The Black Death: The Deadliest Pandemic

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The Black Death was one of the deadliest pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1348 and 1350. Hundreds of thousands of people suffered a painful death that dramatically decreased the population in and around Europe. A disease so deadly and quick spreading greatly sacred the people of this time. Nothing like this had ever been encountered in the past. People looked for many explanations for this pandemic and to this day, one has yet to be found. The greatest differences in the opinions of the cause were influenced through religion. The major religions in the time where the Black Death was spreading was Christian and Muslim. The followers of these religions had very differing opinions on the reason the terrible illness was plaguing their towns and remedies to cure it.

Document one shows how the Black Death spread all through out the Middle East. It infected from Egypt, to Italy and Rome, and then all the way to England and Germany. The only area that was spared was the Sahara Desert. One scary part of this plague was the rate at which it spread. It started in Balasagun in 1338 and had traveled all the way to England by 1349 and to Germany by 1350.

The only similarity in the situations of the Christians and Muslims were the number of deaths. Document two shows that the mortality rate of the Christians in Europe and the Muslims in the Middle East were very close with only a two percent difference. Even though these two religions faced the Black Death very differently, in the end both results were about the same. Document three gives two accounts of the symptoms that people suffered; one from a Christan and the other from a Muslim. This time was filled with chaos and terror. People did not know what was causi...

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...oined. The Jews had their book of law and the Christians had the gospel, all in tears, asking for Gods forgiveness and help. In the Middle East, document ten gives the Muslim account. The Muslims believed that there was no need for messianic movements that might have associated the Black Death with an apocalypse. They believed that what ever God did was His intention and nothing needed to be prayed against. The Muslims also knew that there was never a direct casual relationship between the Black Death and the active persecutions of minorities, or Jews, as in Europe.

The Black Death brought a time of great suffering for everyone, no matter what religion. About one fourth of the worlds population perished. People came up with what ever idea that brought them comfort at the time, but to this day there is no final explanation as to how one virus could be so deadly.

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