What religious beliefs where around during the times of the Salem Witch Trials?

[KyPerson]

The people involved in the Salem witch trials were Puritans. These were people who had broken away from the Church of England and wanted to purify it from any and all taint of Catholicism. They did not celebrate Christmas. They were extremely Calvinistic and preached hellfire and damnation at every opportunity. Read Jonathan Edwards sermon “Sinners in the hands of an angry God” to get an idea of how they saw things.
However, the Puritans did do some very good things. They stressed literacy since they wanted everyone to read the Bible (but woe be unto the reader if he differed from the minister (see Anne Hathaway’s fate to find out). They produced John Milton the great English poet and Isaac Watts the father of English hymnody.

 

[phil19034]

United Church of Christ today. Those tend to be the more liberal types and are very different from the Puritans of the 16th and 17th centuries!

But there are some Church of Christ groups that are still very “conservative” and far more puritanical, which are not part of the United Church of Christ.

 

[ltwin]

That’s one way to put it. Wow - I’d have never guessed that in a million years. It’s like the pendulum swung completely the other way in almost a defiant way.

Some Congregationalists in the 1700s and 1800s started questioning things like the Trinity and eternal damnation and gradually became identifiably Unitarian. By 1825, the Unitarians started the American Unitarian Association, and that made the split official. In the 1960s, the Unitarians merged with the Universalist Church of America to create the Unitarian Universalists.

In fact, the First Church of Salem is Unitarian today.

 

[ltwin]

What would have happened to someone who was a believer but did not have a conversion experience with narrative or someone who was not admitted to full church membership? Were they looked down on?

Depending on the time period and colony, they would not be able to vote (in church or in secular elections) unless they were Covenanted. As time went on, this became a problem and the Half-Way Covenant was introduced. This allowed the unconverted who otherwise lived moral and Christian lives to affirm the church covenant and have their children baptized.

However, even Halfway members were excluded from the Lord’s Supper and church government.

 

[ltwin]

But there are some Church of Christ groups that are still very “conservative” and far more puritanical, which are not part of the United Church of Christ.

Edit:
To clarify, UCC is different from the Churches of Christ.

There are however conservative Congregationalist churches still around. Park Street Church in Boston comes to mind.

 

[ltwin]

They were extremely Calvinistic and preached hellfire and damnation at every opportunity. Read Jonathan Edwards sermon “Sinners in the hands of an angry God” to get an idea of how they saw things.
However, the Puritans did do some very good things.

Actually, this is a caricature. “Sinners . . .” was one sermon by Edwards and is not representative of most of his theological output, which mainly focused on disinterested benevolence (love).

Edit:
To expand, the Puritans believed in preaching both the terrors of the Law and the good news of the Gospel because it was the Law that teaches God’s hatred of sin, brings conviction and allows man to realize that God’s mercy alone can save him.

They stressed literacy since they wanted everyone to read the Bible (but woe be unto the reader if he differed from the minister (see Anne Hathaway’s fate to find out).

Yes, they demanded religious conformity – as most Christian societies at the time did. Anne Hutchinson was banished for denouncing all the ministers in New England (except perhaps for John Cotton) as preachers of false doctrines and that their beliefs should be prohibited.

 

[theCardinalbird]

This is great info!! Thank you all

 

[TigerLily-1]

However, even Halfway members were excluded from the Lord’s Supper and church government.

Thank you Itwin!

The Halfway members were apparently looked down upon as “second” class Christians, which I consider both unChristian and unBiblical. I wonder how the Puritans developed this tiered doctrine of Christian and half-Christian? I’m guessing that belief is still around in other forms today, such as OSAS.

 

[ltwin]

The Halfway members were apparently looked down upon as “second” class Christians, which I consider both unChristian and unBiblical.

Well, keep in mind that the Halfway members were the children and grandchildren of the Covenanted members and in many ways they were successful and respected people in New England society.

The main difference is that Covenanted members had had a conscious work of grace in their lives, which was identified with regeneration and justification.

I wonder how the Puritans developed this tiered doctrine of Christian and half-Christian?

The Puritans were Calvinists. They were looking for evidence that they were among the elect. Their evidence was both subjective religious experience coupled with constant introspection and self-examination to discern evidence of sanctification and the fruit of the Spirit in their lives.

They wanted the church to be one of “visible saints” and as far as possible to keep membership limited to the regenerated rather than just letting everyone in the entire country become church members.

 

[Augustinian]

But there are some Church of Christ groups that are still very “conservative” and far more puritanical, which are not part of the United Church of Christ.

The Church of Christ groups have a different pedigree entirely from the the UCC people.

The CoC folks are the spiritual offspring of Alexander Campbell in the early 19th Century

 

[JimR-OCDS]

Giles Corey was pressed to death because he refused to confessed to practicing witchcraft, but he knew that the false charge was made in order to take possession of his land.

We must also keep in mind that back in those days, as well as during the witch burnings in Europe, witchcraft was believed in and highly feared.

People reacted to fear, pretty much as they do today.

Jim

 

[JimR-OCDS]

Absolutely.

The people of those times believed and feared witchcraft and demonic possession.

We see similar today

Jim

 

[ltwin]

The Puritan movement pretty much imploded.

It was just really diverse. They never agreed completely. Some Puritans were Congregagationalists, some were Episcopalians, some were Presbyterian, and the most radical became Baptist. After the Restoration, Puritans were forced out of the Church of England and developed separate denominations.

 

[Limoncello4021]

Oliver Wendell Holmes’ poem, “The Deacon’s Masterpiece; or, The One-Hoss Shay,” is often considered a satire on the complete collapse of hard-core Calvinist Puritanism by the mid-1800s.
Nathaniel Hawthorne, among other writers, dealt with its repercussions in his literary career. Hawthorne’s relative, Judge Hathorne, was one of the “hanging judges” at the trials, and Nathaniel was haunted by it.
One interesting thing about the trials was the admission of “spectral evidence,” which allowed the testimony of those who insisted they saw devils or were “ridden” by devils, etc.

 

[DaveBj]

One person, the old man Giles Corey, was “pressed to death” and not hanged.

I played him in an amateur production of The Crucible.

Also, I’m a sideways cousin to a whole bunch of Parrises who are descended from Rev. Samuel Parris, who was the local minister who led the witch-hunt.

D

 

[theCardinalbird]

Also, I’m a sideways cousin to a whole bunch of Parrises who are descended from Rev. Samuel Parris, who was the local minister who led the witch-hunt.

For real!!? That’s amazing!!

 

[Limoncello4021]

I was going to mention The Crucible. Miller’s play really is an excellent recreation of the trials. I like the Winona Ryder/Daniel Day Lewis version!

 

[ltwin]

And the play was meant as an attack on McCarthyism.

 

[mrsdizzyd]

ltwin:

United Church of Christ today. Those tend to be the more liberal types and are very different from the Puritans of the 16th and 17th centuries!

But there are some Church of Christ groups that are still very “conservative” and far more puritanical, which are not part of the United Church of Christ.

International Church of Christ comes to mind…

 

[ltwin]

International Church of Christ comes to mind…

While they are conservative, these churches aren’t directly descended from New England Puritanism. Their roots run through the Stone-Campbell Movement through Scotch-Irish Presbyterianism.