A Week with the Twelve Tribes: 12 Lessons from the 12 Tribes (Part 2 of 2)

Garrett and Lauren Smith have been traveling around Australia for the last four months working on organic farms through the WWOOF (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) program. A recent farm visit in the Sydney area brought them to a community of the Twelve Tribes (www.twelvetribes.com), a Messianic religious movement of people living communally in various countries, including the U.S. and Australia. Although milking goats had been the attraction of the farm stay, Garrett and Lauren were confronted with a very different, sometimes bewildering, view of life and religious doctrine. Last week, they shared an article in which they introduced the Twelve Tribes religious movement and reflected upon their experiences from living a week with a community in the Tribe of Asher. This second article identifies the positive aspects of the community life they observed, which they intend to apply to improve their own life of religion. -Editor

Last week, we gave a little expose of what life was like in the Twelve Tribes. We tried to keep the account as unbiased as possible. Doubtless, the reader noted some large divergences in doctrine. There were, and this week we’d like to emphasize some of the contrasts. However, instead of a lengthy discourse on the legitimacy of their dogma vs. ours, we’d like to focus instead on the good qualities that we observed within the community. Amidst all the dissension, we found some valuable lessons to apply to our own lives in the New Church. Here are the twelve positive points we learned from a week with the Twelve Tribes (an unintended coincidence of number, I assure you) that we invite you to consider as well.

1.Members of the Twelve Tribes actively and officially acknowledge the Lord and their need of His presence in their lives two times a day, every day of the week.

Every morning and evening at 7:00, the community members lay aside whatever they may be doing (or thinking about) and gather together to acknowledge the Lord. They sing and dance, read the Bible and have doctrinal lessons, and close each session with a group prayer.

2.There is active participation by all in attendance at the religious gatherings.

It is understood that there is a shared responsibility for learning the way and the will of the Lord. There are multiple 'leaders' who share the reading and teaching of the lessons. When the floor is open for thoughts, anyone can share what's on their mind, including the children. Not everyone speaks every day, but there is never a meeting where just one person carries the entire responsibility of the teaching and learning.

3.Most of the adults are well read in the Bible.

When having a discussion of doctrine or sharing in the daily gatherings, the members cite numerous passages WITH chapter and verse to support their point.

4.The Twelve Tribes are very devout in keeping the Sabbath and remembering its purpose.

Beginning the evening before, a full day is set aside and dedicated to the Lord through feasts, worship, and reflection. Both adults and children use the time to share their victories over personal challenges, similar to the Lord’s victory over death on the cross. New goals for behavior and personal challenges to overcome are avowed for the next week. In this way, the resurrection of the Lord is remembered every week, on the Sabbath, instead of once a year.

5.The members are very bold in sharing their beliefs to outsiders.

They are enthusiastic about sharing their religion with others and speak confidently when asked about their lifestyle. When they pray together, they speak loudly and boldly, gathering in a close circle and lifting their hands up to the Lord.

6.Members actively listen for the Lord’s guidance and trust Him to lead them (even when they don’t know to where or whom).

There are many stories of members from various communities feeling the call and responding, “Send me, Lord.” The result is often an actual walk, where one or two of the ‘called’ members go backpacking/hitchhiking and pray that along the way, the Lord will send people—as rides or otherwise—who need to hear their message. Other manifestations of this is handing out pamphlets at concerts and farmers markets.

7.The members actively attempt to avoid “worldly” ways.

They do this by rejecting as many worldly things as they can get away with and still make a living. They do not keep any unnecessary material possessions so as to avoid the temptation of worshipping possessions and objects too much. Their choices down to the level of food reflect their rejection of possible pitfalls. (They do not consume alcohol, hot drinks with caffeine, or chocolate, because they see these substances being abused and idolized by society at large.)

8.The members live together in community sharing all things.

All members wear the same sort of clothing and hair styles. No one has any individual possessions but rather everything is shared, including the income from their businesses. The idea is to treat everyone with equal respect and love as you would in a family. Everyone contributes as they are best able to with the expectation that there are no unmet needs. In addition to daily tasks, everyone does their best to provide physical, emotional, and spiritual support for all the other members.

9.The communities value healthy, sustainable use of the land and its resources.

Valuing love for the neighbor, the Twelve Tribes view agriculture and responsible management of land and the environment as the best way to support people and thus, the intended toil of man.

10.There is a very active focus on marriage.

Similar to the teachings of the New Church, they teach that marriage should be based first on friendship, mutual trust, and consent. They support this ideal with a system where mutually interested people (whom the community also think are a compatible match) have a waiting period where they work together on some project for a period of several months to determine if they work well together. During this period they are not allowed to touch—they may hold hands once they are betrothed. The marriage celebration is then gifted to the couple by the community, who put on a grand party with delicious food, instrumental music, and dancing. Post-wedding, married couples are supported by an older mentor couple.

11.There is a very active focus on raising their kids well.

A regular prayer during the morning and evening meetings from the parents is that God would “turn their hearts” to their children so that their children would then turn their hearts toward their parents and to Jashua (Christ). The parents also hold their own meetings to talk about how best to approach child rearing and education so that they are all in agreement and can provide consistent support during child care duties.

12.The community involves their children in most aspects of life, both religious and daily duties.

The children are not considered “too young” to sit through an hour of lessons and adult conversation about religion. Additionally, the children are given many opportunities to work with their parents from an early age with three year olds helping chop vegetables in the kitchen while their older siblings help their fathers in the gardens or care for the animals.

In listing these positive attributes of the Twelve Tribes, we understand that not all of these are possible for us to realize with our current lifestyles. Some of these ‘positives’ have dark sides as well. One that particularly struck us was their harsh opposition to allowing their children the freedom to choose, or even learn about, any other lifestyle or religious doctrine besides their own. “We don't need to chuck them into the cesspool so that they'll learn that it stinks,” stated one of the parents. Regardless of the caveats, we believe that the exercise of recognizing and highlighting the successes of a community to live what they preach is useful to our own life of religion.

Garrett and Lauren Smith

Garrett and Lauren enjoy writing these little bios more than the articles above them. They dislike beetroot on burgers and ants in their Lamingtons.