THE PURITANS: 5 MYTHS
Woodcut from c.1700-1720, England. Image: Wellcome Collection
MYTH NO. 1: Puritans came to America to establish freedom of religion
When it comes to the Puritans, most of us think of intolerance – with hypocrisy following close behind. What’s a simple example to prove both points? The Puritans came to America for freedom of religion, then denied it to others!
But the Puritans didn’t leave England to found a society where all religions would be tolerated. That is, they did not come to North America “in search of religious freedom.” They came here so they could practice their own religion freely, which is a very different thing.
Every 17th century European kingdom had an official religion which was headed by the monarch. Anyone who criticized the state church therefore committed treason. England, where the Puritans wanted to change Anglican worship, was no exception; they were persecuted for their views. The Massachusetts colony promised the Puritans the possibility of a godly state where their “true” religion could be preserved. It was therefore crucial to them that in New England only their style of reformed Anglican worship, which came to be called Congregationalism, be practiced unopposed.
The Puritans’ ability to enforce a single religion in their colonies was short-lived. Not only did Quakers, Baptists and other non-Puritans move in (with mixed results), but when Charles II came to the throne in 1660 he turned a dark eye on Congregationalism, and that spelled the eventual end of its religious domination in New England.
European fear of witches was widespread, as illustrated by the cover of an English civil-war era pamphlet, A Most Certain Strange and True Discovery of a VVitch, 1643. Image: Thomason Collection, British Library
MYTH NO. 2: Puritans constantly persecuted and burned women as witches
Because of the infamous Salem witch trials of 1692, in which 20 people accused of witchcraft were executed, the New England Puritans are often singled out as an ignorant, hostile, and superstitious people prone to witchcraft “hysteria.”
It’s true that the Puritans believed in witchcraft, as did every society in Europe at the time (and as do many societies today). Rather than being hysterical about it, the Puritans took witchcraft seriously: accusations of witchcraft were thoroughly investigated, and usually dismissed. The number of witchcraft cases that made it to court in Puritan New England is very small. From the first witchcraft trial in New England in 1638 to the last in 1697 – excluding Salem’s 20 victims – 65 people were tried, out of a population of tens of thousands. More than half were acquitted; 16 were executed. They were not burned – no person was ever burned in New England. Men and women convicted of witchcraft were usually hanged, and sometimes pressed to death.
Contrast this with England, where Matthew Hopkins – self-styled “Witchfinder General” – carried out a reign of terror between 1645-1646 that resulted in the execution of some 230 alleged witches. Yet it’s the witchcraft trials in Salem, Massachusetts, resulting in 20 deaths, that continue to dominate the witchcraft conversation.
The Salem episode was the only time in Puritan New England’s history that many Puritans actually did panic about witchcraft. That’s what makes Salem memorable: it was an anomaly, the exception that proved the rule of due process and skepticism towards witchcraft.
MYTH NO. 3: Puritans banished Anne Hutchinson for being a feminist
The one Puritan most Americans know by name is Anne Hutchinson. They learned in high school that Hutchinson was banished from Massachusetts for daring to lead religious meetings when women were forbidden by the Puritan government from doing so.
This is untrue. The Massachusetts Puritans had no laws against women gathering together to study scripture. In fact, women often came together to discuss the latest sermon they’d heard, share their stories of spiritual seeking, and support each other. Long story short, Hutchinson was banished because she was a crucial source and supporter of a rebellion against the religious and political structures of the colony that nearly led to civil war, and was brought to court for slandering the colony’s ministers, all but two of whom she had claimed were “anti-christs.”
During her civil trial, she claimed that God spoke to her directly and said that if she was harmed in any way by the colony’s government, God would destroy the colony. This was both blasphemy (the Puritans didn’t believe that God spoke directly to any person) and treason (threatening the state), and she was banished for that, as were a handful of her unrepentant male followers.
Hutchinson also believed that anyone Christ had saved literally became Christ, and therefore could not be punished for any crime, including murder. She was a radical person who was banished for many reasons, but sexism was not one of them.
MYTH NO. 4: Puritans established a theocracy
The Puritan government of the Massachusetts Bay Colony is described as a theocracy in textbooks, documentaries, commentaries – you name it. But despite all you’ve heard, this is wrong.
A theocracy is a government run by religious authorities who claim divine sanction of their political power. But in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, no minister could run for political office. No person who was censured or excommunicated by his church could lose his political office because of his religious difficulties.
ANNE HUTCHINSON WAS BANISHED FOR MANY REASONS, BUT NOT BECAUSE SHE WAS A WOMAN.
Yes, they described Massachusetts as a godly commonwealth, but the Puritans were bound in covenant with God – and with each other – to form a civil government that ensured the public welfare. This is crucial. They incorporated some biblical law into their government, but they relied on English common law; ministers did not sit as judges in their courts, and ministers did not serve as magistrates. If you want to see an example of a theocracy, look at England, where the monarch was head of the church, archbishops were leaders in government, and if someone was excommunicated they lost their property, position, and sometimes their lives.
While it’s true that the first generation of Massachusetts men were required in 1631 to be full church members in order to vote or hold political office, that requirement was modified in 1658 and permanently retired in by 1664. Although ministers were very influential, religion and politics were formally separate, and ministers had no power to install or remove anyone in political office.
MYTH NO. 5: Puritans hated sex
What’s one thing “everyone” knows about the Puritans? That they hated sex!
They would have been very surprised to hear this. The Puritans believed that the love between married people was the closest humans could get on earth to experiencing the joy of being united with Christ in heaven. And love in marriage had no higher expression than sex – physical sex, entered into with gusto, passion, and love. Catholicism had for centuries declared that virginity and celibacy were superior states of being. But the Puritans said that marriage was ordained by God, and that he created it “not in this sinful world, but in paradise, that most joyful garden of pleasure.”
We get most of our mistaken notions about the Puritans hating sex from their attitude toward adultery – unmarried sex. Adultery was not okay; it was a sin, and one that could be punished by death. But married sex was not only legitimate in the Puritan view, it was meant to be exuberant, and embraced “with good will and delight, willingly, readily, and cheerfully,” as the Puritan William Gouge put it.
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Lori Rogers-Stokes is an independent scholar and author of Records of Trial from Thomas Shepard’s Church in Cambridge, 1638-1649: Heroic Souls (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020).