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Ecclesiasticae rhetoricae, sive de ratione concionandi libri sex . . . Authore R.P.F. Ludovico Granatensi, sacrae Theologiae professore, monacho Dominicano (Lisbon: Antonio Ribeiro, at the expense of João de Espanha, 1576) .

Luis de Granada, O.P. (1504-1588), entered the Order at Santa Cruz, and thereafter lived in the convents of Cordoba, Valladolid and Seville. In 1556 he became Provincial of the Order in Portugal. He was an influential spiritual writer (see catalogue n° 56, n° 77, n° 78, n° 79, n° 80 and n° 81), who based his teaching on the doctrines of his fellow Dominicans, Catherine of Siena, Savonarola, John Tauler, and Thomas Aquinas.

Through the diligent efforts of Melchior Cano (see catalogue n° 53)—a true "hound of God"—some writings by Luis were put on the Index of Prohibited Books. Among other things, Cano objected to Luis' teaching that all Christians should become Christlike. Luis was later exonerated by his confrères, and was named a Master of Sacred Theology in the Order in 1562.

This is the first edition of the Ecclesiastical Rhetoric, a new type of preaching manual, similar in overall conception to Erasmus's Ecclesiastes (1534). Like Erasmus, Luis applies the principles of ancient eloquence to Christian preaching; his work is as different from medieval Dominican preaching manuals as Renaissance theories of topical invention are from medieval school dialectic. Yet Luis' ideal of wisdom and eloquence had eminent Christian authority: Augustine's De doctrina christiana. Following Augustine, Luis subordinated the beauty of "words" to the truth of "realities" in persuasion.

The printer Antonio Ribeiro (active 1574-1590) published many books by friars of the different orders.

References: Anselmo 267-68 no 923; Llaneza 4: 1 no 2842; Quétif-Échard 2/1: 285a-91b.

Catalogue No. 55
Call Number: Rare Books BV 4209 .L968e      Catalog Record

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