[Vision2020] Moscow Neo-Puritans Re-Write Witchcraft Trial History

[Nicholas Gier]

Good Morning Visionaries:

The main source of my column was Eve LaPlante highly praised book "Salem
Witch Judge: The Life and Repentance of Samuel Sewall" (2007). In stark
contrast to Cotton Mather, who wrote a book-length defense of the trials,
Sewall wore sack cloth for the rest of his life to repent for his sins for
participating as a judge in the trials.

There is two corrections I need to make: 1) the teenage girls did testify
that "specters" (hence "spectral" evidence) told them that the ones they
accused were witches and from the Devil; and 2) the adjective "hysterical"
is now ill-advised (as anti-woman) and there may have been natural causes
for their hallucinations.

The following is just one of several theories about what may have caused
the girls' strange behavior:

A widely known theory about the cause of the reported afflictions
attributes the cause to the ingestion of bread that had been made from rye
grain that had been infected by a fungus, *Claviceps purpurea
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claviceps_purpurea>*, commonly known as ergot
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergot>. This fungus contains chemicals
similar to those used in the synthetic psychedelic drug
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychedelic_drug> LSD
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LSD>. Convulsive ergotism
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergotism> causes a variety of symptoms,
including nervous dysfunction.will now check the web to verify what the
leading theories are about their "visions." (Wikipedia)

By the way, NSA Fellow of History Christopher Schlect is listed on the
college website as having a "Ph.D." and also being "ABD" (All But
Dissertation).  Of course most of us know that a student must write a
dissertation to receive a Ph.D. at WSU. NSA now has more Ph.D.s on its
roster, but, embarrassingly so, Schlect is not one of them.

nfg

*MOSCOW’S NEO-PURITANS REWRITE WITCH TRIAL HISTORY*


By Nick Gier, The Palouse Pundit


On the 10th day of this month 322 years ago, Lydia Dustin, found not guilty
of witchcraft but unable to pay her jail fees, died in prison in Salem,
Massachusetts. The  witch hunting frenzy culminated with 185 people accused
and 19 hanged. One man Giles Corey was slowly crushed to death between two
doors because he would not enter a plea.  Presumably the punishment is
designed to “press” a confession out of the accused!

On October 29, 1692, Governor William Phips terminated the witchcraft court
and dismissed the judges. His own wife had been accused, and the general
fear was that soon everyone would be charged with a crime of the dark
arts.  Even the great Rev. Cotton Mather’s wife was targeted as a witch
after giving birth to a deformed child.

Christopher Schlect, a Fellow of History at Moscow’s New Andrews College,
has written a reinterpretation of the witch trials in the Christ Church
journal *Credenda Agenda* (vol. 7:2,3). Schlect claims if it had not been
"sober minded clergy" reaffirming Puritan standards of justice, there would
have been far more executions.

The Puritan ministers, however, were concerned only about “spectral”
evidence, and apart from that reservation, they urged the trials to
continue. Historian Edmund S. Morgan states that a sermon preached by Salem
minister Deodat Lawson in March 1692 was “an important factor in the
widening of the Salem scare.” The publication of this sermon was endorsed
by five major Puritan divines, including Increase and Cotton Mather.

Ironically, Schlect resorts to the separation of church and state in his
defense of the Puritan clergy. The witch court was a civil not a religious
body, and Schlect praises the pastors for their “godly virtue of submission
to authority.” Insisting that the trials be stopped would have made them
guilty of the sin of “humanistic individualism.”

Schlect ignores the fact that the clergy were intimately involved in
identifying alleged witches and then recommending the accused for trial.
With regard to the alleged witch Mary Glover, hanged in 1688, the “sober
minded” Cotton Mather declared that she was “a scandalous old Irishwoman, a
Roman Catholic, and obstinate in idolatry.” Martha Carrier’s sons were
tortured into testifying against her, and as she was led to the gallows,
the good Rev. Mather yelled out that she was a “rampant hag.” It was Thomas
Barnard, the assistant minister at her church, who had arranged for the
brutal interrogation of Carrier’s sons.

At the hanging of the Rev. George Burroughs, the condemned was able to
recite the Lord’s Prayer flawlessly, a widely accepted sign that Burroughs
was innocent of the charge of witchcraft. The crowd was amazed and clamored
for his release, but Cotton Mather asserted his pastoral authority and
insisted that the execution proceed.

Schlect states that there is a “glaring need in our own society for a
resurgence of stalwart Puritanism.” In *Credenda Agenda *(3:9,11, now
removed from the internet) Greg Dickison declares that "if we could have it
our way,” then there would be capital punishment for “kidnapping, sorcery,
bestiality, adultery, homosexuality, and cursing one’s parents.”

As their theocratic vision is unlikely to be fulfilled, I would recommend
that Schlect and Dickison express their godly virtue and submit to secular
authority, which is based on the “humanistic individualism” of our Founding
Fathers.  This allows free men and women to criticize anyone who would make
ancient religious laws the laws of the land.

Fourteen of those hung for witchcraft were women living at the margins of
society. Appealing to our secular Constitution, dozens of sober minded
appellate court judges have ruled that all citizens, including our GLBT
brothers and sisters no longer in the closet, should marry whom they love
and be free from harassment and discrimination.

Nick Gier taught religion and philosophy at the University of Idaho for 31
years.
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