Religion and the Witch craze

Religion has always played a key role in establishing the accepted views and beliefs of society. The church’s enormous influence has caused many societal changes throughout history. Among them was the influence of the church during the fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. The church, striving for conformity, as it still does today, played a key role in enhancing the lengths to which the judicial system of the time would go in order to rid the world of its evil. This need for religious and political conformity spawned a number of different issues for the time, many of them based on the belief that the problems of the world or even their neighbors were the works of the devil, who now took the shape of a man, through his sly and cunning ways of manipulating weaker persons to do his evil bidding. This grew into the historical witch-hunts, as they are known today.
As the church forced the issue onto the people those who did not conform or stood behind there old beliefs were believed to be in league with the devil and therefore witches. Due to the patriarchal society, women were believed to be the weaker of the sexes. Such as it was, it was believed a woman needed a man t

The outbreak of war in actuality helped to reduce the accusations of witches by diverting attention. Misfortunes could now be blamed on something other than a witch. Not that it completely eradicated accusations of witchcraft but it did lessen them. Society had another scapegoat for its problems, rather than someone practicing witchcraft or who did not conform to the societal norms of the time.

There were many reasons for the rise and fall in the accusations, trials and executions of witches. However the combination of politics, religious views and the flaws of the judicial system were among the largest. They were the basis for most accusations and executions for witchcraft as a result of the influences of religion.

man to survive the trials and tribulations of life because she could not possible handle it herself. Hence, accused witches were mostly women. In general, they were older, single or widowed women. It was believed they had made pacts with the devil in order to survive and therefore had to repay him in some manner. So naturally, his repayment was in the form of evil works.

The split in the churches also had a large effect on the witch-hunts. Both the Catholic and Protestant priests insisted each set of beliefs were correct causing more disconformities among the people and further escalated the witch-hunts. The extra strain while reconstruction of the churches was in process only served to increase tension among the general public and facilitate accusations more readily between family, friends and neighbors. This now included those who practiced “white magic” or those who were considered healers of the time. It was thought that any power that could heal could also destroy so in turn anyone who practiced any form of magic was prosecuted. This also meant according to the Catholic reformers that for those who were using cha