El sentido de De los nombres de Cristo de fray Luis de León (y una posible fuente)

Abstract

It is extremely interesting that De los nombres de Cristo is the only one of Fray Luis de Leon's biblical commentaries in which he made extensive use of allegorical interpretation. It was above all his insistence on the priority of the literal meaning of the Hebrew text of the Bible that led to his arrest by the Inquisition in 1572. In this article I propose that De los nombres de Cristo, which Fray Luis began writing in jail, was above all his self-defense against the charges brought against him by his enemies. The book's principal theme is in fact not the names of Christ but (1) the meaning of history, and (2) justice and the proper exercise of power. I suggest that Fray Luis's development of these themes was inspired by his reading of Samuel Usque's Consolaçam ás tribulaçoens de Israel (1533).