They must also abstain because of future children. A clean offspring must be conceived without lust, therefore it must be conceived by sin-free, reborn parents. Danjel and Inga-Lena already had three children, born while they themselves still lived in the flesh, and he felt great anguish for the sake of these children. As they had not been conceived in a true marriage, they must be considered the result of adultery, he thought. But he prayed continually that his offspring might through God’s grace be purified and accepted as clean.
Inga-Lena, the housewife of Kärragärde, was in a difficult dilemma. She was devoted to her husband — next to God he was dearer to her than anyone. She lived only to serve him, and followed his will in everything: by nature she was irresolute, relying on him for decisions; he was the lord and master. After his conversion she still tried to please him but found it difficult to accept his new ideas, and the consequent changes in their lives. She would willingly share her loaf of bread with a hungry beggar who might come to the farm. But she was filled with sadness and anxiety when the number of house folk increased by four people whom her husband invited and whom the house must feed. And when she also must receive into her home Ulrika of Västergöhl, the most detested woman in the parish, she spoke to her husband with mild reproach. She wished to do naught against his will, nor say that he was wrong when he allowed Ulrika and her illegitimate daughter to live with them, but what would others think or say when he housed in their home the Glad One, the great whore herself? Danjel answered: We must obey God above man. Let that woman who is without sin come here and throw the first stone at Ulrika.
Inga-Lena was greatly disturbed, too, when her husband repeated the doings and actions of the Åkians. Åke Svensson had aimed to establish a kingdom in which the Holy Ghost and not the King reigned, and where no one called anything his own, but all earthly possessions were common property. No wonder he had been sent to the insane asylum, where he had suffered a pitiful death after a few years — despite his being a young and hale person. (Though there were those who thought injustice had been done to him, who were convinced he had been tortured to death at Danvik.)
The fate of Åke had terrified all in the region, but no one was surprised; he who insisted that all were equal, and that they must hold their possessions in common and share them as brothers and sisters, such a one must come to an ill end; people were right in this.
Inga-Lena feared now that Danjel’s path in his uncle’s footsteps would lead to an equally horrible end. If you set yourself up against the ordinance of authority, you angered the clergy and came to no good.
But Danjel said that if you walked in Christ’s bloody footsteps you were bound to cause anger and be persecuted by the church, the clergy, and worldly powers as well.
She began to worry about their belongings when her husband no longer locked the house. One night thieves went into the unlocked larder and stole pork and flour. Danjel said they kept a greater store of food than God allowed them, and that was why He had not prevented the theft. But Inga-Lena did not comprehend this. God Himself in His fifth commandment had forbidden theft. It was her responsibility that the food in the house should suffice for all; henceforth, unbeknownst to her husband, she locked the larder door in the evening.
But her conscience bothered her each time she disobeyed him. The Bible’s words in Ephesians were clear and distinct: “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church. . Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing.”
Inga-Lena, furthermore, had a feeling of being a defiled and unclean woman when her husband deserted the marital bed. She had disturbing and painful dreams during her lonely nights; she awakened, and called on God for advice and help. She confessed in her prayers that she was a woman of only poor understanding; her knowledge was insufficient to comprehend Åke’s religion. She prayed God to enlighten her. Danjel prayed the same prayer.
And after a while the couple’s prayers were heard: the Spirit came to Inga-Lena and she experienced her rebirth. She came to understand that she must obey her husband, not her own inadequate intelligence. Danjel was right in spiritual things, she had been wrong. And so their marriage became a true marriage. Danjel returned to the marital bed, and again knew his wife.
By now there was a small flock of Åkians in Kärragärde. The paupers who made their home on the farm, as well as a few of the neighbors, embraced the Åkian teachings and saw in Danjel Andreasson a new Lord’s apostle on earth.
But his wife Inga-Lena still committed, in secret every evening, the gross sin of doubt when she locked the farm’s larder for the night.
— 2—
The happenings in Kärragärde were soon brought to the attention of Dean Brusander. It was said that people under pretext of devotion met at Danjel Andreasson’s, where he preached the Åkian faith — this heresy had again begun to spread its horrible poison in the parish.
Dean Brusander was a powerful clergyman who guarded the dignity and sanctity of his office well. Always he had maintained the purity of the evangelical-Lutheran church with unflagging zeal; never sparing himself, he watched over the flock God had entrusted to him, protecting it from heterodoxy. Now he sent promptly for the churchwarden, Per Persson of Åkerby, who confirmed the story of the unlawful meetings in Kärragärde. It was said throughout the parish that Åke Svensson had returned in the shape of his nephew. And Per Persson could affirm that Danjel used evil words about the dean, and called him a neglectful shepherd, because brännvin was distilled and sold in the parsonage.
Brusander was provoked that a parishioner should question his lawful right, shared by all the clergy who cultivated land. And on the King’s estates too brännvin was distilled and sold, as well as on the Prince’s manor at Bäckaskog. The farmer in Kärragärde had therefore, through his criticism, committed a serious crime against the Crown. The sale and serving of brännvin in the parsonage was nowadays allowed only on weekdays; the drink was stimulating to laborers and servants after a day’s toil. It was true that the well-known Dean Wieselgren in Västerstad wanted to abolish brännvin altogether, and that in un-Christian hatred he persecuted his colleagues who only enjoyed their legal rights. Wieselgren in his blindness wanted to rob the peasants of their lawful trade; if they were not permitted to distill their grain to brännvin, the agriculture of the country would in a short time be ruined and the farmers impoverished. The price of grain would drop so low that the farmers would be bankrupt, which in turn would make the poor people more insolent; it would be difficult then to obtain servants and day laborers. Who would want to do day labor if a bushel of barley could be bought at six shillings?
Dean Brusander called Danjel Andreasson of Kärragärde to appear at the parsonage, and in the presence of his assistant, Pastor Krusell, and the churchwardens of the parish, he questioned the farmer at length.
— 3—
At this inquiry the assistant pastor made notes which were signed by the churchwardens as unbiased witnesses and deposited in the archives of the parish.
“Summoned homeowner Danjel Andreasson was first questioned briefly in religion by Dean Brusander; he showed satisfactory knowledge in the foundation and order of the salvation tenets. Questioned specifically, Danjel Andreasson admitted that at the present time several loose people maintained their residence in his house, to wit: court-martialed soldier Severius Pihl, disabled servant wench Sissa Svensdotter, unmarried female Ulrika of Västergöhl and her illegitimate daughter Elin. Ulrika being known since her youth for her lewd and immoral life, during which she had conceived four illegitimate children of whom three died in infancy. Danjel Andreasson admitted that he fed and protected these people in his house.