Francisco José de Jaca

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Francisco José de Jaca (* 1645 in Aragon , Spain ; † 1690 ) was a Capuchin monk and missionary who fought for the rights of slaves deported from Africa in the Spanish colonies together with his brother Epifanio de Moirans .

Life

Francisco José de Jaca joined the Capuchin Order in 1665. After completing his novitiate and studying philosophy and theology, he was ordained a priest in 1672 (at the latest). In 1676 his order sent him as a missionary to the Audiencia Santo Domingo , first to the Llanos in what is now Venezuela , and later to the mission on the Gulf of Darién .

During a trip to Cartagena de Indias in 1678, Jaca saw with his own eyes the cruelty of the slave trade , an impression that never left him. When he returned to Caracas , the capital of the Provincia de Venezuela , he began there to preach against the slave trade and the crimes against slaves . He then wrote to King Charles II and described what he had experienced. Jaca claimed to be able to turn to the king directly, bypassing the usual channels of authority, since it was about the life and rights of the slaves.

Jaca came to Havana in June 1681 . In the port there he met Epifanio de Moirans, who had come from Cayenne via Cumaná . Both felt their meeting as a " providence of God" because they were inspired by the same cause. They preached against the slave trade and slavery:

  1. All human beings are naturally free.
  2. The slave trade is an injustice and a sin .
  3. Owning slaves is an injustice and a sin.
  4. The slave owners are therefore obliged to release their slaves before their conscience.
  5. For the sake of justice, they are obliged to compensate the slaves for the value of their work, i.e. to pay the wages.

Accordingly, they refused slaveholders in the confession , the absolution and locked them also from the other sacraments from. They also wrote memoranda on their concerns. Jaca wrote the statement intended for the king on the freedom of negroes and their descendants, in the state of the pagans and later as Christians ( Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios, en estado de paganos y después ya cristianos ), based on the Is dated August 28, 1681 and which he also revised afterwards. In the resolution, he refutes the reasons put forward to justify slavery, on the one hand from natural law , international law and the Bible , and on the other hand with theological arguments. In doing so, he draws on a wealth of quotes from philosophers and theologians from both antiquity ( Aristotle , Augustine ) and modern times (Tomás de Mercado, Francisco de Vitoria , Domingo de Soto , Luis de Molina and Juan de Solórzano).

With their sermons and writings, Jaca and Moirans aroused resistance from the slave owners and from parts of the church hierarchy . They were accused of calling for a riot and were arrested on January 17, 1682 by order of the governor, first in the Hospital de San Juan de Dios in Havana, then in the fortress Fuerza Vieja in Havana. It is noteworthy that they were not asked to withdraw their statements.

Jaca and Moirans also fought for their cause during their imprisonment. You wrote to the Consejo de Indias and the Roman Inquisition , among others . A list of the manuscripts they worked on during their imprisonment has been preserved and testifies to their undiminished productivity.

The authorities in Havana decided to continue the investigation in Spain. Upon arriving in Cadiz in September 1682, Jaca and Moirans sent a report to Propaganda Fide about the horrors of slavery . On October 10, 1682, the General Congregation of Propaganda Fide (which usually met in the presence of the Pope ) first discussed the two Capuchins' submissions. These were meanwhile housed in changing convents of their order, which they were not allowed to leave. The proceedings initiated against them were determined by a tug-of-war between the royal authorities (who wanted to proceed according to state law) and the papal ambassadors (who insisted that the two, as religious, be subject to ecclesiastical jurisdiction). It ended with her release in 1683. This was due not least to the fact that numerous clerics had campaigned for Jaca and Moirans and - to the displeasure of their opponents - caused their "case" to remain public.

In the spring of 1685 Jaca and Moirans were able to present their concerns to the Roman Curia . They asked to condemn 11 sentences that condemned the slave trade and slavery. This happened: by a decree of March 20, 1686, the Roman Inquisition condemned these 11 sentences (with minor restrictions) - a milestone.

However, the slave owners ensured that in the colonies, i.e. where it mattered, the Inquisition's condemnation of slavery remained almost without consequences. Instead, the practice of slavery continued. The Spanish authorities managed to prevent the "poisonous" writings of Jaca and Moirans from being spread. They remained under lock and key in the Archivo General de Indias . Jaca and Moirans had asked to return to the mission in America. But they were denied this wish. A letter from Jaca dated October 23, 1689 is his last known sign of life.

Afterlife

Francisco José de Jacas Resolución was the most resolute and argumentatively strongest indictment against slavery to date. Historian Thomas Weller called Epifanio de Moirans and Francisco José de Jaca a "two-man movement" at the beginning of the struggle for the abolition of slavery. Their biographies and their work, which had fallen into oblivion, have been "rediscovered" and intensively researched by Spanish and Latin American historians and theologians since the late 1970s, above all through the dissertation of José Tomás López García from 1982 and by the Capuchin Miguel Anxo Pena González.

Fonts

  • Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios, en estado de paganos y después ya cristianos. La primera condena de la esclavitud en el pensamiento hispano . Historical-critical edition by Miguel Anxo Pena González (= Corpus Hispanorum de Pace, Second Series, Vol. 11). Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), Madrid 2002, ISBN 84-00-08115-3 (attached: Letters and reports from Jaca to King Charles II, to the Consejo de Indias, to the Roman Inquisition, to Propaganda Fide and to the Nuncio in Spain).

literature

  • José Tomás López García: Dos defensores de los esclavos negros en el siglo XVII, Francisco José de Jaca y Epifanio de Moirans (= Biblioteca Corpozulia, vol. 3). Universidad Católica Andrés Bello, Caracas 1982.
  • Miguel Anxo Pena González: Un autor singular y desconocido en el pensamiento hispano . In: Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios, en estado de paganos y después ya cristianos . Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), Madrid 2002, pp. XXIII-XCVIII.
  • Miguel Anxo Pena González: Francisco José de Jaca. La primera propuesta abolicionista de la esclavitud en el pensamiento hispano . Universidad Pontificia, Salamanca 2003, ISBN 84-7299-551-8 .

Web link

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ José Tomás López García: Dos defensores de los esclavos negros en el siglo XVII, Francisco José de Jaca y Epifanio de Moirans . Universidad Católica Andrés Bello, Caracas 1982, p. 32.
  2. ^ Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, p. XXIV.
  3. ↑ a b Carmen José Alejos-Grau: Francisco José de Jaca. "Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios, en estado de paganos y después ya cristianos" . In: Anuario Historia de la Iglesia , ISSN  1133-0104 , vol. 13 (2004), pp. 493-494, here p. 493.
  4. ↑ Epifanio de Moirans: Servi liberi seu naturalis mancipiorum libertatis iusta defensio , quoted from José Tomás López García: Dos defensores de los esclavos negros en el siglo XVII, Francisco José de Jaca y Epifanio de Moirans , p. 34.
  5. ↑ José Tomás López García: Dos defensores de los esclavos negros en el siglo XVII, Francisco José de Jaca y Epifanio de Moirans , p. 35.
  6. ↑ Josep Ignasi Saranyana (Ed.): Teología en América Latina , Vol. 1: Carmen José Alejos Grau, Elisa Luque Alcaide and others: Desde los orígenes a la Guerra de Sucesión 1493-1715 . Vervuert, Frankfurt am Main 1999, ISBN 3-89354-113-6 . Pp. 304-307.
  7. ^ A b Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, p. XXIX.
  8. ^ Miguel Anxo Pena: Epifanio de Moirans (1644-1689). Misionero capuchino y antiesclavista . In: Collectanea Franciscana , Vol. 74 (2004), pp. 111-145, here p. 116.
  9. ^ Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, p. 184.
  10. ^ Relación de Francisco José de Jaca al Santo Oficio . In: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, pp. 88-96.
  11. ↑ José Tomás López García: Dos defensores de los esclavos negros en el siglo XVII, Francisco José de Jaca y Epifanio de Moirans , p. 38.
  12. ^ Relación de Francisco José de Jaca a Propaganda Fide . In: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, pp. 98-105.
  13. ^ Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, p. XXXI.
  14. ↑ Leví Marrero: Cuba. Economía y sociedad . Vol. 5: El Siglo XVII , Part III. Playor, Madrid 1976, ISBN 84-359-0128-9 , pp. 185-188.
  15. ^ Miguel Anxo Pena: Epifanio de Moirans (1644-1689). Misionero capuchino y antiesclavista . In: Collectanea Franciscana , Vol. 74 (2004), pp. 111-145, here p. 123.
  16. ↑ a b José Tomás López García: Dos defensores de los esclavos negros en el siglo XVII, Francisco José de Jaca y Epifanio de Moirans , p. 44.
  17. ^ Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, p. XXXVII.
  18. ↑ Jesús María García Añoveros: Foreword to Francisco José de Jaca: Resolución sobre la libertad de los negros y sus originarios . Madrid 2002, pp. XV – XVII, here p. XVII.
  19. ↑ Stefanie Hardick: Unfair trade . In: leibniz , ISSN  2192-7847 , 2018, No. 7: Arbeit , pp. 38–44, here p. 40.
personal data
SURNAME Jaca, Francisco José de
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Capuchin monk and missionary
DATE OF BIRTH 1645
PLACE OF BIRTH Aragon , Spain
DATE OF DEATH 1690