The Amish faith itself can be traced back to the Protestant Reformation of the early 16th century. Not satisfied with the reformation attempts of Martin Luther and Huldrych Zwingli (who is a lesser known but influential leader from Zurich, Switzerland), a small group in Zurich “re-baptized” themselves, declaring that salvation was based on faith, and that baptism was a decision that could only be made by adults through their own free will. They considered infant baptism to be an imposition of government, and therefore not legitimate. Hence, followers of this branch of the Protestant Reformation were called “Anabaptists,” which means to be “rebaptized.” Within only a few years, almost all the founders had been hunted down, imprisoned, and put to death by state authorities, both Catholic and Lutherans, who saw the Anabaptist movement as a threat to their conjoined civil and religious authority. The word “Amish” comes from the name of a leader of a conservative group located on the other side of the Rhine River in the Alsace-Lorraine area of present-day France, who in 1693 disagreed with the growing assimilation of the Swiss-Mennonites (also known as the Swiss Brethren) as persecution by state authorities finally began to decline. His name was Jacob Ammann.

The term Amish was first used as a Schandename (a term of disgrace) in 1710 by opponents of Jakob Amman, an Anabaptist leader. The first informal division between Swiss Brethren was recorded in the 17th century between Oberländers (those living in the hills) and Emmentalers (those living in the Emmental). The Oberländers were a more extreme congregation; their zeal pushed them into more remote areas. Swiss Anabaptism developed, from this point, in two parallel streams, most clearly marked by disagreement over the preferred treatment of "fallen" believers. Amish began migrating to Pennsylvania, then-regarded favorably due to the lack of religious persecution and attractive land offers, in the early 18th century as part of a larger migration from the Palatinate and neighboring areas. Between 1717 and 1750, approximately 500 Amish migrated to North America, mainly to the region that became Berks County, Pennsylvania, but later moved, motivated by land issues and by security concerns tied to the French and Indian War. Many eventually settled in Lancaster County. A second wave of around 1,500 arrived around the mid-19th century and settled mostly in Ohio, Illinois, Iowa and southern Ontario. Most of these late immigrants eventually did not join the Old Order Amish but more liberal groups.

Although the first Amish arrived in America in the mid 1700s, the European Anabaptist movement began well before that, in 1525, as a radical wing of the Protestant Reformation. Anabaptists differed from other Christians most significantly in two things: they practiced adult baptism, which went against the beliefs of Catholics and other Protestants at the time, and they insisted on a "free Church" separate from state interference. In the late 1600s, Anabaptist leader Jacob Ammann and his followers promoted "shunning" and other religious innovations, which ultimately led to a split among the Swiss Anabaptists into Mennonite and Amish branches in 1693. The first Anabaptists arrived in Ohio in the early 1800’s. It is said that the rolling hills of eastern Holmes County reminded these immigrants of homelands in Switzerland, although most had started their journey from Pennsylvania. The most notable of these early settlers is Jonas Stutzman, “Der Weiss.” Stutzman settled near present-day Walnut Creek in 1809, where he began one of the first sawmills. His reputation as “Der Weiss,” translated as “the white,” developed later in his life. Stutzman predicted the return of Christ, built and carried an oversized chair for Christ to sit in judgment, and wore white to symbolize his own purity.