Sacred violence took place in the seventeenth to eighteenth century in Early America. According to Susan Juster the word sacred refers to all that exists outside or transcends the human sphere. In Early America, Christianity had taken deep root as was the case in Europe. Many of the Christians at that time believed that they were supreme over other forms of religion and that no other religion was considered Godly. As a result of this frame of mind Christians took it upon themselves to rid the world of “evil” people, this being non-Christians by and large. The method use to exterminate these so called “evil” was through mass killings of an entire tribe, culture and ethnic grouping. These killing were very brutal as witnessed in the 1637 Pequot War where Fort Mystic was set ablaze and the result was the death of five hundred men, women and children of Indian origin at the hands of the Puritan militia (Juster 1).
Such militia as the Puritan and others were riding on the “fact” that they were doing God’s will through executing what they termed as “righteous killing.” However, what was unclear was whether the arson attack on Fort Mystic was a racial or religious attack. Susan Juster writes that it was both a racial and religious killing. The dividing factor between people and communities was the thin line between Christians and non-Christians.
What characterized sacred violence and distinguished it from other forms of aggression was its viciousness (Juster 4). These wars against any threat to their religion were more zealous and brutal with only an ounce of remorse or regret as compared to other forms of warfare. These Christians were passionate in what they were doing as they viewed themselves to be a cleansing agent that would rid the world of non-Christians and ultimately all evil according to them. They took it upon themselves to be the judge, the jury, the prosecutor and the executors of God’s work. To them they were serving a much higher calling than any other human beings, that of the creator Himself.
The sixteenth to seventeenth century marked the age of the wars of religion in Europe. Many characteristics of the religious forms were replicated in early America such as orchestrated assaults, judicial torture, massacre, martyrdom and iconoclasm. The most significant was martyrdom which is defined as the willingness of individuals to kill or be killed for the sake of their religion in the name of God. This was considered the ultimate sacrifice that any human being could make. Martyrdom was very prevalent in Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth century than it was in colonial America because martyrs were viewed as heroes and there was a system of identifying and promoting martyrs which involved printing pamphlets and pouring them to the masses. Historian Brad Gregory termed Europe as being, "awash in martyrological literature" (Juster 15).
It is estimated that over 5000 people were executed judicially because of their religion. The execution involved the traditional burning at the stake. However this is a conservative figure because if it were to include those people who were indirectly killed, say in religious protests and riots or those who died in prison among other instances, the figures would run into tens of thousands of people. All in all Early America’s religious history was characterized by so much inflamed passion yet so little actual persecution.
Work Cited
Juster, Susan. “What’s "Sacred" about Violence in Early America?” Common Place Oct. 2005.
Web. 16 Sept. 2011. (http://www.common-place.org/vol-06/no-01/juster/)
