Everything You Want to Know About: Amish Families

Seth Carter 15/06/2015

#AMISHCULTURE AMISH AMERICA amish family

Amish families are the heart of Amish life. Their homes are filled with activity, faith, and structure. In this article, we explore how Amish families live, raise children, and uphold their values. We’re proud to once again feature insights from Erik Wesner, founder of Amish America, who brings his firsthand experience and research to this topic.

Go on, Erik –

Amish Families: Values

Family Life is the name of perhaps the most widely-read Amish publication, and the title is a good one—reflecting the great value of family to the Amish. While Amish families are not perfect, a number of what we might consider old-fashioned values remain highly important in the Amish family.

What is the Amish View on Divorce?

First, divorce is not sanctioned by the Amish, and divorcing a spouse can be grounds for excommunication from the church. Dysfunctional families certainly do exist among the Amish, but absentee fathers, single-parent or split households are not the norm that they’ve become in much of the rest of society.

How Big Are Amish Families?

Amish families are large. They believe in the injunction in the Book of Genesis to “be fruitful and multiply”, and families of 6 to 8 children are typical (with some communities averaging even 8 or 9 children per family). Children are considered a great blessing, and Amish individuals enjoy large extended families, with dozens of cousins, numerous aunts and uncles, and many siblings.

Amish Family Time

Family time is important for the Amish. Doing things together allows parents to be a good example to children, both in the sense of learning a work ethic and also as a spiritual model. Farming has traditionally been considered the ideal occupation by Amish. This is due in part to the fact that it allows fathers to be at home working together with their wives and children.

Despite this feeling, farming has dwindled in some Amish settlements, though many have opened home businesses instead—which can provide similar benefits in terms of time spent together and instilling a work ethic in the next generation.

Amish Families: Children

Amish typically marry in their early to mid-20s. The new family typically begins adding new members soon after.

What are Amish Views on Birth Control?

Amish do not sanction birth control (though it likely is practiced in some form in some families), which means large families.

Children Develop Strong Work Ethics Early

Amish Children are given responsibility at an early age, with most learning a strong work ethic. Given the size of Amish extended families, an Amish child is surrounded by older and younger siblings, aunts, uncles, and grandparents, who in many cases live nearby, so they rarely want for companionship and playmates.

Amish Families and Finances of Their Children

Amish children live at home, typically until marriage. They attend school from the 1^st to the 8^th grades, after which they graduate, and at age 14 or 15 begin working (often at home or for neighbors’ businesses, though the types of tasks they can perform are limited by safety regulations in some cases). It’s typical that Amish children contribute their paychecks to the household budget until the age of 21. At marriage, Amish parents help their children get started in life, in some cases helping finance a home or farm purchase.

Read more about Amish wedding traditions.

Amish Families: Parental Roles

Amish parents have distinct roles in the home.

Men’s Roles in Amish Families

The male is considered the head of the household, a stance Amish find support for in Scripture. He is also usually the main breadwinner (though Amish women in some cases contribute significantly to the household finances). He is the public voice of the family as well, and in some cases takes other leadership roles, such as in the ministry if chosen, or in lay leadership – for example, serving on a parochial school board or other committees.

Women’s Roles in Amish Families

Women have numerous important roles to fulfill as well. Amish consider a man’s wife his “helpmeet”, his primary support in this life. She is a mother, and in some cases (for example, when Amish men work away from home), may have the more prominent influence in raising the children. She is the household manager, responsible for maintaining the home, cooking food (often with help from the children), raising and canning vegetables and fruits from the substantial gardens found at most Amish homes, and may fulfill other roles such as helping handle finances for a home business, doing farm chores, and maintaining correspondence with other Amish via letter writing.

For more information on the roles of Amish women in the workplace, check out the podcast below or read more about Amish women in the workplace.

Amish Families: The Home

The Amish home is the center of family life and reflects both the emphasis on family as well as the given community’s church standards (some homes are fancier, or plainer, as a result). Amish homes are generally large, with numerous rooms, spacious common areas such as living rooms and kitchens, and sizable basements, which can provide a space for gatherings such as Sunday church services which most Amish families host at least once per year.

How are Amish Homes Heated?

Amish homes may be heated and lit in a variety of ways, depending on the local church rules, including using liquid propane or kerosene lighting, and with wood stoves commonly used for warmth.

Do Amish Have Indoor Plumbing and Refrigerators?

The technology homes contain varies as well—for example, some Amish keep their food cold using propane or natural gas refrigerators, while others rely on iceboxes. Most have indoor plumbing and bathrooms, but some—the most conservative—do not.

What Sort of Technology do the Amish Keep Out of the Home?

All Amish, wary of worldly influences, seek to keep certain technologies out of the home, including television, radio, and computers. Instead, Amish homes typically contain wholesome reading material for children, including Bible stories, Amish publications, and other books.

How Many Amish Families Make up a Typical Church?

Families are also the building blocks, in one sense, of the Amish church. Typically, 25 to 35 Amish families make up a congregation (also known as a “church district”).

Church is held at the homes of members. This means families get to know each other more closely, visiting each household in the congregation at least once per year. Outside of family and close friends, Amish tend to know the people in their church district best, through not only regular attendance at church service but at other events.

Family Strength Based on Deeply-held Values

Outsiders tend to admire Amish families for their strong family lives, well-behaved children, or because they remind us of “how things used to be”. It’s no accident we have these perceptions, which in many cases are probably accurate.

Amish emphasize certain values that lead to these family characteristics–both Biblical beliefs (promoting large families, an emphasis on selflessness, brotherly love, and other Christian values, forbidding divorce) and cultural (limited technology, which keeps focus on the family), and emphasizing traditional group activities like games, singing, and so on, rather than individualistic pursuits).

Some wonder how to capture these aspects in their own lives. It’s possible, yet it’s important to remember that these are the fruits of commitments Amish have made to their faith, culture and communities. Replicating what Amish families have may take changing one’s life in uncomfortable ways—not by becoming Amish, but making similar sacrifices and commitments. It’s not always easy, but the Amish certainly believe it is worth it.

Erik Wesner is the author of Success Made Simple: An Inside Look at Why Amish Businesses Thrive, and editor of the Amish America website.

Learn More About the Amish

3 comments

Jayca Pike
June 18, 2015 at 9:40 am
Thank you!
Just wondering in MS
September 8, 2022 at 10:02 am
My question is, Does each family have chickens, hogs, cows, garden? or Is there one family sect, that takes care of the cows for all of their families etc?
The reason I ask, is Stantonville Tn. I don’t see any chickens, hogs, cows at any of their homes. At one of the homes, they sell milk to the public.
Beth Rice
September 9, 2022 at 9:15 am
Hello,
The practices at Amish homes can vary. Some are dairy farms, some focus on produce, others raise poultry. Here’s a helpful link to http://www.amishamerica.com that can tell you more.
https://amishamerica.com/what-foods-and-crops-do-amish-farmers-produce/
Thank you for your question and for visiting us on Timber to Table.