Miller provided leadership after Beissel, but Ephrata's communal property was deeded to trustees in 1814. The offshoot Snow Hill cloister in western Pennsylvania lasted until about 1880. Alderfer points out that Beissel's belief and practice at Ephrata caused controversy in his own day and that it was the subject of debate among historians until well into the twentieth century. The author's own references to pietism, mysticism, and seventh-day Baptist beliefs, as well as the theosophy, Masonic, and Rosicrucian rituals, are not developed enough to describe fully the inner life of Ephrata. Alderfer concludes with a description of the "Ephrata motif as he sees it expressed in later communal movements and in Thomas Mann's novel Doctor Faustus. The book includes four photographs of the restored buildings, several examples of illuminated lettering, and two appendixes: "Religious and Communal Countercultures Prior to the Reformation"; and "Religious Communes in America, 1662-1800." The sixteen-page bibliography is particularly rich in reference to articles in Pennsylvania county and state historical journals.
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