José Luis Egío
Departamento Filosofía y Sociedad, UCM (jegio@ucm.es; ORCID: 0000-0002-9256- 8490).
Isotta Nogarola and Teresa of Cartagena. Two female attempts to enter the male Republic of letters through the narrow door of theology
Abstract: This article offers a comparative perspective on two of the main theological-philosophical works written by women in the cultural context of the Christian Latin Mediterranean in the mid-fifteenth century: the Latin contentio De Pari aut Impari Evae atque Adae Peccato, written by the Veronese humanist Isotta Nogarola (1418-66) in 1451, and the treatise Admiraçion operum Dey, written around 1475 by Teresa de Cartagena, a nun from Burgos (c. 1425- c. 1482). The two works would seem, at first sight, to be in opposition, since Nogarola writes with the intention of exonerating the involuntary and naturally ignorant Eve from responsibility for original sin, while Cartagena tries, on the other hand, to defend women’s capacity for reasoning and writing when their nature – more limited intellectually than that of the male – receives the supernatural help of the omnipotent God. However, despite this apparent difference, both authors coincide in trying to assert the weight of women’s voices in a field of knowledge as complex and guarded as theology. Drawing on a literal exegesis of the Bible (against the most misogynist exegetes) and relying on authors (Church Fathers, scholastic thinkers) and patriarchal ideas commonly assumed as authorities by the viri probi of their time, Nogarola and Cartagena embark on a path of concessions to gain access to the masculine Republic of letters. Amidst apologies for their boldness as authors and apparent concessions to patriarchal tradition, a series of philogynist arguments expressed with great rhetorical subtlety find their way into Nogarola’s and Cartagena’s writings.
Keywords: Querelle des femmes; Isotta Nogarola; Teresa de Cartagena; Original Sin; Biblical Exegesis