Domingo de Soto (1494 – 15 November 1560) was a Spanish Dominican priest and Scholastic theologian and naturalist born in

Segovia Segovia ( , , ) is a city in the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Castile and León, Spain. It is the capital and most populated municipality of the Province of Segovia. Segovia is located in the Meseta central, Inner Pl ...

(

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

), and died in

Salamanca Salamanca () is a Municipality of Spain, municipality and city in Spain, capital of the Province of Salamanca, province of the same name, located in the autonomous community of Castile and León. It is located in the Campo Charro comarca, in the ...

(

), at the age of 66. He is best known as one of the founders of international law and of the Spanish Thomistic philosophical and theological movement known as the

School of Salamanca The School of Salamanca () was an intellectual movement of 16th-century and 17th-century Iberian Scholasticism, Scholastic theology, theologians rooted in the intellectual and pedagogical work of Francisco de Vitoria. From the beginning of the ...

. He is also known for his contributions to mechanical physics: His works on

mechanics Mechanics () is the area of physics concerned with the relationships between force, matter, and motion among Physical object, physical objects. Forces applied to objects may result in Displacement (vector), displacements, which are changes of ...

and gravity, which he presented in his book "''Physicorum Aristotelis quaestiones''", in 1551, served as the basis for

Galileo Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642), commonly referred to as Galileo Galilei ( , , ) or mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a poly ...

's and

Isaac Newton Sir Isaac Newton () was an English polymath active as a mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author. Newton was a key figure in the Scientific Revolution and the Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment that followed ...

studies.

Biography

De Soto was born in

in 1494. He studied philosophy and theology at the Universities of Alcalá and

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, and obtained a chair in philosophy at Alcalá in 1520. Soto resigned from this post suddenly and headed for the

abbey of Montserrat Santa Maria de Montserrat () is an abbey of the Order of Saint Benedict located on the mountain of Montserrat in Monistrol de Montserrat, Catalonia, Spain. It is notable for enshrining the image of the Virgin of Montserrat. The monastery was fou ...

, hoping to join the

Benedictines The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly Christian mysticism, contemplative Christian monasticism, monastic Religious order (Catholic), order of the Catholic Church for men and f ...

, but he was instead led to the

Dominicans Dominicans () also known as Quisqueyans () are an ethnic group, ethno-nationality, national people, a people of shared ancestry and culture, who have ancestral roots in the Dominican Republic. The Dominican ethnic group was born out of a fusio ...

, entering their community at San Pablo de Burgos in 1524 and becoming professor of dialectics at their Segovia house of studies in 1525. Appointed to the Dominican chair in theology at Salamanca in 1532, he was promoted to the principal chair in 1552, as successor to

Melchor Cano Melchor Cano (1509? – 30 September 1560) was a Spanish Scholastic theologian. Cano's most important theological work was his posthumously published ''De locis theologicis'' (Salamanca, 1563), a major contribution to the New Scholasticism of ...

. From his earliest days in the university classroom, Soto undertook an attack on the ''via moderna'' and pressed for a revival of

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

. At

he collaborated with

Francisco de Vitoria Francisco de Vitoria ( – 12 August 1546; also known as Francisco de Victoria) was a Spanish Roman Catholic philosopher, theologian, and jurist of Renaissance Spain. He is the founder of the tradition in philosophy known as the School of Sala ...

and Cano in their methodological reforms and on the development of what came to be known as positive or

fundamental theology Fundamental theology, in John Hardon's ''Modern Catholic Dictionary'', is a "branch of theology which establishes the fact that God has made a supernatural revelation and established the Church, founded by Christ, as its divinely authorized custod ...

. Sent as imperial theologian to the

Council of Trent The Council of Trent (), held between 1545 and 1563 in Trent (or Trento), now in northern Italy, was the 19th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. Prompted by the Protestant Reformation at the time, it has been described as the "most ...

by the emperor

Charles V Charles V may refer to: Kings and Emperors * Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor (1500–1558) * Charles V of Naples (1661–1700), better known as Charles II of Spain * Charles V of France (1338–1380), called the Wise Others * Charles V, Duke ...

, Soto soon distinguished himself for his learning and piety (1545–1547). Steering the council away from compromise with the Protestants, he served as one of the principal defenders of tradition on such key questions as

original sin Original sin () in Christian theology refers to the condition of sinfulness that all humans share, which is inherited from Adam and Eve due to the Fall of man, Fall, involving the loss of original righteousness and the distortion of the Image ...

predestination Predestination, in theology, is the doctrine that all events have been willed by God, usually with reference to the eventual fate of the individual soul. Explanations of predestination often seek to address the paradox of free will, whereby Go ...

, justification, the scriptural canon, and the authority of the

Vulgate Bible The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Roman Church. Later, of his own initia ...

. In 1547, when the council was interrupted, Soto was appointed confessor and spiritual adviser to Charles V, a post he fulfilled for two years. Immensely pleased by Soto, Charles offered him the bishopric of Segovia. Soto refused the honor and in 1550 returned to teaching at Salamanca. That same year he took part in the celebrated debate held at Valladolid on the treatment of New World natives, joining his Dominican brethren in a thorough condemnation of the idea that the Indians were inferior beings worthy of

enslavement Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...

. Soto’s chief opponent in this controversy was

Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda (1490 – 17 November 1573) was a Spanish humanist, philosopher, and theologian of the Spanish Renaissance. He is mainly known for his participation in a famous debate with Bartolomé de las Casas in Valladolid, Spai ...

, chaplain and official chronicler to Emperor Charles V. Sepúlveda’s defeat at the hands of Soto and other Dominicans led to the enactment of laws protecting the rights of native peoples in the New World. In addition to producing such influential philosophical and theological works as the ''Summulae'' (1529), a manual of

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the study of deductively valid inferences or logical truths. It examines how conclusions follow from premises based on the structure o ...

; ''De natura et gratia'' (1547), a polemic against Protestant

soteriology Soteriology (; ' "salvation" from wikt:σωτήρ, σωτήρ ' "savior, preserver" and wikt:λόγος, λόγος ' "study" or "word") is the study of Doctrine, religious doctrines of salvation. Salvation theory occupies a place of special sign ...

; and his commentaries on Aristotle (1543 and 1545), on

Paul Paul may refer to: People * Paul (given name), a given name, including a list of people * Paul (surname), a list of people * Paul the Apostle, an apostle who wrote many of the books of the New Testament * Ray Hildebrand, half of the singing duo ...

epistle to the Romans The Epistle to the Romans is the sixth book in the New Testament, and the longest of the thirteen Pauline epistles. Biblical scholars agree that it was composed by Paul the Apostle to explain that Salvation (Christianity), salvation is offered ...

(1550), and on

Peter Lombard Peter Lombard (also Peter the Lombard, Pierre Lombard or Petrus Lombardus; 1096 – 21/22 August 1160) was an Italian scholasticism, scholastic theologian, Bishop of Paris, and author of ''Sentences, Four Books of Sentences'' which became the s ...

's ''

Sentences The ''Sentences'' (. ) is a compendium of Christian theology written by Peter Lombard around 1150. It was the most important religious textbook of the Middle Ages. Background The sentence genre emerged from works like Prosper of Aquitaine's ...

'' (1557), Soto contributed significantly to the development of political and legal theory, principally through his ''De iustitia et iure'' (1553), his most important jurisprudential work, in which he proposed that the ordinance of reason (''rationis ordinatio'') was the mechanism by which laws could be evaluated. He also took the view that international law (

jus gentium In Roman law and legal traditions influenced by it, ''ius gentium'' or ''jus gentium'' (Latin for "law of nations" or "law of peoples") is the law that applies to all ''gentes'' ("peoples" or "nations"). It was an early form of international law, ...

) was a part of the law of specific communities (later termed

positive law Positive laws () are human-made laws that oblige or specify an action. Positive law also describes the establishment of specific rights for an individual or group. Etymologically, the name derives from the verb ''to posit''. The concept of posit ...

) rather than a moral or natural law. True to the

school of Salamanca The School of Salamanca () was an intellectual movement of 16th-century and 17th-century Iberian Scholasticism, Scholastic theology, theologians rooted in the intellectual and pedagogical work of Francisco de Vitoria. From the beginning of the ...

's predilection for ethical questions and to its conviction that theology should be used to create a Christian moral order based on

natural law Natural law (, ) is a Philosophy, philosophical and legal theory that posits the existence of a set of inherent laws derived from nature and universal moral principles, which are discoverable through reason. In ethics, natural law theory asserts ...

, Soto also devoted attention to the issue of

poverty Poverty is a state or condition in which an individual lacks the financial resources and essentials for a basic standard of living. Poverty can have diverse Biophysical environmen ...

, producing a landmark study, ''Deliberatio in causa pauperum'' (1545), and devising ways to feed and lodge the poorer students at Salamanca. Like his fellow Spanish Dominicans Vitoria and Cano, Soto contributed substantially to the reinvigoration of Roman Catholicism in the sixteenth century by strengthening and broadening the theological curriculum, by stressing the need for continuity with the scholastic tradition (especially with

Thomism Thomism is the philosophical and theological school which arose as a legacy of the work and thought of Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), the Dominican philosopher, theologian, and Doctor of the Church. In philosophy, Thomas's disputed ques ...

), and by actively seeking

social justice Social justice is justice in relation to the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society where individuals' rights are recognized and protected. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has of ...

. Soto died in

on 15 November 1560.

Thought

Usury

De Soto was concerned about the complexity that had emerged from unclear moral standards of

usury Usury () is the practice of making loans that are seen as unfairly enriching the lender. The term may be used in a moral sense—condemning taking advantage of others' misfortunes—or in a legal sense, where an interest rate is charged in e ...

. He complained that the merchants had invented convoluted schemes in order to meet the conflicting demands of church leaders. His position should be seen within the background of his Dominican background and historical context. De Soto was involved in an active debate in the medieval era on the sterility of money and the requirements of

given this sterility. His rationale on interest is explained by Langholm. Woods and D'Emic characterize de Soto's attitude toward

in significantly different ways. D'Emic reports that De Soto thought voluntary contributions given from borrower to lender in gratitude were acceptable, but strictly forbid the lender from pressuring the borrower. He also asserts that De Soto thought lenders were permitted to hope for such contributions along with other motives of benevolence and friendship, but regarded the sole motivation of financial gain as immoral "mental usury". Woods, on the other hand, reports that De Soto did not believe Christ had declared usury to be sinful at all, and did not believe that had anything to do with lending at interest.

Mechanics

In 1551, Domingo de Soto became the first to state that a body in

free fall In classical mechanics, free fall is any motion of a physical object, body where gravity is the only force acting upon it. A freely falling object may not necessarily be falling down in the vertical direction. If the common definition of the word ...

accelerates uniformly and that this acceleration is caused by the mass of the Earth This key concept of physics was essential for the later studies of gravity by

and

Newton Newton most commonly refers to: * Isaac Newton (1642–1726/1727), English scientist * Newton (unit), SI unit of force named after Isaac Newton Newton may also refer to: People * Newton (surname), including a list of people with the surname * ...

. Galileo credited De Soto as his inspiration and source of his studies, but

despite having read

Galileo Galilei Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642), commonly referred to as Galileo Galilei ( , , ) or mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a poly ...

never mentioned him. In the 20th century,

Pierre Duhem Pierre Maurice Marie Duhem (; 9 June 1861 – 14 September 1916) was a French theoretical physicist who made significant contributions to thermodynamics, hydrodynamics, and the theory of Elasticity (physics), elasticity. Duhem was also a prolif ...

credited him with important achievements in dynamics and viewed his work as a forerunner of modern mechanics.

Law

In 1556, Soto published a treatise on law, ''De Justitia and Jure'' (''Justice and the Law''), that is considered a foundational text in the general theory of law, and international law, in particular. This opus was also considered as one of the first attempt of systematisation of Contract Law, even if this characteristic must be reevaluated in light of previous works of german legal thinkers like

Matthew of Kraków Matthew of Kraków (c. 1335 – 5 March 1410) was a German- Polish scholar and priest of the fourteenth century. Early life He was born in Kraków, the son of a German immigrant town-clerk, but the view, once generally held, that he was desce ...

and . More conservative than the later members of the

, Soto believed that, although contractual freedom stemed from

does indeed exists, it must been more supervised by the authorities, which are attentive to public interests. They can, for example, restrict free management of people's goods, due to immaturity, ill or insanity, or scrupulously apply the prohibition of

. Opposed like

to any contractual consensualism, Soto was criticized by

Leonardus Lessius Lenaert Leys, better known as Leonardus Lessius (1 October 1554 in Brecht - 15 January 1623, in Leuven) was a Brabant jurist, theologian, economist from the Jesuit order. Nicknamed the "oracle of the Low Countries", figurehead of the School o ...

and

Luis de Molina Luis de Molina (29 September 1535 – 12 October 1600) was a Spanish Jesuit Catholic priest, jurist, economist and theologian renowned for his contributions to philosophy and economics within the framework of the second scholasticism. A ...

. Like his teacher

, Soto helped to provide a modern insight to the Spanish conquests in the New World, helping to build the concept of people's rights, including the right to private property of the native Americans. Soto is also famous for having defended the rights of the legitimate poor, based on

, against imperial and urban policies restricting access to poor relief and secularizing charities, as advocated by

Juan Luis Vives Juan Luis Vives y March (; ; ; ; 6 March 6 May 1540) was a Spaniards, Spanish (Valencian people, Valencian) scholar and Renaissance humanist who spent most of his adult life in the southern Habsburg Netherlands. His beliefs on the soul, insigh ...

. For him, the rich and the poor are bound in a symbiotic relation of mutual necessity, inasmuch as the second need the material support of the first to survive but the first need also the second to apply

charity Charity may refer to: Common meanings * Charitable organization or charity, a non-profit organization whose primary objectives are philanthropy and social well-being of persons * Charity (practice), the practice of being benevolent, giving and sha ...

and get the salvation of their souls.

Works

*''Summulae'', 1529. (A manual of logic.) *''De ratione tegendi et detegendi secretum'', 1541
''In dialecticam Aristotelis commentarii''
1544 *''In VIII libros physicorum'', 1545 (An influential commentary on Aristotle's ''Physics''.) *''Deliberacion en la causa de los pobres'', 1545 *''De natura et gratia libri III'', 1547 (A treatise on original sin and grace, written from a Thomistic point of view.) *''Comment. in Ep. ad Romanos'', 1550 *''In IV sent. libros comment.'' 1555-6. *''De justitia et jure libri X'', 1556 (A treatise on law.) * Jaime Brufau Prats and Sixto Sanchez-Lauro, eds. Domingo de Soto, OP., ''Relecciones y opúsculos'' (Salamanca, Editorial San Esteban, 2011).

Notes

References

* * * * Decock, W. (ed.), Schwartz D. (introd.), Possemiers, J., Lasquety-Reyes (transl.).
Domingo de Soto: Deliberation on the Cause of the Poor
', CLP Academic. ISBN 978-1-949-01109-8 * * * * * * * * *

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Soto, Domingo de 1494 births 1560 deaths People from Segovia Catholic philosophers 16th-century Spanish Roman Catholic theologians Spanish Dominicans 16th-century Spanish Roman Catholic priests Participants in the Council of Trent 16th-century Spanish male writers Latin commentators on Aristotle Mercantilists Academic staff of the University of Salamanca 16th-century writers in Latin 16th-century Spanish jurists 16th-century Spanish philosophers School of Salamanca Spanish scientists Spanish theologians