Forms and ambiguity of poverty in Andrés Pérez de Rivas from isolation and barbarie to civilization

Abstract

Andrés Pérez de Rivas’ books consider poverty from four perspectives: economic poverty; isolation and barbarism; ignorance of the Christian faith and holy poverty. In the case of Native Americans, in no case does poverty appear as injustice or as the result of
injustice. There is no complaint or criticism of social content. He is speaking of a vulnerable, unprotected being and, therefore, of a minor, a person in need of help, a dependent. What if there is a project to overcome this situation of precariousness, barbarism, and paganism; a project that constitutes a discourse of legitimation of the colonial fact. This speech, mainly contained in History of the triumphs of our holy faith, is the subject of this article.