This paper methodologically re-examines the problem of evil in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible and, from a Buddhist critical stance, reads the play as an allegory of our times. Miller’s text dramatizes the Salem witch hunt (1692) and presents a series of possible causes that combined to create this tragedy, in which nineteen villagers were hanged for witchcraft. Employing the perspective of Buddhist Pratītyasamutpāda (sometimes translated into English as “dependent arising”), this paper reads the witch hunt in Salem as occurring through an interdependent meshing of factors including (a) similar Puritan persecutions taking place in England, and (b) the severely theocratic social organization of Salem village, which (c) suppressed individual freedoms, and (d) assumed that evil lay hidden somewhere inside each of the Salem villagers (and indeed their domestic animals too: as a result of the witch hunt, two dogs were also executed). From a Buddhist point of view, the roots of evil are avarice, anger, and stupidity; to rid oneself of these three limitations is the way to restore oneself to goodness and mercy. For this purpose, Buddha teaches the eight Right ways and the Middle Way. In Miller’s play, the village of Salem is a miniature version of the world; by extension, as in Salem, without ridding ourselves of anger, avarice, and stupidity, witch hunts will continue. In that sense, the spiritual victory of Miller’s protagonist, Proctor, who overcomes evil and chooses goodness by exercising free will alone, exemplifies an ethical model that foregrounds hope in human goodness.