Against the Wind: Eberhard Arnold and the Bruderhof - Plough

Against the Wind
for the lectures, and a reservation fee was charged. The organizing committee,
which included Eberhard, had distributed thousands of fliers. At von Gerdtell’s
wish conspicuous announcements were posted at the city’s advertising kiosks.
For the first lecture (“for men only”) von Gerdtell appeared in evening dress,
replete with top hat and kid gloves. All this preparation only accentuated the
disappointment when the lecture hall held only a sprinkling of people. Not until
the second lecture, open to both men and women, did von Gerdtell find more
response. Afterwards, thoroughly in keeping with his methods, he departed and
left Eberhard to finish the work. This time, however, Eberhard felt confirmed in
the contradictory impression he had first gained back in Erfurt: the success of
von Gerdtell’s work should not be overestimated. “Only a few conversions are
made by him,” he wrote. “He really evangelized only once, and otherwise sent his
time in answering scientific and pracical objections and questions.” The Leipzig
mission was most probably the last project on which Eberhard and von Gerdtell
collaborated.
In the following years Ludwig von Gerdtell isolated himself more and more
from almost all of his earlier companions. His tone grew sharper, his polemic
against the state church more corrosive, his opinion of the reformers, esecially
of Martin Luther, more disresectful and contemptuous. His theology acquired
bizarre elements. 16 As late as 1921 Eberhard wrote to von Gerdtell pointing out
some of the far too venturesome subjects and erroneous claims in his book The
Revolutionizing of the Church. 17 If von Gerdtell sent an answer, it was not preserved.
In Eberhard’s correspondence the last reference to von Gerdtell occurs at the end
of 1923. After this all trace of von Gerdtell disappears from his life. In reality, this
unusual friendship had already grown very shaky in the spring of 1910 and no
longer had any recognizable foundation.
CallEd to hallE
By the summer of 1910 Eberhard’s duties and obligations in Halle were so
numerous that to continue commuting from Leipzig once or twice a week was no
longer adequate. For the time being the Arnolds took some rooms with the Rast
family a mile or so northwest of Halle. 18 The Alte Promenade Fellowship voiced
their request for the Arnolds to take up permanent residence in Halle. When the
couple realized that their home in Leipzig would soon be too small – Emmy was
expecting – they did not find the decision difficult. They gave up their home in
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