The responses to the Black Death were vastly different from Christian and Muslim points of view. Although there were some similarities, most things varied based on how the religion itself thought of this disease. Death rates were still high and the disease was a very dangerous one. It killed up one-third to one-half of the world 's population at that point in time.
The Black Death was not just one disease, it was three diseases that were all around at the same time. They were the bubonic, pneumonic and septicemic plagues.They each attacked different parts of the body and were all deadly. The bubonic is the most common one so the other two are often forgotten. Despite the religious views, the plague did not differentiate between race, culture, wealth, gender or religion. It killed almost everyone it came in contact with. The mortality rates were similar for both Christian and Muslim people. The spread of the disease made people start to become paranoid and ready to find a scapegoat to blame this horrible tragedy on.
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They believed that praying for the disease to be stopped would be the best thing to do in the time of need. In addition to praying, there were other ways the Christian people tried to cure the victims of the Black Death. They thought that by building fires, covering windows with wax cloth, having flowers around the home, drinking a solution of liquified Armenian clay, and avoiding sleeping on their backs they could prevent the plague. The Christian people quickly blamed the Jews for the creation and spread of the disease. They would capture them and toss them into a pit full of timber and they would light it on fire, burning the Jewish people. It was thought of as the right and just thing to do at that time. Although fact now proves that the Jewish people did not cause this
The Black Death has been marked as one of the worst plagues to have ever struck humans in history, since it killed twenty five million Europeans in the course of the plague, and twenty million in Asia. (“The Black Death, JewishHistory.com) The Black Death took place in England in the fourteen century and killed millions between the years 1347-1350.(“Black Death”, n.p.) This came after an already terrible period in European history known as the Great Famine which left many people dead; the source starvation. The Great Famine occurred because of terrible climate changes that led to a disastrous farming season, that resulted in England loosing “…about 15 percent of its population during the famine years, between 1317 and 1348…”
The Black Death was so devastating to Europe because of the population change and the effects it had on people. The Black Death changed many people’s lives. For example, most of the population decreased, which is sad because their lives are gone. It affected Spain, France, and Italy in 1348; Barbaria, and England in 1349; and Poland in 1350.
During the thirteenth century, a disease known as the Black Death spread from Asia to Europe at an alarming speed. It travelled through the trade routes, in the form of infected fleas carried from town to town on rats causing catastrophic loses of population . The Black Death consisted of two forms of the disease; the pneumonic plague, and the bubonic plague . Since it was unknown as to what caused the disease at the time, their responses to the plague’s outbreak were almost entirely futile. Since religion was a big factor in nearly everybody’s lives, the records of the Black Death that we do have are heavily influenced by religion, and as such, their views strongly swayed things like treatments and medicine that were used against the plague.
The Black Death ravaged over 20 million people in China, India, Persia, Syria and Egypt during the early 1340’s. Most of these people were in Europe; this was over ⅓ of the population at the time (“BLACK PLAGUE”). This was the First Pandemic of the Bubonic Plague, killing far more than any Pandemic to follow it. Given the knowledge of medicine and science during this era, the Black Plague spread like wildfire, and caused many hideous symptoms which led to several ineffective treatments. Luckily, scientists and doctors worked together to create a cure, and while the Bubonic Plague does still infect people to this day, the wave that killed countless Europeans died out by 1400 (“IN THE WAKE OF THE PLAGUE:
The Black Death was a horrific pandemic that killed millions of people across the world, and it affected many nations. It spread across Asia, Europe, and North Africa, infecting millions of people in the process. The plague included three different types of illnesses, depending on which part of the body the disease infected. The cause and spread of the Black Death changed life in Asia, Europe, and North Africa drastically, and it left a lasting mark on the world. There were a couple of different factors that historians believe contributed to causing the Black Death.
The Black Death The Black Death: The Medieval black plague that ravaged Europe and killed a third of its population. It was due to the plague which is caused by a bacterium (Yersinia pestis) transmitted to humans from infected rats by the oriental rat flea. “By all accounts, the Black Death spread from France in the summer of 1348 to the port of Weymouth on the southern coast of England, from whence it travelled very rapidly to other ports in both directions along the coast. It progressed up through the Bristol Channel to Bristol before advancing along the Severn to Gloucester.
The epidemic affected Europe culturally, as the citizens developed an excessive reliance on religion as an answer for their tragedy. Additionally, the Black Death shifted the people’s social perspectives; they lost compassion for the sick and indulged in selfish desires. Finally, the pestilence altered the Europeans’ mental state, as their appreciation of life itself diminished, since the rapid spread of the plague caused torrential death rates across Europe. In response to the Black Death, the people of Europe became passionately pious, for they viewed their misfortune as a punishment from God and, thus, believed the only way to bring about continental happiness was through religion.
The Black Death had a big impact on European religion. Because people could not understand the plague, they strongly believed that the plague was a punishment sent by God. The church claimed that God was punishing people because of the sins they have committed. They organized religious marches and told people to pray to get rid of the horrible disease. However, around 1348, Christians started accusing the Jews of bringing and spreading the plague to Europe.
Most of the known world was devoured by the most notorious epidemic in history. In the 1351 , the infamous Black Death began to chew up and spit out Europe along with Asia and Africa as if being a victim of the Black Death once wasn’t horrific enough, The Great Pestilence hit Europe for the second time in the 18th century, along side that, in the 20th century Asia and Africa were revisited by The Great Plague. According to the background essay, “In five short years, the plague killed between 25 and 45% of the population it encountered.” During the time of the gruesome Black Death, two religions were widely practiced in this region of the world, Christianity and Islam. These were two religions with some different views and reasoning for this merciless period of terror and death.
The reactions from the Christians and the Muslims to the greatly feared disease, known as the Black Death or the Great Plague were different in several ways. The first Plague was documented from 541 to 544 CE. Known as the Plague of Justinian. The Plague came in three different ways: bubonic, pneumonic, and septicemic. With bubonic being the most common.
The Black Death The two faiths, Christianity and Islamic, approach the black death in similar ways religiously, medically, and in dealing with the Jews. Religiously the faiths saw the plague as a curse. The Muslims thought of the black plague as a blessing from god. (Document 4, 6, 8) the Muslims and the Christians have their own opinions of what they think the Black Death is.
The Black Death was a plague that was in Asia that also spread to Europe in the Middle Ages. Its took a toll on the society, trading and political development. Since the plague was considered to be bubonic and pneumonic almost anyone could catch it. At the time, there was not much knowledge on how to treat people with the plague. There also wasn’t much knowledge on hyenine, so the plague spread faster.
The Black Death was a disease that had a catastrophic impact on Europe. Reaching Europe in 1347, the plague killed an estimation of one-third of the population in the first wave. Each document varies with its reasons for the cause of the plague and how to deal with it. The first document Ordinances against the Spread of Plague seemed to blame Pisa and Lucca for the plague and thus, began to forbid contact with those places. It was forbidden for citizens of Pistoia to go to, or have contact with anyone or anything from Pisa or Lucca.
During the mid-fourteenth century, a plague hit Europe. Initially spreading through rats and subsequently fleas, it killed at least one-third of the population of Europe and continued intermittently until the 18th century. There was no known cure at the time, and the bacteria spread very quickly and would kill an infected person within two days, which led to structural public policies, religious, and medical changes in Europe. The plague had an enormous social effect, killing much of the population and encouraging new health reforms, it also had religious effects by attracting the attention of the Catholic Church, and lastly, it affected the trade around Europe, limiting the transportation of goods. As a response to the plague that took place
Muslims did not believe in the idea of ordinal sin. They did not believe humanity had committed a great act of sin, and therefore they did not believe that God created the Black Death as a means of punishment. Muslims viewed the Black Death as more of a natural disaster in which God did not try to prevent. Additionally, Muslims believed that the Black Death served as a martyrdom for those individuals who were truly committed to their faith. Ibn al-Wardi, of Aleppo, Syria states in an essay on the Report of the Pestilence “When a Muslim endures misfortune, then patience is in his worship.”