Inquisição e protestantismo na colônia: o caso de José Antônio das Mercês, um herege no Brasil pombalino (1735-1762)

Abstract

The present work discusses the trajectory of an anonymous character in history, José Antônio das Mercês, from the historiographical conceptions proposed by microhistory: the onomastic method and the game of scales. We incorporated into the analysis the concept of habitus proposed by Pierre Bourdieu and ethos established by Patrick Charaudeau. The objective is to reflect on the effects caused by the arrival of Protestant sailors, for which we use the category of luteranos das naus, in colonial territory and problematize the presence of Protestantism in Brazil in the 18th century. The text, through that individual's life, is run through two environments, or worlds, with its social-religious dynamics: the Protestant and the Catholic. We leave German territory, We pass through the Netherlands, we crossed the Atlantic by looking at the navigations and looked at three places related to the territory of Portuguese America: Salvador, Rio de Janeiro and Recife. Finally, following the thread that was the guide of the research, we come to the prisoner of the ecclesiastical courts in the colony and later defendant of the Court of the Holy Office, the escape from prison and the involvement with the English sailors in Bahia in 1759, the return to prison, the sending to Lisbon, and the conviction for the rebaptism. The case under investigation, on the one hand, demonstrates an exceptionality in characterizing the path of a Protestant who arrived in Brazil in the 18th century and opted for a change of religion; on the other hand, a relatively common dynamic in presenting the arrival of the luteranos das naus in Brazilian ports at that time, the circumstances arising from this and the possible impacts of the transit of these individuals in Luso-Brazilian territory.