Religious Reactions and the Persecution of Jewish Communities

Across Europe the Black Death was widely interpreted as divine punishment for humanity's sins, a belief that fed an intense wave of collective penance. The flagellant movement, which had existed in more limited form since the thirteenth century, surged uncontrollably during the pandemic, especially in Germany and the Low Countries, where processions of penitents whipped themselves publicly, often to the point of bleeding, in fixed cycles of thirty-three days symbolizing the years of Christ's life. What began as a tolerated, even encouraged practice increasingly alarmed both civil and ecclesiastical authorities as it grew more autonomous of Church control and became entangled with violence against religious minorities; Pope Clement VI formally condemned the flagellants in a papal bull of October 1349.