Magic In The Middle Ages

Every culture is different, it is what makes the world an interesting place. Being different does not indicate one culture or group of people is superior to another, just different. All humans are entitled to believe and practice what they believe is the right thing. In central Africa, in the Sudan Region, there is a place called Zande where the Azande people live. In the book written by Holly Peters-Golden, Culture Sketches, Chapter 1 educates the reader on the subject of the Azande people and their primitive way of life. The author discusses the uniqueness of their culture, including their traditions, beliefs, and customs. While American and Azande cultures vary greatly, both societies have the freedom to practice

The document, The Passions of Saints Perpetua and Felicity, shows how brave the Christian faith was in Rome. During Diocletian’s ruling, Christianity was not a common religion. In fact, most Romans practiced polytheism. Under these circumstances, many Christian followers were publicly persecuted for their faith. The Roman government assumed that if the executions were public, it would discourage others from becoming Christians and shift away from the Roman life traditions, in which would guarantee wealth and prominence to the Roman elites. Shockingly, this did not bother the Christians that they were publicly sentenced to death because their faith in god was so strong they believed that by dying for their faith would bring them closer to god. Despite the cruelty and crudness of these executions however, it did not stop christianity from spreading. As a result, all persecutions were ended and it was declared leniency for the Christians. After such changes, Christianity became the official state religion of the Roman Empire. Such adjustments in policy spread Christian religion throughout every edge of the Empire. Although these legal orders ended a lifetime of Christian persecutions, they also could have shattered the traditional Roman values system. By this time, the Christians had only believed in one god, who was not the emperor. Due to the disregarding of the emperor, it weakened his authority and credibility. Lastly, another change was enacted which caused the fall

of the magic of Avalon. the Christians, however, feel that it was by the faith

During the Medieval Era in Europe, Christianity was seen as a threat to the Roman Empire due to Christians refusing to worship other gods or the emperor. As a result, many Christians were persecuted due to their refusals. However, after the fall of the Roman Empire, the church became dominant in Europe. Christianity (Catholicism) was the only religion that was recognized during this specific era. Christianity began its spread from the north and to the west into Europe. It was carried mostly by merchants, missionaries, and soldiers, which they believed helped to guarantee their freedom. Moreover, Christianity played a major role within the Medieval Era in Europe, which saved many lives and freed many people.

As a text written in the early middle ages, the Canon Episcopi by Regino of Prüm was revolutionary in the fact that it exemplified a growing skepticism for magic within the Christian community, and most importantly, it served as a strict call to arms for church officials to identify and eliminate practices of magic within parish communities. As a major theological text in the time where Christianity is finally solidifying doctrine, the Canon Episcopi should both draw upon existing ideas of its predecessors and shape the theological works of its successors. While the works of other theological minds show evidence of a common theme or influence, there is still extreme variability and sometimes even direct opposition to Regino’s themes. While

Joan Didion’s tone of the “cool customer” in The Year of Magical Thinking interacts with the content of traumatizing loss by creating a feeling organization through the chaos that is taking over her life. Didion starts with a description of traumatic events and the seemingly “ordinary” situations that they appear from. These statements of how ordinary death can seem are followed by descriptions of the moments after her husband’s death yet we are not told that he is not dead yet only how the events passed by. Didion’s description of her journey through her husband’s death furthers the tone of the cool customer. She tells us of the discussion they were having about world war one moments before he slumps over in his chair and even her chaotic

A letter rebuking Otto Synboden of Ameneburg, a priest in the diocese of Mainz, perfectly explains how magic came to be viewed in the fifteenth century. The letter consists of Boniface IX, scolding a priest who used magic to determine the identity of a thief. Once Otto was out of sight, the individual who had been robbed confronted the accused and killed him.8 Although Otto’s intentions were not in contrast with the church, he was still held accountable for invoking a demon for knowledge and for not foreseeing the devil prompting the men to murder. It was the power behind the action that made the act heretical. The result proved that regardless of his intent the source was demonic and nothing holy, exemplifying that all magic regardless of

In William Shakespeare’s book, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, magic is a powerful and useful tool for the characters that have the capability to use it. Some of the characters abuse the power of magic, while others are more responsible in how they use it. Oberon is one the characters that abuses the power of magic. Oberon’s magic has an immense impact on the plot of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. More specifically, Oberon’s magic affects his own life, the lives of other characters, and all the characters in the story experience his magic differently. We will see that even the person who has power to use the magic can become surprised by it. Magic, the ultimate supernatural power, is often unpredictable and inexplicable.

As religion is at the center of every community, the Christian Roman Empire and Roman Republic and Empire held fast to their beliefs. To be part of the Christian religion, in the Christian Roman Empire, citizens simply were required to accept that Jesus was God’s son and that he died for our sins and rose from the dead. Yet, in the Roman Empire, they believed in the several gods. Some, even from lands they conquered, then changed the names of the god to fit into the Roman norm. Regrettably, Christians were often accused of causing hardships to the Roman Empire. The Emperor Decius enforced the rule that everyone must sacrifice to him, but the Christians would not. Since, the Christians denied the Emperor Decius the pleasure of having everyone sacrifice to him, hundreds of Christians were massacred. Once Emperor Decius passed, the brutal killings subsided. Eventually, Constantine allowed the free worship of Christianity. While the Christians believe that fate is already decided, the pontiffs (priests) of the Roman Empire performed religious rituals to make the gods do what they desired, such as: ensure victory in war, safe childbirths, and bountiful

So, when the Protestant Christians were finally convinced that their magic was not the work of the devil, they decided to protect and raise these witches and wizards. No doubt planning on using them in coming wars. King Charles II restored the English, Irish and Scottish monarchies and brought unity to the United Kingdom again, this was called ‘The Restoration’. However, that was not the only thing he brought unity to, it was also the people. He created a law that protected witches and wizards on two conditions.

As stated previously, negativity was shown towards the individuals who believed and practiced witchcraft. Some great examples are African witchcraft and European witchcraft. According to Elliot Currie, author of ‘Crimes without Criminals: Witchcraft and Its Control in Renaissance Europe’, he stated, “witchcraft was usually prosecuted as a form of heresy… and as a felony whose essence was primarily mental” in Europe (Currie, pg. 8-9). This was during the Renaissance which was from the 14th century to the 17th century. During the Renaissance Europe, religion was extremely sensitive, but powerful. The people of the Roman Catholic Church were devoted to one god and no other higher being. They believed that everyone should worship the same god and

This text also goes on to state that Nider also met a Benedictine monk who, many years before their introduction, acted as “a necromancer, juggler, buffoon, and strolling player, well-known as an expert among the secular nobility.” (Internet History Sourcebooks Project) The most interesting story in the text however, is the recount of another young man, who was arrested and eventually burned after being found guilty of being a witch. This man and wife, who was also a witch, were previously arrested but had escaped confinement from Peter. Their escape only further solidified the belief that they were in fact witches and they were eventually arrested again and brought back to Bern. When they returned to Bern, the man and his wife were placed in different prisons to keep them from escaping again. From his prison, the man stated "If I can obtain absolution for my sins, I will freely lay bare all I know about witchcraft, for I see that I have death to expect." (Internet History Sourcebooks Project) After being assured that by carrying out this confession, he would be absolved of all of his sins, the man provided all of the knowledge that had about witchcraft and offered himself for execution.

. . [was] often confusing".6 The Church was fully capable of using obscure rituals and ceremonies in the everyday practice of their religion, but for a peasant to use such "magic," however, it could be considered heresy. As Europe progressed through the Enlightenment, the Roman Catholic Church’s role as a mediator between the common populace and the supernatural became highly disputed.7 Protestantism had ultimately weakened the clergy by making religious controversy familiar to the common tides of Europe.8 The Church was seen as a bastion of religious intolerance and intellectual backwardness because the clergy simply refused to let go of their out-dated ideals in order to embrace scientific reasoning.

St. Thomas Aquinas was a Dominican professor that began teaching at the University of Paris in the year 1256, in theology. His works in the field of theology were greatly influenced by Aristotle as well as Plato. His main goal in the section of his writing, Summa Contra Gentiles, was to explain how magic was portrayed in the “natural world”. He was trying to show non-Christians, especially Muslims, how Catholic beliefs could be rationalized. All the documents of St. Aquinas’s that were paired together in the section of the book by the editors were detailed works that were seen as controversial back when they were first published. One of the works in this section, titled Commentary on the Four Books of Sentences: Sorcery and Exorcism, in

Magic can be very functional in fantasy novels, but may be hard to interpret with no deliberate rules. The use of J.R.R Tolkien’s and Ursula K. Le Guin’s limitations of magic, in their respective novels, are more similar than different. In fantasy novels magic can be very limited, following strict rules, as in A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin (AWOE), or very open, with the limitation uncertain, such as they are sometimes in Lord of the Rings The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien (LOTR). A few limitations on magic among fantasy novels could be geography, knowledge, and activation and guidance through the use of an item.