LATE SPANISH DOCTORS ON USURY, AND THE EVOLVING SCHOLASTIC TRADITION

Abstract

The scholastic intellectual tradition was the dominant scientific paradigm for nearly five centuries in western Europe. That the economic issues of interest to these scholars were similar throughout the period is undisputable, but were the individual views on these issues also similar? This is a pertinent question, upon which an evaluation of the evolution of this intellectual tradition, which often has been considered as monolithic, can be based.This paper focuses on the analysis of the so-called “natural law case” against usury, and tracks how the lines of intellectual reasoning subtly evolved between early and late scholastics. While the issues, methods, and purposes of scholastic thought remained the same in this period, there also was a systematic evolution within this tradition that makes the essence of the scholastic doctrines conformable to economic realities.