What were the Burning Times?
The Burning Times refers to the European inquisition of individuals charged with practicing Witchcraft and other heresy against the Roman Catholic church doctrine between the 14th and 17th century. Suspected and accused Witches were tortured to produce a confession and tried by an Inquisitional court before being executed either through hanging, burning or drowning. In South Africa suspected witches were and still often are banished from their homes and villages. In the 1980’s witch killings started to increase in South Africa, notably in Venda, Lebowa and Gazankulu in the Northern Province. From January 1990 until April 1995, 455 cases related to witchcraft were reported to the SAPS in the Northern Province. Witch killings tend to increase during times of violent turmoil.
The Burning Times is the name used by many Wiccans for the era of the Inquisition, and of the other witch hunts which sprang from it. During that time, thousands of women (and some men) were persecuted, tortured and killed for practices objectionable to the Catholic Church, especially witchcraft. This time is considered a very important event by most Wiccans (comparable to the atrocities and devastation perpetrated during the Holocaust), one that should never be forgotten.- edited from the alt.religion.wicca FAQ and the alt.
The Burning Times refers to the European inquisition of individuals charged with practicing Witchcraft and other heresy against the Roman Catholic church doctrine between the 14th and 17th century. Suspected and accused Witches were tortured to produce a confession and tried by an Inquisitional court before being executed either through hanging, burning or drowning. In South Africa suspected witches were and still often are banished from their homes and villages. In the 1980’s witch killings started to increase in South Africa, notably in Venda, Lebowa and Gazankulu in the Northern Province. From January 1990 until April 1995, 455 cases related to witchcraft were reported to the SAPS in the Northern Province. Witch killings tend to increase during times of violent turmoil. The Witchcraft Suppression Act 3 of 1957 as amended by the Witchcraft Suppression Amendment Act 50 of 1970 makes it illegal to “accuse a person of witchcraft or sorcery, or to name a person as a witch or wizard or to
The Burning Times is the name used by many modern Witches and pagans for the era of the Inquisition, and of the other witch hunts (including Salem) which sprang from it. During that time, many women and some men were persecuted for practices objectionable to the Church, especially witchcraft. The _Malleus Maleficarum_ was a guide on how to torture accused witches into confessing to whatever they were accused of. At the height of the persecutions, entire towns were left with only one or two women in them, and to this day no one knows for sure how many people were brutally murdered during this craze. As is often the case, this horror sprang from fear and misinformation — most of the people who were arrested, tortured and killed were not Witches (or witches) of any sort, but simply people who had gotten on the wrong side of someone who had the local magistrate’s ear, or who somehow didn’t fit in (particularly beautiful or ugly women, widows who had wealth or owned land, the handicapped a
“The Burning Times” is the term used by many modern Neo-Pagans and feminists to refer to the great European witch-hunts of the early modern period, coincident with the time of the reformation and seen by many as a crucial step in Christianity’s crushing of the Pagan religions, driving these underground. Some authors claim as many as ten million people were killed in these hunts, while more recent scholarship puts the number of documented deaths at 20-100 thousands, 80-90% of these women. Sometimes these numbers are doubled to account for non-judicial killings and deaths from torture, suicide, etcetera. Whatever the numbers, however, victims of these hunts (be they actual witches or not) are perceived as martyrs by Wiccans today, with the lessons of intolerance, misogyny and religious terror clearly noted.
