European Witch Craze Essay

‘In the context of the period c1550 to c1650 to what extent were religious changes most responsible for the persecution of witches in Europe?’

The ‘European witch craze’ in which widespread moral panic suggested that wicked satanic witches were operating as an organised threat to Christianity; those accused were portrayed as being worshipers of the Devil, engaged in acts of malevolent sorcery at meetings known as Witches’ Sabbaths. Those arrested, convicted and executed were statistically old, poor women. Midelfort’s ‘domino theory’ explains the escalation of persecution as the consequence of attempts “to enforce social and moral discipline (…) one of the consequences of the general movement of reform and repression”. Murray and Trevor-Roper

The Reformation and Counter Reformation had the combined effect of raising moral standards within both churches. Personal responsibility and the individual’s choice in whether to choose good over evil took precedence over other explanations, including demonic possession, for an individual’s behaviour. Scarre and Callow argue the Reformation had shattered the “religious uniformity” of the middle Ages and promoted a “greater degree of self-conception, identity and cynicism among the ranks of the elite”. Additionally, the Reformation greatly elevated the place of the Bible in Christian worship. During this time the Bible was translated into a vernacular the common person could understand with an emphasis on a literal understanding, an offence that led many to be burned at the stake, including the Englishman William Tyndale . Unfortunately, some translations were misleading; consequently when taken literally it had deadly results. Levack7 gives the example of Exodus 22:18, which states, “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live”, meaning a ‘poisoner or someone who works in darkness and mutters things’, not the satanic definition of a ‘witch’, giving permission and even encouraged capital punishment of those