Witchcraft And Fear Research Paper

The first reason the Salem witch trials occurred was mainly because people were scared of the devil. The people of Salem were all Puritans and were extremely scared of Satan. Since they were so scared, once one person was accused, everybody became spectacle and believed that there was witchcraft in the village. The smallest little suspicions caused people to think that you were a witch. Even by the way you acted in one little way, the town would freak out

The Salem Witch Trials brought havoc among the citizens of Salem, Massachusetts starting in 1692. Many of the people within the town continued to have strong loyalties to their new Puritan religion and their old king back home. The church of England had moved away from the Catholic religion with the help of King Henry VIII and the Puritans were a new group of people who accepted the split from Catholicism but still believed that the church of England had a lot of aspects that remained with the Catholic religion. Despite this, loyalty to the king remained strong because the Puritans were not looking to break off from the Church of England instead they wanted to reform the religion and make it their own. These loyalties stretched to such an extent that any sin committed was also considered an act of treason and thus punished. The Salem community was constantly searching for evil within their town to prove their righteousness to God which lead to high rates of fear and paranoia in their daily lives. The strict Puritan religion soon became the root cause of the monstrous imagination that started to form within the community of Salem. Many people still feared the presence of Catholic ideas within their communities and in response were willing to go to any extent to irradiate these views. Some historians also account the beginning of the trials to divisions within the two towns of Salem that lead to tensions and turmoil between the townsmen. But without the increased belief in their new religion, women around town wouldn’t have been persecuted. The strict belief in the Puritan religion and culture was the root cause of fear and paranoia that led to the mass execution of many women and townspeople during the Salem Witch Trials.

Salem, Massachusetts became famously known for the witch trials that took place in the late 1600’s. For the men and women residing in Salem, Massachusetts it was a time in which they lived in fear of allegations and deceit. Twenty men and women lost their lives during what is known as the Salem Witchcraft Hysteria. Socioeconomic tensions within the community are to blame for the witchcraft hysteria in Salem, Massachusetts during the late 1600’s. Factors such as politics, religion, and social status all played a role in the deadly and devastating era.

The largest outbreak of witchcraft in America took place in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. A group of girls, including the Parris’s Indian slave Tituba, gathered in the Salem village and were attempting to see the future by decoding “messages”. Shortly after this gathering the girls started showing signs of the possessed (pg. 73). To this day people all over America are still amazed with the events that took place in this time. But why is that? The fear of the village fell heavily onto the judicial system, which later made people focus on the proper separation of government and religious beliefs. Mass hysteria broke out amongst the village and many people were being accused, therefore leading to many innocent deaths. Although there could be many theories as to the reason the witch trials in Salem began, there are two points of view that are very commonly shared amongst people. Some believe that the Salem witch trials were women unconsciously searching for power, whereas others believe it was an encephalitis epidemic.

The major problem then led to other fears - fear of punishment, fear of gossip and a tarnished reputation. Hysteria ensues as the townspeople of Salem consider there may be witchcraft in their midst, and begin to recall friends and neighbours' past actions that have been suspicious. This becomes clear when Proctor says 'I'll tell you what's walking Salem now--vengeance is walking Salem. We are what we always were in Salem, but now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law!' People took advantage of the situation and used it to the best of their abilities.

The Salem Witch Trials were a time of paranoia and mass hysteria. In this small town of Massachusetts hundreds were accused of witchcraft and 19 people were executed. Salem was home to very devout Puritans. The worries arrived when young girls would become sick with no explanation or cure. The doctors not knowing what the cause of the illness was, quickly pronounce the girls bewitched. It spread terror through the town. The girls, as well as other residents, started accusing others of witchery. Many accusations were because of vengeance or self-interest. There were rivalries between families over land or wealth. Neighbors started accusing each other in order to gain their land. The religious community had an intensified sense of fear that the Devil was walking among them. They believed witches were out to destroy the Puritans. In order to purify the village of evil they had trials for the accused.

Three centuries ago, the Puritan religion was the base of the Salem village and many townspeople strongly believed in the existence of witches and witchcraft. According to the common Puritan belief, witches were in alliance with the devil and were granted power to harm. People were blamed for illness, failed crops, to bad weather, and many other things that were evident centuries ago. Due to the belief in witchcraft villagers were, perhaps, inclined to the most improbable explanations. The Puritans held strict views, ways of living, perspectives fears, and fantasies. Many Puritan ministers used the the fear of witchcraft to scare the believers into following the church. Historians believe these strict Puritan ways of life may have brought upon the witchcraft hysteria in Salem. At the time, witches and witchcraft were a serious and viewed as a real threat; almost as real as

The religion of the townspeople supported the witchcraft accusations that were spreading. Back then, the people of Salem read the Bible extremely literally. In the book, it says, ‘“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” (Doc 1) This is how the executions began and how more and more people became convinced that witchcraft existed. After these three women were jailed, this set off a large stream of accusations that continued for the next few months. In the Bible it says that mostly women were bewitched, and since the people took the Bible very seriously, a large portion of the accused were female. Around 24-30 males were accused while 88-110 females were. (Doc 5) Also, since the Bible said that witches must die, 20 people were executed. Some were hanged, some died in jail. (Doc 2) The support of their religion caused paranoia to break out, introducing the last cause of hysteria.

This happened after both the first accusations of witchery as well as the attack on twin towers. All citizens in Salem believed that the girls were telling the truth about the accused, and so, everyone began to turn against one another. People were afraid to do anything wrong or rude to anyone (especially the girls), because if so, there would be a great chance of accused for witchery. Similarly after the 9/11 attack, security in airports and other transportation were on high. Like the town of Salem, US citizens were extremely afraid of another attack. The town of Salem and the United States after 9/11 are similar because all citizens were greatly affected, but more importantly, they lived in fear after the

    Fear can control your life. It can make you hallucinate and think of doing evil things. People used this as an advantage to get what they wanted during the Salem Witch trials. The  Salem Witch Trials was a horrific event for family, friends, children, and parents. During the year of 1692, Salem Village, Massachusetts had a fearful downfall. In the Salem Witch hunt times, there was so much paranoia that anyone could and would be accused. These accusations spread like wildfire and caused chaotic pain.(Fear) The villagers used fear to control other people’s minds; which made it easier for

People often fear things they do not understand. In Nigeria, churches are accusing defenseless children of witchcraft; a boy’s “family pastor had accused him of being a witch, and his father then tried to force acid down his throat as an exorcism ” (The Boston Globe para. 2); permanently impairing the boy. The boy’s father did not understand why or how what his son was and tried to kill him out of fear of the consequences. Pastors were accusing either orphaned or children from poor families as witches because they could not fight back, as way to establish their credentials. Hysteria made the townspeople actually believe and fear witchcraft in both Nigeria and Salem. In the case of “The Dying Girl that No One Helped” one person did not get involved because the police” might have picked [him] up as suspect” he feared the outcome and did not understand the importance of the situation.

Both Salem, Massachusetts in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, and post 9/11 America are societies that dread witches or terrorists and tries to identify and eliminate them. When people find something that they are afraid of, they will do everything in their power to get rid of that fear. It will not matter to them what they have to do in order to eliminate their unease. Any fear that is great enough can take over people and make them do horrible, unjust things.

Prior to the girls being afflicted, a wave of chaos flew through Salem. The situation was so hysterical, that the trial required a special court to hold them. In addition to the trials, there were many other factors that went into the stress possessed by the Puritans. These included a smallpox epidemic in the colony, worries about losing their religion were present, growing rivalries between families within the colony, and many other factors added into the stress of the Puritans(“Salem Witch Trials”). Like the Salem Witch Trials, fear was evident throughout those in the Holocaust. Adolf Hitler caused many people to be afraid of being captured and many people to assist the targets of his crimes. People were detained or confined without trial(“Concentration Camps”), and many people held beliefs that were different than the anti-seminists. So, they helped those targeted and gave them shelter to hide. Some who helped the targeted hide did it for there own benefit. The poor would charge others for a place to hide, and farmers would offer a hiding place to those targeted, in return for a job(¨Causes and Motivation¨). The fear that was present in the communities would be over in both events, but the emotions throughout both would never be

Fear is used many times to essentially deteriorate the mental state of the community of Salem. When Abigail led on the girls to cry out during the accusations. “Abigail, now staring full front as though hypnotized, and mimicking the exact tone of Mary Warren’s cry: She sees nothin’!” (Miller, Abigail 115) this suggests a very crazy and hysterical account on the girls’ part. As the girl go on, chanting and crying, it sends demonic and horrifying emotions into the trial. It radiates a sense of dubiousness towards the reader as well. This is a prime example of mass hysteria at this particular moment, creating a latent fear. Additionally, fear played a role in a different part of the play as well. In the beginning, the whole community was captivated by the fact the devil’s presence may be lurking among them. As said by Miller, “Salem folk believed that the virgin forest was the Devil’s last preserve, his home base and the citadel of his

"I'll get you my pretty, and your little dog too!" The Wicked Witch of the West...