AMANA COLONIES (1714-1749)

In Iowa County, east central Iowa, U.S., near the Iowa River, are a group pf seven villages: Amana, East Amana, Middle Amana, High Amana, West Amana, South Amana, and Homestead.


Amana developed from the Community of True Inspiration, founded in 1714 in Hesse, in Germany, by Johan Friedrich Rock and Eberhard Ludwig Gruber, Pietistic mystics reacting against Lutheran orthodoxy. They taught that direct revelation and divine inspiration were current realities. Following Rock´s denunciation by the Pietist leader Count von Zinzendorf and then, in 1749, his death, the movement disintegrated.


Its remnants were strengthened in 1817 when Christian Metz and Barbara Heinemann reported that they had received the gift of direct inspiration. This group, centred mainly in Württemberg, encountered hostility from the civil authorities because of their opposition to war and other doctrines, and in 1842, they migrated to the United States, where they established the communal moved westward to Iowa, where 18,000 acres (7,280 hectares; later expanded to 26,000 acres) had been purchased. 


This new home, governed by elected elders, was called Amana (from Hebrew: "faith") and was incorporated in 1859. Members of the community gave up their property to a common fund and were promised security through life. They held two meetings on Sunday, many on weekdays, and prayer meetings, every morning. They celebrated the Lord´s Supper, along with foot washing, once a year. In addition to their opposition to military service, they also opposed swearing to oaths, amusement, and a paid ministry.


The community prospered at first but began to decline after the Civil War. Financial disaster caused by the Depression of the 1930s necessitated reorganization in 1932. A cooperative was set up and each member was made a shareholder with medical care benefits. In addition to its seven farms, one for each village, the society operates several industries that include a woollen mill and two meat markets.


The Amala Church Society, separately organized in 1932, continues its Pietistic emphasis and remains the dominating force in the community. Simple worship services, conducted in German in unadorned village churches, include readings from the writtings of the sect´s founders.


The church society, governed by 26 elders, has no ordained clergy. It reported 1,500 members in seven churches in the mid-1970s.