Salem Witch Hunt: The Treatment of Women
Salem Witch Hunt: The Treatment of Women
The Salem witch trials of 1692 was a prime example of the men taking the superior roll in the way of life and, having the view point of women being “reckless” or “dangerous”. During the 1600’s, men made the rules for the majority of things, including religion in their churches. This left the women to follow these strict rules and never go out of the religious realms that were set by the men. As noted from Jackson’s lecture about the Puritans, “For one town there would be a man who was the towns governor and this man was the head of the church, there for the would preach gods word the way he believed it.” (Jackson, 12)
The first example to express is the fact that women were viewed as reckless with their viewpoints on religion. With the 1600’s being a time of male dominance in the New England towns, woman really just had to sit back and listen to what the men thought. They never really could put their opinion in, even when they didn’t agree with the puritan rules, or beliefs. For a prime example I bring Anne Hutchinson to point. As we learned in the lecture, “Anne Hutchinson was a midwife who had 14 children, and was from Boston. Anne would go to church every Sunday, never really was a rule breaker until she started to think differently about her puritan beliefs verses the governments view of Puritanism. When Anne started thinking differently, she began giving lectures, at her house, after the Sunday sermon. She would preach to crowds of 60-80 people. All though she thought she was doing right, the men in the town viewed her as reckless and thought her views were becoming very destructive, telling these women that they had power. The town and churches’ government told her to stop preaching but, she didn’t quit. Therefore they tried Anne with harrise (speaking out against the church). Anne tried to stand her ground and defend her rights, but in 1638 she lost her trial and was cast out of the puritan society, and was deemed as being “lost to satin”” (Jackson, September 12, 2012)
Anne Hutchinson’s story was one of many in this time that is an example of men viewing women as “reckless” in their churches society. The reason for this huge trial was that women weren’t free to do, or say what they believed in. Men were in charge of the church and the women were supposed to just sit back and go with what they heard in church even when they didn’t believe what they were hearing. The fact that they call the women reckless during this time, is just men thinking so highly of themselves, because they think they are chosen by god to speak his word. What if Anne was chosen by god to speak his word? The men didn’t even give her a chance to go forth and do so.
As I found in the introduction of The Salem Witch Hunt, when the witchcraft scare began to arise in 1692, there were many examples of men having the upper