin Ballou who spoke on the subject at the Concord Lyceum on occasion and who founded the New England Non-Resistance Society (of which William Lloyd Garrison was also a leader, and a Lyceum speaker as well). Thoreau debated the subject "Is it ever proper to offer forcible resistance?" in a formal Lyceum debate (arguing the affirmative) in 1841, and surviving records of the Lyceum note that the subject came up many times in debates, discussions, and lectures. Thoreau's own views were very much influenced by these non-resistants, and are often confused with them even today. When Amos Bronson Alcott resisted his taxes to protest war and slavery, three years before Thoreau would resist his taxes over the same issues, Alcott's action was explained within the context of "non-resistant" philosophy.
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" It is on this basis that Thoreau could so strongly inveigh against the British administration and Catholicism in A Yankee in Canada. Despotic authority, Thoreau argued, had crushed the people's sense of ingenuity and enterprise; the Canadian habitants had been reduced, in his view, to a perpetual childlike state. Ignoring the recent rebellions, he argued that there would be no revolution in the St. Lawrence River valley. Although Thoreau believed resistance to unjustly exercised authority could be both violent (exemplified in his support for John Brown) and nonviolent (his own example of tax resistance displayed in Resistance to Civil Government), he regarded pacifist nonresistance as temptation to passivity,The Service from the Writings of Henry David Thoreau: The Digital Collection writing: "Let not our Peace be proclaimed by the rust on our swords, or our inability to draw them from their scabbards; but let her at least have so much work on her hands as to keep those swords bright and sharp.
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"Marriage of the Rev. Mr. Pentecost," New York Times, October 17, 1880. Shortly after his wedding, he once again became a pastor for a Baptist church in Brooklyn, but Pentecost left the Baptist denomination, and became a pastor for non-denominational church in Manhattan and then the Belleville-Avenue Congregation Church in Newark, New Jersey. Pentecost became widely known for his eloquent sermons and his support for anti-poverty causes, Georgist land reform, socialism, and nonresistance. In 1887, he began to make speeches for Henry George's Anti-Poverty Society,"Anti-Poverty's Apostles: Speeches at Two Meetings of the Society," New York Times, June 20, 1887; "Talking to the Printers: Mr. Pentecost at an Anti-Poverty Meeting," New York Times, September 24, 1887. ran and lost a race for mayor of Newark on the United Labor ticket,"Pentecost for Mayor," New York Times, October 5, 1887; "Surprises of the Election," New York Times, October 13, 1887; "Tired of Mr. Pentecost's Vagaries," New York Times, November 23, 1887.
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The outdoors complimented the academic work that he was pursuing and he applied his graduate studies in comparative literature to his passion for the outdoors. Patricia Hassler stated in a Booklist review that as a young idealist "Tallmadge sought the authenticity, power, and possibility of the wilderness by following the intellectual and physical trails blazed by Henry Thoreau and John Muir... he takes us along on his hikes to the High Sierra, Katahdin, and the Deeps and Canyonlands where, like some knight-errant, he proves himself over and over. If his teaching tenure is denied, Tallmadge realizes he has learned nature's lessons: just as water overcomes through nonresistance and the jack pine needs fire to release its seeds, man endures through spirit and faith." His studies in nature writing fall under the genre of ecocriticism, a term coined by William Rueckert in 1978, and focus on the works of Thoreau, John Muir, Edward Abbey, and Aldo Leopold, to name just a few.
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Brethren emphasize simplicity and humility in their life, including their architecture—as exemplified by this simple church built by Dunkers in Germantown, Philadelphia, pictured c. 1905. The beliefs of the Schwarzenau Brethren include triple or trine immersion baptism, which provides that the candidate kneel in water and be immersed, face first, three times in the name of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit; the New Testament as the infallible guide in spiritual matters; communion service celebrated in the evening, accompanied by the love feast; the ceremony of the washing of feet; the salutation of the Holy kiss; prayer and anointing with oil over the sick; and nonresistance. See also The Brethren Card. Many of the early Schwarzenau Brethren believed in universal restoration, a variant of universal salvation that foretold that after the judgment and harsh punishment described in the New Testament, God's love would one day restore all souls to God.
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Tax resistance motivated by conscientious objection to war had traditionally been practiced in the United States under the Christian theory of nonresistance as extrapolated by the historic peace churches, and its development had largely taken place within the context of those churches. Rare exceptions included the brief flowering of tax resistance among the New England Transcendentalists like Henry David Thoreau, a small war tax resistance contingent in the late-19th Century pacifist movement, and a few war tax resisters in small sects like the International Bible Students and Rogerenes. After World WarII, a non-sectarian war tax resistance movement began to come together, and would develop its own practices of war tax resistance under a more secular theory of pacifism. Some of the figures in this early movement were members of the historic peace churches, such as Mary Stone McDowell, a Quaker who had resisted the Liberty Bond drives during World WarI, but many others were not.
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Although the surviving proportion of the European population that rebelled against Catholic, Lutheran and Zwinglian churches was small, Radical Reformers wrote profusely and the literature on the Radical Reformation is disproportionately large, partly as a result of the proliferation of the Radical Reformation teachings in the United States. Despite significant diversity among the early Radical Reformers, some "repeating patterns," emerged among many Anabaptist groups. Many of these patterns were enshrined in the Schleitheim Confession (1527), and include believers' (or adult) baptism, memorial view of the Lord's Supper, belief that Scripture is the final authority on matters of faith and practice, emphasis on the New Testament and the Sermon on the Mount, interpretation of Scripture in community, separation from the world and a two- kingdom theology, pacifism and nonresistance, communalism and economic sharing, belief in the freedom of the will, non-swearing of oaths, "yieldedness" (Gelassenheit) to one's community and to God, the ban, salvation through divinization (Vergöttung) and ethical living, and discipleship (Nachfolge Christi).Andrew P. Klager, "Ingestion and Gestation: Peacemaking, the Lord's Supper, and the Theotokos in the Mennonite-Anabaptist and Eastern Orthodox Traditions," Journal of Ecumenical Studies 47, no.
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