Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Black Death: The Reactions


People had many different reactions to the pandemic that was taking over the world. Many people would get drunk and run around in the streets. They figured, hey, if I’m gonna die tomorrow might as well live today! So I guess they kind of had a Middle Age Jersey Shore type deal going? Maybe, anyway some other people saw the plague as God’s punishment for human wickedness. So they would pray for forgiveness and many times would die praying. Some “Flagellants” arose, whipping them selves for God. Making them selves weak and eventually dying off. Finally, at an all time low, Christians started persecuting Jews. Christians thought that Jews were the cause of the plague, so they started to slaughter them mercilessly. Why does everyone always bag on the Jews? It’s really mean and I think Hitler pretty much took the cake on that one the Christians need to just back away. So anyway, a few years later Christians “found answers” to the plague in astrology and stopped persecuting the Jews.
The Christians thought that the plague was a result of the alignment of the planets Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars. People generally accepted this idea, but then realized that touching one infected with plague usually infected other people. So they rejected this idea. Luckily, the Christians had stopped persecuting the Jews and had moved on to new theories.
Jews being burnt alive as punishment for "causing" the plague

1 comment:

TMeek6 said...

I think it's funny how they had the "If I'm gonna die tomorrow I might as well live today" mentality. I also don't know where they would get the idea that it was because Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars aligning. But, hey, when everybody's dying you gotta think of a cause no matter how crazy it is.