WITCH

In the winter of 1692, a wave of witch hysteria surrounded the settlement of Salem Village in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The accusations began with two little girls who were acting strangely. There are many underlying factors to why these thoughts of witchcraft started coming about. These issues were going on before that winter of 1692. The winter of 1692 was the onset of the hysterics behind the witchcraft trials.

To understand the reasons behind the hysteria, you have to know a little about the people who settled the area of Salem Village. Mainly Puritans inhabited Salem Village. There were very few other religions at that time. The Puritans left England to escape religious persecution. Puritans wanted to purify the national church by eliminated what they saw as Catholic influence. They believed in the total sovereignty of God and the absolute sinfulness of man. They wanted to establish a union of church and state. Puritans believed they were entering into a sacred compact with God in the founding of the Massachusetts colony. They agreed to live according to his will in return for a divine endorsement in the New World.

The people of Salem Village believed in witches. The word witchcraft meant the “art of bewitching, casting spells, or manipulating the forces of nature”. It was the idea of the people that this was impossible without the cooperation of the Devil. Many perceived that the Devil resented their way of life. The Devil had to act through a witch to do physical harm to human beings. He couldnt do it on his own. People who wholly believed in witches were always on the lookout for them. As a result, many people were wrongly accused.

Puritans viewed the world in basic black and white. Discipline and devotion were slogans in the service of the Lord. The simplest acts of innocence were looked upon as questionable conduct or even abnormal. Sinners were severely punished in Salem Village. The punishments were meant to humiliate the person as well as hurt.

There was never respect for the privacy of any individual in the seventeenth century. The community as a whole was expected to uphold the Puritan religion. They were encouraged to watch their neighbors closely and report any behavior that drifted even slightly from the “straight and narrow”.

According to some sources there was a problem with womens increasing independence. They lived in a society where men exercised substantial authority over a woman.