International Journal of Language & Literature

Expanding narratives about economic practices in the Middle Ages from the perspective of Thomas Aquinas
Thiago Martins Prado, Pedro Theobald

Abstract
Departing from Saint Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologica and restricting itself to his observations regarding economic conduct, the purpose of this paper is to verify how the need to suppress the interpretive multiplicity of biblical narratives does not result in perfect correspondence, but creates new dimensions and concepts necessary for the continuity of the narration of the world in which Aquinas sees himself inserted and also as creator (even if he does not describe himself as such). Although he requires interpretive homogeneity, Aquinas inaugurates a different world (with necessary discussions), and the ways of translating this world emerge from living with the interpretive multiplicity of sacred narratives and their commentators. Concentrating on the moral ordering of commerce advocated by Aquinas, it is stated that, as the reverse effect of stanching interpretation, the Summa Theologica motivated the Christian imaginary in narratives such as Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, so as to broaden the reflection on the categories of sinners for money, as well as it provided subsidies for the construction of anti-models in part of the framed narratives of Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, which are filled with misers, simoniacs and fraudsters.

Full Text: PDF      DOI: 10.15640/ijll.v11n1a2