Deviante Ehevorstellungen und Eheverlaufsformen in radikal-pietistischen Gemeinschaften um 1800: das Fallbeispiel Dietrich und Christine Reckefuß

Abstract

So long as marriage remains an institution of the church and of the state, there will be resistance from those whose marriages do not conform to restrictions of the church or state. The lives of Dietrich Reckefus and his wife were shaped by conflicts over their marriages, which ultimately reached the Prussian King. Toward the end of the 18th century the two people lived together several years before formally marrying within a circle of rural friends. The state never recognized this union but simply tolerated it. In the beginning of the 1800s the couple became members of a pietist religious settlement, temporarily submitting to this group's views on marriage. By the early 1830s, however, a scandal emerged as it came to light that both partners of this marriage had exchanged partners with a second couple. After expulsion from the settlement's community the four continued to live communally according to their principles on a farm which had become a center for radical pietism.