juan gines de sepulveda

Juan Gins de Seplveda (1494 - 1573) was a Spanish philosopher and theologian. He was the adversary of Bartolom de las Casas in the Valladolid Controversy in 1550. The Valladolid Controversy was organized by king Charles V (grandson of Ferdinand and Isabell) to give an answer to two question whether the Native Americans were humans or not. Seplvada defended the position of the colonists. According to him the natives should not be treated as humans, but as natural slaves. "Those whose condition is such that their function is the use of their bodies and nothing better can be expected of them, those, I say, are slaves of nature. It is better for them to be ruled thus." He said the natives are "as children to parents, as women are to men, as cruel people are from mild people". He wrote this in Tratado Sobre Las Justas Causas de La Guerra (The Just Causes for War among the Indians). He based most of his ideas on Aristotle's "Politics" and the Bible, which says "He who is stupid will serve the wise man." (Proverbs 11:29). Las Casas also based his ideas on the Bible. According to Las Casas Jesus had power over all people in the world, especially those who never heard of Christianity. Seplveda and Las Casas agreed with the fact that the natives shouldn't be ruled by their own laws. Las Casas thought they should be governed just like any other people in Spain, while Seplveda thought they should become slaves. Nowadays Seplveda's opinions would be considered highly racist, though in the 16th century they weren't extraordinary. At the end of the debate, Charles V adopted Las Casas' opinion, but many of the atrocities in the Americas continued. Seplveda translated several of Aristotle's works into Latin (e.g. Parva naturalia 1522, Politics = De re publica 1548).

Juan Gines De Sepulveda

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