Sor Juana's Critique of Theological Arrogance

Most scholarship on Sor Juana's letters La Respuesta (The Answer) and Carta Athenagórica (Letter Worthy of Athena) focuses on Sor Juana's defense of women's right to study and defends her self-effacement in the shadow of the Mexican Inquisition. While these are important and relevant perspectives on these letters, this article takes the analysis further by considering what she is communicating about the discipline of theology at large in these letters. Not only are her "modesty clauses" utilized to shield her as much as possible from religious authorities who would take issue with a nun's published criticisms of a famous Jesuit priest, but in the context of her letters they serve as a contrast to the arrogance she finds in the theology of the ecclesial hierarchy. This article uncovers Sor Juana's discussion of the limits of the human mind to comprehend, and of language to communicate, the divine.