en in the scriptures and gospels of the Bible. For this reason, all of the Puritans were expected to believe in witches since the Bible contained stories about them. During the time of the trials, it was especially a shock to the colonists if anyone said that they did not believe in witches. In some circumstances there were people, like Elizabeth Proctor, that stated a disbelief in witches (Miller 70). The colonists thought it a sin that anyone would go against the Bible, and so they accused these people of witchcraft. The Puritans were also fearful of witches after reading about them in the Bible. A major cause of the fear was that the Bible condemned all witches. The Bible also stated that witches had the power to harm their neighbors. Therefore, if any person in Salem had the least bit of a suspicion that someone was a witch, they would speak up about it in order to protect themselves and others. They also accused people because the Bible says, “Do not suffer a witch to live.” (Burner 71). Because witches’ views conflicted with holy ones, according to the Bible, the people of Salem did not want them to be a part of their society (Schwartz 1).The Salem Witch Trials came at a time where the colonists were just trying to overcome many other problems. In 1686, King James created the Dominion of New England. The Dominion of New England was an attempt by the king of England to unite all of the colonies. As a part of this plan, he wanted all of the colonies to be ruled by one governor. Therefore, he appointed Sir Edmund Andros as the governor of the Dominion of New England. The colonists were unhappy with the appointment of Andros because they felt that he undermined local self-government. As a result, the colonists felt that their power and control over themselves was being challenged. People who lived in religious communities, like Salem, did not want their form of government to change from a theocracy (B...
