The Rise of the Christian Witch

I was going through some old history journals last term, looking for material for a seminar paper, when I was sidetracked by a really interesting piece in History Today, volume 50, no 11, November 2000. It’s The Emergence of the Christian Witch by P. G. Maxwell-Stuart, an expert on the subject and the translator of my edition of the Malleus Maleficarum

Let me just highlight the main argument for future reference. Christianity, at the point that it began to acquire ever greater influence in the Roman world, faced two specific challenges: heretical deviations for orthodox teachings and the continuing belief in the power of magic among ordinary people. Indeed, converts were attracted into the church in part because of its own claim to magical practices. The early Christian fathers went that one step further, claiming a unique power. Indeed we have here, in essence, the cult of the saints, of the miraculous transformations achieved by preternatural intervention and the possession of ‘magical’ relics.

The problem remained how to convince a wavering pagan audience that the miracles of Christ and the Apostles were genuine, whereas those of people like Simon Magus or Apollonius of Tyre were fraudulent. This was tied up with increasingly pejorative interpretations of the old religions. Daimones, the old spiritual intermediaries between this world and the next, were reinterpreted as demons, all under the command of Satan. There was an interesting process at work because Christianity itself came dangerously close to Manichaeism, a particular persistent heresy, in which the world is divided between the light and the dark, a constant battle-ground between good and evil.

In the end all magic, all magic that was not Christian that is, was condemned as potentially dangerous and heretical. The Theodosian Code of 428AD identified what was considered to be maleficium or harmful magic. The Church itself continued to work towards a solution to the perceived problem in a series of councils held between the fourth and the eighth centuries. Amongst other things women were forbidden to keep watch at cemeteries, presumably in case they invoked the spirits of the dead.

Even so, there was no systematic view of the dangers of witchcraft as a whole, as opposed to an activity carried on by isolated individuals. Bit by bit, though, a new preoccupation with the significance e of heresy began to emerge. Paganism and the practitioners of magic were, by this measure, viewed as an organised group, answerable to and inspired by Satan himself.

In 1437 Pope Eugenius IV issued a bull addressed to all inquisitors, deploring the fact that so many were practicing various forms of magic, worshipping evil spirits and making pacts with them. Witchcraft was now tied up with more general forms of apostasy, with the first known depiction of a witch on a broomstick appearing in Martin le Franc’s Champion des Dames in 1440, were she is described as Vaudoise, a Waldensian heretic.

The various elements now began to coalesce: the practice of magic, intercourse with evil spirits, the attendance at the sabbat, the pact with Satan himself. The fifteenth century theologian Pedro Ciruelo summed it up thus:

Anyone who maintains a treaty of friendship with the Devil commits a very grave sin because he is breaking the first commandment and sinning against God, committing the crime of treason and lese majestie. His action is also contrary to the religious vow he made when he was baptized. He has become an apostate to Christ, and an idolater who renders service to the enemy of God, the Devil.

The Christian Witch had been born.

The Danse Macabre-a Legacy of Christian Terror

Death, death; O amiable lovely death!
Thou odouriferous stench! sound rottenness!
Arise forth from the couch of lasting night,
Thou hate and terror to prosperity,
And I will kiss thy detestable bones
And put my eyeballs in thy vaulty brows
And ring these fingers with thy household worms
And stop this gap of breath with fulsome dust
And be a carrion monster like thyself:
Come, grin on me, and I will think thou smilest
And buss thee as thy wife. Misery's love,
O, come to me!
King John, Act III, Scene 4

I had breakfast this morning pouring over a fascinating journal piece on Death and the Danse Macabre. There is a development in the perceptions of death, in the manner in which death related to life. In the Pagan World death is a presence, yes, but one quite different from that of Christian Middle Ages. The Romans, for example, accepted Homer’s identification of Death as the elder brother of Sleep, and the two are often depicted together as winged genii on funeral monuments. The Egyptians, according to Herodotus, were in the habit of introducing a sarcophagus to the festive table as a reminder of the fragility of life;

Behold this image of what you yourself will be; eat and drink therefore and be happy.

Plutarch later took up this notion, though in his account a skeleton was displayed. This was another custom adopted by the Romans, as can be seen in Petronius’ Dinner of Trimalchio, though here a jointed puppet takes the place of the skeleton.

The point to all this was not that death was to be feared: it was no more than the implacable will of the gods. In essence it was a spur aimed at redoubling carnal pleasures in the midst of a transitory existence. It was an invitation, if you like, to even greater sin.

Then, like the ghost of Banqo, Christianity arrived at the feast, with a dead and deadening hand. Now an eternity of suffering was the promised ‘reward’ of carnal sin. Death was thus reborn as a figure of terror, the gatekeeper to a world of even greater terrors. Thus was born the Danse Macabre.

Now the skeleton reappears in paintings and frescos across Europe, leading the living in a gruesome dance. The pageant begins in earnest in the fourteenth century, the age of the Black Death, and continues beyond. The skeleton takes the hand of all, from Emperor to Peasant, leading them onwards in an irresistible caper, often in procession, with the partners walking hand-in hand. Death is not at the end of life; he is there forcing his presence on every scene of pleasure, or of love, or of simple family intimacy. He takes at will; he takes the child from the mother, the wife from the husband; he separates lovers, forcing his own intimate embraces on the one or the other.

Fear of death, even in an age when the Danse Macabre has been consigned to the edges of consciousness, is arguably the most lasting Christian legacy

Heresy and Belief

Christianity borrowed and adapted from older religions, and the New Testament is, arguably, little more than a palimpsest. But perhaps the objection is more fundamental than that. The original parchment is, of course, Judaism, and prior to the advent of St. Paul Christianity was little more than a Judaic heresy.

Yes, the foundation is Judaic but it proceeds by way of an almost total misunderstanding, or, perhaps, a deliberate perversion of the mother tradition. The Messiah, the anointed one, of the Old Testament, is a figure who combines both spiritual and political power. He comes as an earthly ruler and spiritual authority, a judge rather than a saviour of souls; his power is of this world. Mohammed might be said to have been such a figure, and there have been others, pretenders of one kind or another, in both the Jewish and the Muslim tradition. But Jesus is not to be perceived in such a light, for the simple reason that the Messiah was not and could not be the son of God. For if God is one, indivisible and absolute, such a claim is logically absurd; it is also heretical.

So, Christianity, as a religion, is founded on a fallacy, an error of interpretation, and a heresy. So, has belief in itself been enough to give life to their God, to their Messiah, to their Christ? Perhaps it has, but it has also given rise to theological and philosophical problems beyond all resolution. However, there is another question, even more fundamental. Is it possible for a mortal to become God? Would belief in itself be sufficient to invest you or me or any of us with divine and miraculous powers?

Well, again perhaps, though it is not a question that I can answer. All I will say that if it is possible to give life to a god it is equally possible to kill him, and the Christians have been doing that, in their several ways, for well over a century.

Here the madman fell silent and looked again at his listeners; and they, too, were silent and stared at him in astonishment. At last he threw his lantern on the ground, and it broke into pieces and went out. "I have come too early," he said then; "my time is not yet. This tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering; it has not yet reached the ears of men. Lightning and thunder require time; the light of the stars requires time; deeds, though done, still require time to be seen and heard. This deed is still more distant from them than most distant stars---and yet they have done it themselves.
It has been related further that on the same day the madman forced his way into several churches and there struck up his requiem aeternam deo. Led out and called to account, he is said always to have replied nothing but: "What after all are these churches now if they are not the tombs and sepulchers of God?"

Christianity-Our Great Legacy

Let me identify what I see as the positive dimensions of Christianity, in the widest possible sense. The reasons, contained within each of the headings that are about to follow, are, I think, self-explanatory. What unifies them all is, I suppose, the inspiration behind faith, rather than faith itself. Anyway, here we go;

The Bible.

This is a book filled with mystery, with majesty, with poetry and with power, the power of words. I simply cannot imagine those who love words not also loving the Bible, one of the richest texts in human history. Some of my favourite passages are in the Old Testament, particularly in The Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes, rich with the most beautiful imagery in the English language. Yes, I know, it’s not Christian, but it is the foundation of all that was to follow. Now, if I turn to the New Testament, the words that move me most are those of St. Paul in 1 Corinthians;

1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 And if I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Love suffereth long, and is kind; love envieth not; love vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, 5 doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not its own, is not provoked, taketh not account of evil; 6 rejoiceth not in unrighteousness, but rejoiceth with the truth; 7 beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Love never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall be done away; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall be done away. 9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part: 10 but when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away. 11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child: now that I am become a man, I have put away childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I have been known. 13 But now abideth faith, hope, love, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

A Literary Tradition

It’s almost impossible to be succinct here, but try to imagine our experience, the experience of Western Civilization, of all civilization, without the writings inspired by Christian faith; from St Augustine to Thomas A Kempis (O quam cito transit Gloria mundi-How quickly the glory of the world passes away); from Dante to Gerald Manley Hopkins; From St Teresa of Avila, to The Book Of Common Prayer; from John Donne to Blaise Pascal. I alight like a sparrow in the garden, picking up a few crumbs here and there.

The Preservation of the Past

It’s no longer fashionable among historians, I know, to talk of the Dark Ages. Still, there was a period, when, but for the Christian Church, much of the literary tradition of the Classical world would have disappeared. There were also new beginnings. The history of my own country really begins with Bede of Jarrow, who stands in relation to England as Herodotus does to Greece. His History of the English Church and People contains another of my favourite texts, dealing with the final acceptance of Christianity, when one of the thanes, casting his weight behind the new religion, addresses the king;

The present life of man, O king, seems to me, in comparison of that time which is unknown to us, like to the swift flight of a sparrow through the room wherein you sit at supper in winter, with your commanders and ministers, and a good fire in the midst, whilst the storms of rain and snow prevail abroad; the sparrow, I say, flying in at one door, and immediately out at another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry storm; but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of your sight, into the dark winter from which he had emerged. So this life of man appears for a short space, but of what went before, or what is to follow, we are utterly ignorant. If, therefore, this new doctrine contains something more certain, it seems justly to deserve to be followed.

Art.

So much of our greatest art was inspired by Christianity, from the Byzantine icons to the paintings of Fra Angelico and El Greco; from the frescos of Giotto to the sculptures of Michelangelo. I visited the Sistine Chapel and find it difficult to describe the sheer power of The Last Judgement.

Music.

Again, where would much of our musical tradition be without the influence of the Church? I love so much sacred music, from Hildegard of Bingen to Gregorian chant; to the masses of Bach and Gounod. My favourite is Gounod’s Sanctus, from the St. Cecilia Mass. If that does not stir the soul I have no idea what would. :-)

Christianity: Adaptation and Departure

It is important to understand that Christianity did not supersede the Old Testament. Indeed, after the death of Jesus, his followers continued for some time as a specifically Jewish sect, under the leadership, amongst others, of his half-brother, James the Just. The sect continued to observe Jewish rituals and customs, including circumscision.

It was the advent of Paul and the broadening of the Church's ministry to embrace non-Jews, who were generally more receptive to the message, that Christianity began to adapt to new circumstances, including the relaxation of strict dietary and ritual laws. All faiths show elements of inconsistency, and it is always a mistake to take a literal reading of sacred texts, one of the chief Catholic objections to the Protestant Reformation. And in the end there is no real contradiction between supplement and replace. Christianity was based upon and supplemented all that went before. It replaced in the sense of offering a new interpretation of the old and a radical point of departure.

The First Christian Emperor?

Most people, if they consider the matter at all, will think of Constantine the Great as the first Christian Roman Emperor, but there is a tradition that this distinction belongs to a third century emperor known as Philip the Arab. This is based on no greater evidence than a report in Eusebius of Caesarea’s Ecclesiastical History, which the author himself doubts, that Philip attended a Christian service at Easter, after being required by an unnamed bishop to confess his sins, though the date and the location are not mentioned. Beyond Eusebius there is nothing, and in his five year reign, about which not an awful lot is known, Philip continued to follow the state religion.

I was interested to note, though, in a glance over Marta Sordi’s The Christians in the Roman Empire that she makes the case for Philip, drawing on Eusebius and traditions after him. “I personally believe the story to be true”, Sordi concludes. What she, what any historian does or does not believe is monumentally irrelevant. All that matters is what can be proved.

The Legend of Joseph of Arimathea

I was thinking about Joseph of Arimathea, of whom almost nothing is known and yet much has been written.

Joseph simply appears in the Gospels as a wealthy man who allowed his own prepared tomb to be used for the burial of Jesus. There is really not much to go on, and the story itself may have been inserted in confirmation of prediction contained in the Book of Isaiah. But on such simple foundations an ice-cream castle has been erected, one in which Joseph has links with Britain, King Arthur and the Holy Grail.

The mythology begins with the apocrypha and un-canonical texts, works like the Acts of Pilate, The Gospel of Nicodemus and The Narrative of Joseph. There are also several fanciful references in the writings of the early church historians.

The first reference to Joseph in connection with Britain comes in the ninth century in The Life of Mary Magdalene, written by Rabanus Maurus, Archbishop of Mainz. The story was taken up by William of Malmesbury in The Chronicles of the English Kings, where Joseph and eleven companions are said to be responsible for the foundation of Glastonbury Abbey.

But it was Robert de Boron, a French poet who lived in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, who associated Joseph with the Grail for the first time in his Joseph d’Arimathe, amplifying on aspects of the Acts of Pilate.

In Boron’s account Joseph, imprisoned by the Jewish elders, is sustained during his captivity by the Grail. On his release he brings the sacred vessel with him on his journey to Britain. Legend then became truth and truth legend as the Grail cycle spun ever more elaborate threads. John of Glastonbury claims Joseph as an ancestor of King Arthur. For Elizabeth I his missionary work allowed her to assert that Christianity came to England before the Roman Church. So, the new Holy Grail was the foundation of an English National Church, with Joseph as it’s cup-bearer and prophet!

Christianity and the Mother Goddess

The more I look into Christianity the more complex the religion appears. In some sense it really is not a monotheistic religion at all, despite all the subtle apologetics over the exact nature of the Trinity. Indeed, if one looks beyond this core theological concept, there is a clear pantheistic quality to the faith, certainly in its Catholic clothing, with saints and intermediaries of all kinds in a sort of mutation of a late pagan tradition. But the key-figure, the mother-goddess, if you like, is the figure of the Virgin.

I read Mary and the Making of Europe by Mari Ruben in the March edition of History Today, part of the argument she presents in her book, The Mother of God: A History of the Virgin Mary, which I am also reading.

The cult of Mary served so many different purposes. For one thing its spread across Europe from the eleventh century onwards helped give a universal focus to a Church that had been fragmented in its devotion to local martyrs and saints. For another Mary was a more accessible figure, more human, if you like, than the Father, the Son or the Holy Ghost. More than that, she was believed to possess forms of leverage unique to herself. After all, she was a mother, was she not, and what son can refuse a plea from his mother? There is a twelfth century French prayer which sums up this mood perfectly;

Whatever you wish
Your only son will give you.
For whomever you seek
You will have the pardon and glory.

It was to her that even the monks turned when others might have been uncharitable or unforgiving;

O blessed and most saintly Mary, always Virgin, I am thus afflicted in the face of your goodness. I am greatly confused by the abominations of my sins which have made me deformed and horrible in the eyes of angels and all saints.


Mary also served as a focus of late Medieval anti-Judaism. As Mary was the vessel of the Incarnation-a blasphemous concept in Judaism-she was often deployed as proof of the perversity of the Jews and an instrument for converting unbelievers in the miracle stories of the period.

So Mary became a friend to the errant, a confidant of both monks and nuns, the Great Mother, in some ways more important than Christ himself in terms of popular devotion. All this is quite remarkable when one considers how little she figures in the Gospels.

The Wandering Jew

I’m completely fascinated by the story of the Wandering Jew, the man who allegedly mocked Christ on his way to the Crucifixion. He was promptly cursed, doomed to wander the earth, without rest, until the Second Coming.

The legend is most likely of ancient provenance, but it first written reference dates to the thirteenth century, to Flores Historiarum, the chronicle of Roger of Wendover, an English monk. In this he is said to have been a shoemaker by the name of Cartaphilus.

The story first made it into popular consciousness at the beginning of the seventeenth century, with the publication of a pamphlet in German. From Germany the legend spread rapidly across Europe, though the Jew in question is now known as Ahaserus. The pamphlet quotes Matthew Chapter sixteen, verse twenty-eight, which many have taken to be the source of all that followed;

Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here, which shall not taste death, till they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.

Wander he did, over the whole of Europe and beyond. There were reports of sightings as late as the nineteenth century. Seemingly he even made it to Salt Lake City in 1868. Perhaps he is now a Latter Day Saint? :))