Taken from an article in the Smithsonian on the History of Witches.

By Jennie Tiderman-Österberg

During the witch hysteria of the seventeenth century, these beliefs were thrust upon those who practiced herbalism. Ideas of cunning women and men who magically cured the sick through herbs and ointments were reinterpreted and given threatening meanings as a strategy for demonizing folk beliefs. Only the church and health professionals could cure illness. For anyone else to try was to challenge church authority and power and, as the Lutheran church was so tied to the Crown, the king’s as well. The force that bound all subjects together should be the God of Christians alone

But despite these processes of religious control, older ideas remained. Folk beliefs often work as a glue that holds a community together, and this is not something that can be dissolved so easily. The “witch crisis” arrived as a hot pot of clashes between older folklore and the new Lutheran religion. What these beliefs had in common was an ontological starting point: that outside our visible world existed a spiritual and celestial one that was equally real.

Another way the Lutheran church strengthened its power was by setting rules for the organization of the household. These were meant to resemble the hierarchy under which society was organized under God and, of course, the king, and placed the women of a household far beneath their husbands or fathers; a wife should worship her husband as she did the Lord.

The author does state that the church alone was not at fault a series of environmental issues and other disasters caused people to look for what was causing the problems. Suzanne Deakins

(Submitted by Suzanne Deakins, H.W., M.)