John Hale is the minister of Beverly, which has been summoned to Salem to discover and
extinguish supposed witchcraft in the town of Salem, Mass. in the colonial period. Hale
overgoes a gradual change of character and belief as the play unfolds. As a dynamic
character? Though a gradual change it is, the change drastically changes his views and
ideas of what is God’s will and where his priorities lie.
The end of Act One exhibits the audience a zealous priest, Reverend John Hale,
looking for evidence of witchcraft, real or make believe. Most convenient for Hale the
town of Salem has more than enough evidence for him to become ecstatic about.
Although he does express that, “We can not look to superstition in this. The Devil is
precise; the marks of his presence are as definite as stone, and I must tell you all that I
shall not precede unless you are prepared to believe me if I should find no bruise of hell
upon her” (38), it is a mere empty promise, since before the ending of Act One he already
mentally decides Salem is plagued with witchcraft, with or without concrete evidence to
support his allegation. Hale uses such scant evidence as Putnam’s death of her first seven
children and Giles’ wife reading of strange books which keep him from reciting the Lord’s
prayer. Ironically, he encounters, Tituba, after hearing that this Barbados slave had been
practicing voodoo with the afflicted girls. After Hale puts immense pressure on Tituba to
proclaim herself a witch Hale is able to manipulate Tituba to claim that she had used
witchcraft on the girls. After declaring herself a witch she accuses the names of four
honest and innocent women, thus starting the chain affect of accused witches accusing
others of witchcraft, that soon would follow. So Hale, single-handedly, who was
manipulated by Abigail’s lies and false fits, started the entire conflict w...