Introduction and research process:The Black Death of the mid-14th century created panic and fear in Western Europe, provoking a violent reaction from the population. The main document, Flagellants Attempts to Ward Off the Black Death, 1349, discusses a witness's account of the flagellant movements that spread across Western Europe following the Black Death. Flagellant movements were brotherhoods of men and sometimes women who gathered in procession to repent of their sins through flagellation or self-penance. Many of the flagellant movements became heretical and exemplified violence while the brotherhoods led the persecution of the Jews. This article will analyze the interpretations historians have regarding the severity of the flagellant movements and persecution of Jews during the Black Death in order to determine whether the violent movements were justifiable. The academic works selected for this analysis were chosen for the different perspectives they offer. present regarding the flagellating movements of the Black Death. The first work, The Black Death, studies Black Death reactions from a psychosocial perspective, arguing that fear and hysteria were major factors in reactions such as flagellation and persecution. The Black Death suggests that participants in the flagellants and later persecution of the Jews were mostly ignorant, and thus fear and ignorance encouraged the population to participate in the flagellant movements. The Black Death was chosen because it offered a sociological and psychological analysis of the flagellation and persecution movements. Piety and Plague: From Byzantium to the Baroque was chosen as a source for its attention to the history of art. Piety and Plague: From Byzantium the...... middle of paper ...... probably desperately sought a cure for the plague, so they were willing to trust anyone to ensure their survival. Overall, I believe that the sociological issues that arose during the Black Death encouraged psychological issues that ultimately allowed the processions described in the main document to take place. Dols' argument that Christians overreacted during the Black Death compared to Muslims does not seem like a correct analytical statement. As Stearns argues, Christian and Muslim societies are completely different in terms of religion, social structure, and knowledge of the Black Death. Dols fails to take into account major differences that may have discouraged Muslims from reacting similarly to Christians, which, in my opinion, makes his argument weak. Therefore, I do not support Dols' argument because it does not consider why Christians reacted violently.