In Budapest, Andras Udvarnoki, who had been trained in a seminary started by Johann Oncken in Hamburg, advanced the Baptist cause by building a church with over 800 members.  Up until that time, most of the Baptists in Budapest had been ethnic Germans.  Udvarnoki’s congregation was ethnic Hungarian.

Language and cultural differences, combined with personality conflicts to create a division among the Hungarian Baptists.  Udvarnoki and other ethnic Hungarians objected to what they regarded as the authoritarian leadship style of Heinrich Meyer.  Udvarnoki formed a new Baptist association in 1894.  The separation finally ended in 1920.

In 1895, the Hungarian government granted limited religious freedom to the Baptists.  They classified religions into three categories: (1) “Favored” (Roman Catholic, Hungarian Reformed), (2) “Accredited” (Hungarian Baptist Association, and (3) “Tolerated” (Meyer’s group).  In 1906, Udvarnoki established a theological seminary in Budapest and became its first president.  After World War I, the number of Baptists in Hungary declined sharply, because the borders of the country shrank dramatically and many of the Baptists were on the Romanian side of the new eastern boundary.