The Pros And Cons Of Witchcraft

The belief of witchcraft has been around for centries. For being a small city, Salem Massachusetts carries a big name for the events that took place in late winter early spring 1692. When someone hears the word ¨Salem” its mostly the person will think ¨witchcraft”. Many people thoughts on witches that their power are evil and will arm others. My people during that time were accused of being witches and for witchcraft things. There were many young girils, women and men that were sent to death. Why did it come to this? What was the root cause pf the Salem Witch Hysteria? I think this tragity accured because of the role of religion in the village, social issues accurred, political turmiol, and economic dilocation.

From the late fifteenth century throughout the seventeenth century, witches were being persecuted for these three major reasons religion, fear, and deliberate deception in Europe. During this period the Protestant Reformation, the Catholic Reformation, the consolidation of national government occurred which caused and help the 3 major reasons. Women were considered weaker emotionally and physically and there was a popular belief in magic and most this power was thought to have come from the devil causing men with power to believe that women can be witches. Witches were usually suspected to be old, poor, married and unmarried women.

In retrospect, this judicial procedure might best be described as an unconventional massive public panic that had begun to spread throughout the neighboring villages. The numbers of those accused of witchcraft began to grow very quickly and, before long, women of various societal stature also found themselves among the

The people who were being accused of witchcraft were being portrayed as worshipers of the devil. The Witch- Hunting in Europe rose at its peak in between the 16th century and 17th century. There were between 600 and 650 people were arrested for witch craft in France region of Languedoc alone. I think that people who were accused of practicing witch craft have suffred the greatest injustice partially because they were innocent there wasn’t a legit evidence that proves that they practice witch craft. They were rather forced to falsely to admit that they have confessed to devil in order for them to avoid of being tortured more. These people were being exectuted for something that have not done and there was no such of evidence that proves that they have been practicing witch crafting. These people where innocent people and they were being punished and executed for something that is not actually

The witch craze had widely spread through Europe from the Middle Ages up to the 1700’s. Those who were accused of being a witch were persecuted by the use of torture. The number of “witches” who were tried surpassed 100,000. Witches were not viewed too fondly, for they were assumed to associate with the Devil. The three major reasons for the persecutions of witches were economic greed, age and gender bias, and religious beliefs.

One can be very confused with the modern ideas present today. In fact, a lot of individuals are so involved in their own lives that they do not even bother to think where these modern popular beliefs came from. Modern constructs, such as religion, politics, warfare and even the internet all originated somewhere, and it is important that people know at least a little about the history of something before completely use it as a part of their everyday life. Take the case of Witchcraft and Wicca: while most people would probably combine these two in the same area of interest such as witchcraft and spells with the occasional magical tool such as the voodoo doll, one might be surprised that Wicca is actually a religion and witchcraft actually originated from the Wiccan movement.

During that time, many women were accused of being witches because of the fear surrounding witchcraft. The deeply religious Puritan society believed in witchcraft, so whenever strange occurrences would happen, they'd often attribute them to witchcraft. The fear of witchcraft in the highly religious area led to the wrongful accusations and execution of many women. Because of this fear and paranoia, many people strayed away from the spread of “witchcraft” and just wanted to get rid of as many strange women as possible without even rationalizing whether or not they were involved in the sin. The people were so consumed by the fear of witchcraft that they lost sight of the real problem being the decline in their population and the growing distrust in those accusations.

In the 1680’s and 1690’s there was mass hysteria in New England over supposed witchcraft. The most famous outbreak was in Salem, Massachusetts, hence the name Salem Witch Trials. In Salem, there were young girls who started acting strangely, and they leveled accusations of witchcraft against some of the West Indian servants who were immersed in voodoo tradition. Most of the accusations were against women, and soon the accusations started to shift to the substantial and prominent women. Neighbors accused other neighbors, husbands accused their wives, etc. and it kept going on for a while. There was this nature of evil and the trials didn’t end until nineteen Salem residents were put to death in 1692, more importantly before the girls

Firstly, the conflicts were caused by the factors of gender, age, and marital status. When looking at the total number of men and women who were hanged, the women far outnumbered the men, 13 women to 7 men (Source A). Of the 24 males who were accused of witchcraft, 15 were married, while of the 110 females accused, 61 were married. This shows that the number of females accused outnumbered the men and the majority of those accused were married. Of the male accusers, all 5 were single, ranging from the ages of 11-20, whereas off the 29 females accusers, 23 were single (the other 6 were married). The ages of the accusers ranged from under 11 to over 21, with the majority being 16-20 years of age. There is a distinct pattern that stands out in the accused and the accusers. The accused were mainly

In 1692, 19 women were hung and 200 more were accused of witchcraft. All because of the strange actions of 8 young girls. These 8 girls showed signs of being possessed by the Devil. They had seizures, trances, delusions and extreme illness unexpectedly. Fear of being killed by the Indians and worry that there was not enough food and water put the level of tension at a new high for the villages, spread this hysteria faster than wildfire.

Those who claimed to know the future and weren’t prophets were convicted of blasphemy and witchcraft and were punished. It was considered witchcraft because fortune-telling required a direct relationship between a human or witch and unholy spiritual powers. During the Middle Ages, witchcraft in ecclesiastic or church courts was presided over by church-appointed officials. This may have caused biased opinions and also links to religion being a cause of the harsh punishment. In medieval judicial proceedings, torture was sometimes used as a means of extracting information concerning witchcraft, and confessions were not uncommon. Historical evidence states that many confessed out of fear of being tortured and not because they were truly guilty.

The seventeenth century was a time of great religious excitement both in Europe and America. It had been widely believed even before the Puritans left England that witchcraft was a well-practiced profession in Europe. The times for settlers in the New America proved to be quite different and so ever changing. With many new rules, laws, regulations and curfew a true government was being born. Throughout this vast change, religious beliefs became so strong to be studied and participated in. Religions that divided from Christianity and Catholic beliefs, such as Puritans, who had a clear vision of what their churches were going to be like. Witchcraft had been a crime a long time before the trials in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and prior

Back then, there was a period called the dark ages this what when men and women hunted for witches known as the Salem Witch trials. This time will be forever remembered for the people in the town and the victims and family members of the horrifying time. European descents brought with many of them was the belief in witches and the devil. These beliefs that they believed in so much were from the teaching of the catholic church. During the seventeenth century, people were executed for being believed they were witches and followers of Satan. Most of these executions were performed in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. Mainly all of the accused victims were women, many historians believe that the charges of witchcraft were a way to control the

Witchcraft exists. Whether we choose to believe or not, its existence in worldwide cultures is undeniable. Its form takes many shapes that can be determined by the religion, economics, politics, and folk beliefs in each individual culture where it may take place. Its importance in our own, American, history should not go understated: Witches were a major dilemma for people who lived in 1692 Salem, Massachusetts, and as a result women (and men) were hanged due to undeniable belief in the power of Witchcraft. Today, belief in magic and witches has diminished with the increasingly secular nature of our culture, but we must accept there was a time when witches “existed”. While American culture has drifted away from ideas such as witchcraft, others have certainly not, with the primary example being Africa. Witchcraft in African culture accounts for many of the issues found within many of the continents communities. Correcting these issues, at least for a time, usually results in a community being “fixed” (examples are made in Adam Ashford’s account of witchery, Madumo, a Man Bewitched and the anthropological accounts being used for this essay). What is fascinating; however, are the parallels that can be made between witchcraft in different cultures. In a previous essay I touched on this topic by incorporating my definition of witchcraft as “a cultural means of being able to create particular moral boundaries by means of ‘magic’ thinking” (Brian Riddle, 2015). In this essay, I

Wiccan practices and witch practices also differ in regard to what they value. Wiccans worship their gods and goddesses through rituals. Priests and priestesses speak as the gods and goddesses dressed in masks to equally represent sexuality to create wholeness. The purpose of the masks is to “present metaphors for understanding the nature of the cosmos and our proper relationship to it” (Scarboro, Campbell, Stave 44). Since the deities are perceived as being superior, worshipping them through ritual serves as a way to become closer to them. During rituals, Wiccans also impersonate their gods and goddesses, but there are guidelines as to who can impersonate. “A woman may impersonate either the God or the Goddess, but a man may only impersonate the God” (Gardner). The impersonation reflects their belief that by speaking as the god or goddess, they are acknowledging the divinity of the deities and are striving to live by their tellings. However, in witchcraft, deities are seen as characters and as aspects of nature; therefore, witches do not have priests or priestesses to speak as the gods or goddesses. Instead, “Witches choose a ‘Craft name,’ usually that of a mythological figure but sometimes one from literature, or nature, or one they create themselves, by which they are known in the coven” (Scarboro, Campbell, Stave 45). Since witches choose a craft name, they do not value gods and goddesses as highly as Wiccans do because instead of speaking on behalf of the deities, they