Against the Wind: Eberhard Arnold and the Bruderhof - Plough

too Early a dEath?
Against the Wind
Eberhard Arnold died at the age of fifty-two – at the height of his spiritual powers,
authority, and acivity. According to human standards he could have had twenty,
thirty, or more years to live and continue his work, if only – if only what? What
had not gone well? Was this cup filled to the brim or not? Eberhard himself, in
accordance with good early Hutterian theology, had believed and had taught that
unity existed between the upper church of the brothers and sisters who had died
and the visible church incarnate in the believers still on earth. Eberhard knew
himself to be surrounded by a cloud of witnesses from every century. For him, life
did not end in death.
But what about the brotherhood of the Rhön and Alm Bruderhofs? Eberhard’s
death did not leave them orphaned. Through the terrible shock and pain of his
death and the difficulties pressing in from outside the Bruderhofs, they found a
way to work together. They received help from the Hutterian brothers and sisters
in America and from many other friends. They were prepared for the challenges
of their time. This was what Eberhard had been striving for until his last moments.
Winifred Bridgwater, one of the last of those able to tell about Eberhard Arnold
from personal experience, was convinced that “he had prepared this young
brotherhood for the future – consciously, purposefully, and in every conceivable
way.” 33
A few months before Eberhard’s death a visitor to the Rhön Bruderhof had heard
him say, “After I have died, I would wish that my name be forgotten, but that the
truth for which I stood should go on living through God’s great spirit.” 34 Two years
later the marks of his decades of work in Germany were blotted out by the Nazis,
leaving hardly a trace. But the truth for which Eberhard Arnold stood –this truth
could not, and cannot, be suppressed. It lives on.
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