Witch Trials Reconsidered

Why Witch Hunts Happened - A Non Materialist Review

If you take the medieval accounts of witches at face value, they are terrifying. Witches summoned demons, interacted with the devil, killed enemies with curses, ate babies, and were even able to fly across the sky and enter locked doors via keyholes. But, of course, no one takes these accounts seriously. They are assumed to be fanciful tales told by an ignorant fundamentalist population. And the breathtaking amount of historical scholarship on 16th and early 17th century witches almost without exception reflects this perspective. While these historians examine the circumstances, motivations, and causes behind the witch hunts, they do not consider that the actual charges against the witches might be true. Almost all modern scholarship is done from a highly skeptical materialistic point of view and the research on witches is no exception. Any claim, therefore, that the witches were really doing anything (flying, inflicting harm, etc.) are considered dubious and of poor historic credibility. The result of this materialistic paradigm has the consequence of necessitating that all testimonies that include the miraculous be discounted as coerced or apocryphal. And the conclusion of all scholars therefore is that the witches convicted were harmless victims of the zealous church of the day.

But the purpose of this essay is to ask: what if we don’t start with a rigid materialist skepticism? One of the things that I discuss in my book The Return of the Dragon is that discounting claims of the miraculous - especially when it comes to communicating with entities in another dimension, remote viewing/traveling, and other seemingly miraculous doings - cannot just be dismissed because there are logical, scientific, philosophical, and theological reasons why such doings are indeed quite possible. I stated that the ground underfoot of the materialist may not be as solid than we think.

So let’s review their practices with an openness not a skepticism. Let’s consider the many testimonies and contemporary histories assuming nothing about whether the supernatural claims were true or false but instead simply examining them at face value. One of the first things historians object to in both the testimonies and the histories of witches is the widespread claim that witches worshiped Satan. In the most famous anti-witch tomes of the day (including the incredibly influential Malleus Maleficarum) it was said that witches often participated in Satan worship via special gatherings (later dubbed ‘Black Sabbaths’).

Kissing Satan’s Anus, Engraving from Fra Francesco Maria Guazzo’s Compendium Maleficarum,1608

The reason for the skepticism on the part of historians is obvious. They don’t believe in Satan and almost all the accounts state not just that Satan was worshipped but that he actually appeared (something they view as impossible). A good example of this thinking is in Rodney Stark’s “For the Glory of God.” Stark is generally fair in his treatment of church behavior during the witch hunting era but writes that claims of Satanism were false because,

“In any event, confessions of satanism are invalidated, if for no other reason, because they involve impossible acts, often including flying, slipping through keyholes and up chimneys, changing shapes, taking on animal forms, and having sexual intercourse with Satan.” (p. 207).

But there are a few good reasons why I think this is a giant mistake. The claim of Satanism is widespread and otherwise trustworthy people (learned, honest and devout) recounted observations of such. We see these claims made by both in the writings of inquisitors and experts on the subject at the time and in the actual confessions (including uncoerced testimonies). And as I showed in The Return of the Dragon occult pagan practices in northern Europe almost certainly were still being practiced at the time where gods and goddesses were worshiped in secret meetings. Given that Christian observers of these cults would take these other gods as demonic (see 1 Corinthians 10:2), practically speaking whether the participants were worshipping some pagan deity or explicitly naming it as “Satan”, the community (including presumably at least some of the witches) would consider it one and the same thing.

But what of the miraculous claims? Above, Stark lists the ‘impossible’ acts such as, “flying, slipping through keyholes and up chimneys, changing shapes, taking on animal forms, and having sexual intercourse with Satan.” In The Return of the Dragon, I cited research done that indicates that psychedelic drug use was not an uncommon feature in the practice of witches (think of the iconography of a witch mixing a brew in the forest). And in Murder, Magic, and Medicine by John Mann, argues that pagan cults of northern Europe had discovered that hallucinogenic compounds (he points to hyoscine also known as scopolamine) could be absorbed through sweat glands in the armpit or via the mucus membranes of the rectum or vaginal area in order to bypass the first cycle of rapid metabolism by the liver (and severe intestinal discomfort). He argues this is where the iconography of witches riding broomsticks came from. And if they were flying on broomsticks thanks to hallucinogens, it suddenly makes more sense. Consider this account of the investigation of Lady Alice Kyteler in 1324,

"In rifleing the closet of the ladie, they found a pipe of oyntment, wherewith she greased a staffe, upon which she ambled and galloped through thick and thin."

None of this is to say that the travel was not real. The whole point of The Return of the Dragon was to argue that encounters with entities while on psychedelics were not hallucinations but real encounters with real entities. Further, the existence of the paranormal is not so easily dismissed even when drugs are not involved. I recently wrote about how the CIA experimented with the paranormal starting sometime after World War II and going all the way into the early 1990s and came to the shocking conclusion that - whatever the cause - the practices did indeed work. Experiments conducted by the agency and other government entities found individuals that could move things mentally (psychokinesis), read minds, and remote view. Relevant to our discussion, some were able to travel out of body to see places far away from themselves and to see things that there is no plausible way they could know about (including inside hidden compounds). Significantly, part (but not all) of the CIA’s program included the use of psychedelic drugs to aid in the paranormal process. So as we consider things like flying through the air, seeing inside of keyholes, and going up chimneys, in light of the paranormal research done by the CIA and the experiences of those on psychedelics, it is not impossible at all that these accounts were true. And as I wrote about in depth, the use of psychedelic drugs to communicate with entities often called gods and demons is one of the most common experiences reported in research. So the reports of things turning into animals and the appearance of Satan (or other gods that would have been called demons) shouldn’t be considered surprising at all.

So the primary reasons for tossing these accounts is invalid. In fact, these accounts make a lot of sense with everything we know about the occult practices of the day, and the effects of pharmaceutical practices known to have been in use.

And when we start to take these accounts seriously, the accounts become quite disturbing. Because in addition to Satanic interactions, witches were accused regularly of killing babies for their ceremonies. Various testimonies pointed to use of the bones of dead babies to effectively cast spells. And the flesh of the babies was consumed as part of their rites. For example, here is one testimony given to a judge in the State of Berne,

“This is the manner of it. We set our snares chiefly for unbaptized children...we kill them in their cradles or even when they are sleeping by their parents' side, in such a way that they afterwards are thought to have been overlain or to have died some other natural death. Then we secretly take them from their graves, and cook them in a cauldron, until the whole flesh comes away from the bones to make a soup which may easily be drunk. Of the more solid matter we make an unguent which is of virtue to help us in our arts and pleasures and our transportations; and with the liquid we fill a flask or skin, whoever drinks from which, with the addition of a few other ceremonies, immediately acquires much knowledge and becomes a leader in our sect.” Malleus Maleficarum (pp. 62-63)

Or consider this testimony given by a young woman who had been born into a family of witches about a horrific discovery she had made. She stated that “…she had opened a secret pot and found the heads of a great many children.” (Malleus Maleficarum p. 62)

This practice of worshiping entities, practicing magic, and killing and consuming children sounds so horrific modern historians just want to reject it outright but we have to keep in mind that such pagan practices in pre-Christian realms was common. The Romans reported that during their excursions into the northern realms of Europe they witnessed human sacrifice. These practices often involved children. One of the latest nations to convert to Christianity was Iceland and how it happened is instructive. As they were considering conversion, one of the provisions that their leading pagan priest insisted on was that sacrifice and infanticide might be allowed to continue in private for those that so chose.

Further, we know that infanticide was actually a much more common charge during this era than witchcraft itself. For example, in Rouen, France between 1550 and 1590 (the height of the witch-hunts) there were only three women and six men killed for witchcraft alone but sixty-six women were burned for infanticide.

The killing of innocents was real and it needs to be taken as a serious part of the fear of witches. And this doesn’t even take into account that the supposed charms and spells of the witches can’t just be discarded either if you are not a materialist (or if you take the findings of the CIA’s paranormal program seriously).

And once we take all of this seriously, let’s step back and consider the response of Christendom to witches. Rodney Stark states that the best estimates of witches killed during the witch hunt era are that approximately 60,000 suspected witches were killed between 1450 until 1750. Then he writes, “The death of 60,000 innocent people is appalling...” But it is a giant mistake to assume that all of them were innocent. In fact, the conviction rate for witches was surprisingly low (about 50 to 55 percent which was quite low for the time). And when convictions happened, penalties for a first offense were sometimes quite mild (often offering no punishment with a statement of repentance). In areas where the death penalty was given, it is important to note that capital punishment was the usual penalty for almost all felonious offenses (with thieves and robbers being killed at much higher rates). So given that the overall system appears to have been relatively fair and reasonable and throwing out the materialist idea that no witches were really up to demonic and horrific practices, it seems incredibly unlikely that most of the witches that died during those three centuries were “innocent”.

Of course no court system is perfect. In the modern USA it is not strange to hear of someone being wrongly convicted based on false testimony and put in jail for long periods (or perhaps even executed). So it is almost certainly true that there were some false prosecutions in this era. But this is quite different than assuming (as almost all moderns do) that there was nothing to actually prosecute. As we have seen here, there certainly was.

So why did the witch hunts end?

The most common explanation offered for the end of witch hunts is the Enlightenment. The narrative is that while the unhinged Christian zealots were looking for witches in every corner, the secular Enlightenment thinkers brought common sense to finally end it. But this doesn’t match with the evidence. In fact, none of the famous Enlightenment figures were influential in the ending of the witch hunt era. And amazingly, some of them were actually pro-witch hunt. For example, Thomas Hobbes (1599–1679), a man who dismissed all religion as “ignorance,” and “lies”, wrote in Leviathan, “[A]s for witches … they are justly punished.” He didn’t believe they actually had power but simply that they intended to do evil so therefore deserved what they got. Similarly, consider Jean Bodin (1530–1596), a secret atheist and outspoken enemy of the church influential among Enlightenment thinkers. Despite his atheism, Bodin was a believer in demons and the Devil and even served as a judge in several witchcraft trials. He recommended burning witches alive in the slowest possible fire and wrote a tract detailing the workings of witches. By the time significant Enlightenment figures did speak out against witch hunts, they had already faded from the scene.

So if it was not the Enlightenment that ended the hunts, what did? To the extent that anyone spoke out against witch hunts as the practice faded, it was devout Christians (most of whom firmly believed in witchcraft) who voiced objections. Several inquisitors such as Francisco Vaca, writing in 1549, expressed reservations about how many witches there actually were. Johan Weyer’s book On Magic, published in 1563, the author questions how many of the old women were actually able to reach the highest levels of sorcery as they were accused. It is important to note that Weyer definitely believed in sorcery and claims to have personally witnessed it. Other influential accounts followed almost exclusively from true believers in devils and witchcraft who simply believed that either the process of discovering witches was unsound or that the risks posed by witches was overstated. So if credit needs to be given for ending the witch hunts it must be given not to religious skeptics of the Enlightenment but to more thoughtful voices within the church.

But another possibility exists. What if the rising voices wondering about the prevalence of actual witch craft are not evidence that previous alarms (such as those found within Malleus Maleficarum, 1486) were unwarranted but instead a reflection of the fact that efforts to root out cults and covens were successful? What if, after about a century of intense prosecution and widespread literature about the practice, fewer and fewer people actually risked participating? What if the final witch hunts that sparked the greatest concerns from the above writers were not a rising peak in the pursuit of witches but a last gasp of a mostly successful effort? The typical telling of this history is that Europe went sort of crazy for a while and then woke up from their madness as though it was some sort of fever dream. But what if, as we have reviewed here, the true story was something like what follows?

That practices identified by inquisitors reflected real pagan practices common among the decentralized religions of northern Europe prior to Christianity’s rise in the era. Many modern readers will mistakenly assume that when Rome officially converted to Christianity in the 4th and 5th centuries, the entire empire became Christian. In reality, the process of Christianizing Europe took much longer. Ireland was not Christianized until the 5th century. East Anglia (England) was not Christianized until the 7th. Bavaria (Germany) was also in the 7th century. And the Normans of France and Scandinavia didn’t officially convert until the 10th and 11th centuries. But “official” conversions didn’t actually mean that the population became devout Christians. Often the “conversion” of the country was a political agreement on the part of a king or provincial ruler, used to build treaties with the Christians of southern and eastern Europe regarding war and trade. As with any religious transformation, the actual changing of the hearts of the people —the setting aside of the worship of the old gods and the practices of the old rites — lagged far behind these treaties. So, much of Europe (particularly in the north) remained largely non-Christian until well into the second millennium AD. Given this history, it is not surprising that what we now describe as witch hunts gained steam in the late Middle Ages. Because Christianity grew more established and pagan rites became less common, attitudes would have started to shift. It was not that witchcraft was absent before that, but that it was more accepted and normal and there was less taste for prosecuting it. It was only when a large majority of the population and authorities had come to view the old religion as bad that efforts to stamp it out were made in earnest.

This matches with the fact that the regions that had most recently converted to Christianity were those most likely to have high rates of witch hunts. Germany, for example, had the highest witchcraft execution rate, while Ireland —which converted early in the expansion of Christianity —had the lowest. This would make sense if a significant and recent history of paganism remained within the living memory of the population. If we take witchcraft as secret efforts to carry on the pagan traditions within a recently converted population, then many of the observations make a lot of sense. Human sacrifice, flying (possibly due to drug induced experiences), and secret meetings in the woods match what the Ancient Romans reported about the religions they encountered in Norther Europe.

If all this is true, a more likely account would be that witchcraft was real and common and that the heavy prosecution made it harder and harder to safely meet and with time the cases of true witchcraft became more and more infrequent. Soon a larger and larger percentage of the cases would be false charges because actual cases had become so rare.

A useful modern comparison is the practicing of lynching once common in some areas of the United States. Just a century ago, it was not strange that mobs would form to kill accused criminals without trial. And the lynchings could be carried out with a high level of impunity. The civil authorities had little taste for prosecution (and quite often were secretly participating). But over the past century, public opinion has changed dramatically. Movies, books, and public thought leaders have helped shift the mood of the country to the point where the practice of lynching is now considered one of the most odious things a person could do. Prosecutions went from being almost nonexistent to being zealous and focused. Today, no respectable person would dare express serious agreement with lynchings let alone take the giant personal risk of participating in one.

It is likely that witchcraft followed this same pattern. There were pagan practices (horrific) that the society once largely accepted that for a variety of reasons came under the spotlight of culture, were violently opposed both popularly and criminally, and it pushed such practices first to the fringes and then to almost nonexistence. And by the middle of the 17th century, the lack of credible cases had become so glaring that even people who were firm believers in the possibility of witchcraft questioned whether there were still any actual witches.

In conclusion, when you look at the witch hunts, witch prosecutions, and witch burnings of the 15th-18th centuries, we find that far from being insane feverish madness on the part of the church there were genuine reasons to be concerned with such practices. The prosecutions were reasonable for the day (with fair trials that had high acquittal rates and often reasonable sentencing). And when the practices were properly driven from society, the hunts ceased. This is a dramatic retelling of the era but I think it is the best way to understand what happened and why.