What gives someone, in this case historians, the right to make moral judgments about the past? Is this a given right, to be able to make moral judgments about things they most likely will never fully understand?

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Not being alive during the times these things happened can definitely hamper ones ability to understand why people did what they did...



​Is it right for us to judge for instance, why the pyramids were built using slave labor when we live in a society that condemns such actions? Or perhaps when witches were burned after being "judged" during medieval times. These examples are of some events that we today would call 'barbaric' or 'horrific', when at the time it was completely normal or in the eyes of the people of that time totally necessary.



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This History Channel documentary has several historians views on the infamous Salem Witch Trials of 1693

Linking Question:

Can Historians make a moral judgment about the past?