Great Mysteries-Opposing Viewpoints-Witches

The book has quotes from other source on both sides of the issue. The first chapter recounts a witch hanging in Connecticut and how it came about. Some of these quotes, particularly against women, are almost laughable in their anti-female prejudice and stupidity; that is, they'd be laughable if they hadn't led to the vicious attacks against women during the witchcraft trials.

The chapter does tend to confuse superstition with magic.

It examines why the Church got so upset about witchcraft when it had only been mildly concerned, noting that it is possible the Catholic Church was worried about people drifting to other religions, and stated the witch-hunt craze to boost its own power by causing fear in others.

The book examines the Biblical phrase “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” and points out it might be a translation error, and instead of the word witch, the word poisoner or diviner was the right one.

The book holds the number of people killed in Europe in the witch-hunt craze as ranging from “thousands” to “millions,” which is a fairly wide spread.

Chapter 2 deals with the events at Salem. Chapter 3 deals with how witches were detected. Among other things, the chapter notes that witch-hunting and killing was a very profitable business for a variety of people.

Chapter 4 starts out by examining whether or not witches can really fly. The possibility of drug-induced hallucinations is discussed.

Chapter 5 is about what happens at a sabbat. It examines whether sabbats even actually existed, or perhaps were an invention of the witch-hunting craze.

The final chapter is entitled “what happened to the witches?”

The book is rather unusual, both in its not taking a stand on anything, and in it's use of very, very old drawings.

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