The Trans-Atlantic Odyssey of the Community of True Inspiration, 1714–1850

Abstract

Hoehnle explores the communal history of the Community of True Inspiration, a radical German Protestant tradition begun in 1714. The chapter traces how later generations of Inspirationists moved along a distinct axis of communalism, in Hessen in central Germany, in Ebenezer (or Eben-Ezer), New York, and finally in Amana, Iowa. Hoehnle argues communalism was never simply a response to a demanding American landscape, or even an imitating of other Pietist traditions. Rather, many Inspirationists had already gathered together on estates leased in Hessen, including former monasteries and the ruined Moravian Herrnhaag. Hoehnle links this precedent to the full community of goods adopted at Ebenezer in the 1840s, and Amana after 1850.