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Hi,

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I'm Peter Adamson and you're listening to the History

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of Philosophy podcast brought to you with the support

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of the Philosophy Department at King's College London and

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the LMU in Munich, online at

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historyofphilosophy.net. Today's

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episode will be an interview about

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the Reformation in Spain with Andres

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Mespa, who is the academic dean

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at Seville Theological Seminary. And

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he also goes by Andrew or Andy,

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because he's actually from the United States, despite

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that introduction. So hello, Andy. Hi,

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Peter. Really nice to be with you.

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Thank you for joining us. We are going to

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be talking about, as I just said, a kind

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of surprising subject, which is the Reformation

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in Spain and even Protestantism in Spain.

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And as I said to you before, when we were

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talking about this, I was

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surprised that there's anything

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to discuss here, because obviously we think

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of Spain as a Catholic country, and

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we probably think that this church authorities

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did a pretty good job of stopping

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Protestantism from really getting much of a foothold

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in Spain. So can you say

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something about why there is anything

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for you to work on? Yeah,

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that is a great question. And I

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often forget that because I kind of

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live in this day by day. I'm always

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reading their works and studying this out. So

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I forget how surprising it is for people

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to find out that there were Protestants in

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Spain, that there are Protestants in Spain. And

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just to maybe illustrate that, Martin

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Luther, just one reformer, we have

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more of his works than all

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of the Spanish reformers combined. So

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there isn't a ton to work with. Yeah,

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there is a bit of a problem that we have. In fact,

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even... even just we're talking about the

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Spanish Reformation, just defining

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the limits of exactly what we're talking

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about, who we're talking about. There

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were Christian humanists who didn't really like

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the Roman Catholic Church. Do

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we count them as Spanish Protestants or

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not? What do we

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mean by the word Spain? Spain

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today is pretty isolated, restricted

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to the peninsula, but it wasn't in

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the 16th century. The Low Countries, the

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Southern Half of Italy, that was also

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Spain. We have

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this kind of unique phenomenon called

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the Nicodemite phenomenon of people

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who publicly were Roman Catholics,

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but privately were Protestants. That's

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a well-documented phenomenon. You

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also have people riding from outside of

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Spanish borders, maybe from Germany or France

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or England, but they are Spaniards. So

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how do you work through that? They ran

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away from the Inquisition or they became Protestant

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and they're at travel. What do we do

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with that? So I take

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a pretty broad definition to

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Spanish Protestantism. If

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I took a narrow one, we probably wouldn't be

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able to teach the courses here that we teach,

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but so I take a broad definition of

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Protestants who were from Spain or

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who lived in Spain, and

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they would have continued to live in

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Spain if they had the chance. So

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that's kind of the definition that I put

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on it. So if we take this definition

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of Spanish Protestantism, we have three

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sources that we use to get

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information. The first one is

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actually the Inquisition documents. So they kept

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meticulous documents. I mean, it's word for

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word. It's like a

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modern stenographer. It's, you know, this

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person said this and then this person said this, and

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you really feel like you're in a conversation when you

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read them. We have a few

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documents that were written in Spain by

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Spanish Protestants, not necessarily

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openly, but maybe subtly

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writing as Protestants, but most

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of our material comes from people who

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fled Spain, and then they... imagine

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not just theological classics but philosophical

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classics as well and in his

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writings they come out and

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he uses them. He talks about

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Plato, he talks about Aristotle, he

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talks about all the political philosophers.

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So they were generally speaking pretty

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well informed on let's say the

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layout of the philosophical land in

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16th century. And are they actually

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using philosophical sources or arguments to

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argue against Catholicism? That's

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a good question. I mean what separates

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Protestants from Roman Catholics isn't only

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philosophy. I mean there are a lot

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of things for example the debate over

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justification that's kind of a linguistic

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debate. There are other debates that

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are more historical such as you

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know the the canon or how many

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sacraments there are. Other debates are

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based like on piety you know how do

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you use images, what about Mary. But

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there are some philosophical debates

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that end up separating Protestants

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from Roman Catholics. And

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one of the more famous

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debates is on the Eucharist. Actually

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kind of a funny story. I guess

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it's funny just because he was so young when it

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happened but there's a Spaniard. I think he was seven

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years old. He went to

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a public lecture at a university and

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there the lecturer he was

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talking about how it's impossible for a

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substance to be present at two different places at

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the same time. And he

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was applying that even to a Eucharist

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or he was receiving questions. Okay you're

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saying this professor but what about the

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Eucharist? And he would not answer the

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question on you know if this was

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a philosophical impossibility. But that planted a

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thought in his mind on the philosophical,

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I don't know what you want

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to call it, the philosophical difficulty of

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the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation. And

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later on as he grew up that

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seed started to germinate and I think

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it was his early 20s he ended

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up fleeing Spain because he said philosophically

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this just doesn't make sense. And this

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is just one example of many. in

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which they're using philosophy, especially this issue

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of the relation between substance and accidents,

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applying it to the Eucharist, and then

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really coming up with a difficulty. The

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problem there, I guess, is that the body of

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Christ is a substance and it would have to be in

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two different places at the same time because it's in two

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different Eucharistic hosts. Exactly. And those

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seven-year-old kids are thinking,

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this doesn't make any sense. Exactly, yeah.

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Or just thinking, answer the question, man.

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It's a good question. Yeah.

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Well, see, if he were to answer it, he

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could get in big trouble. I mean, it's that

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issue where he wants to be, let's

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say externally, he has to say the right

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answer because if he doesn't, he can get

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in big trouble. But he also, I mean,

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he's a philosopher, this university lecturer, he's a

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philosopher, and he has to be able to

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look at himself in the mirror. And I can imagine

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him saying, I don't know what

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to do because if I say a substance

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can be in two different places at the same

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time and that the Eucharist is completely philosophically justifiable,

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I'm not going to be able to put up with

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myself. But if I deny it, I'm

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going to get in trouble. The

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hazard of living in miracles. Right.

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Okay. Something else you mentioned is that

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they were often trained in humanism. So

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they've gone through this classic kind

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of educational program that we've come to

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expect in the 15th and especially now

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16th centuries, where people are learning Greek

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as well as Latin, sometimes even learning

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Hebrew, as well as Greek and Latin. What

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is their attitude towards humanism in general?

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And maybe in particular, do they

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have a stance, the Spanish Protestants, on

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the extremely controversial question of how to

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apply humanist philology to the Bible? A

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large number of them were well trained

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in humanism. A person comes to my

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mind is his name is Francisco Dancinas.

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And he was actually the first one

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to translate the Bible into Spanish from

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Greek. And he actually did

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that living in Philip Melanchthon's house. He lived

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with him. And Philip encouraged

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him and ended up translating. Interesting

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story, Francisco hand delivered the first edition

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of the Bible. That

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really was how the Roman Catholic Church

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has seen itself, especially since the high

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Middle Ages, as it's no longer two

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swords. It's one ring to rule them

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all. They had complete total control over

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everything, and the secular powers were more

18:12

or less like puppets, you know, the

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little pawns that the pope could move

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as he wanted to because he had

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the power to do so. And

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as I thought about this, it's very

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interesting to see the parallels between the

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kind of, let's say, the Roman Catholic

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approach to authority and Protestant approach to

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authority, and see how that actually plays out.

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There is a coherent parallel between how

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they understand authority and how they understand

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the Eucharist, interestingly enough. So, you know,

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a Roman Catholic, the way that they

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understand the Eucharist philosophically

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is that there really is no bread

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at a substantial level after the words

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of consecration are said, maybe

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at an accidental level, sure, but at

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a substantial level, it's actually no longer

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bread. It's actually the body of Christ.

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And that's their view of politics. Maybe

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let's say at an accidental level, there may happen

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to be kings, there may happen to be princes

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and governors, but at a substantial level, what's

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there is the church. It's the church authority. Where

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did you go to a Protestant understanding of these two

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concepts? Protestants were much more open

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to kind of this two-sword idea. Maybe

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we shouldn't call it two swords, but

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two realities, a political reality and a

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spiritual reality. That actually

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maps over quite nicely onto their understanding of

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the Eucharist, where they weren't denying

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the substantial existence of either of them. They

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were both present, but they were both there

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present in their own way. And

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so when we go to the Spanish

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Protestants, they were understanding this similarly

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that they were upholding

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the reality, the fact of the

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political entity, but they were also

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upholding the reality of a church

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entity. The way that they

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put these two things together was they reversed

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what the Roman Catholic Church was saying. So

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the Roman Catholic Church was putting the church

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above the state and really just dissolving

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the state.