A cada uno sus meritos y dignidad. Pedro de ledesma (1544-1616) on distributive justice and human dignity between will and knowledge

This contribution aims to show the theory of human dignity of Pedro de Ledesma (1544-1616), as traced in his De esse Dei and Suma Moral. In these two works the Dominican author, within his life in Salamanca as professor of theology, recognizes human dignity in the space created by human will and knowledge, when a man act in the world that surrounds himself. Normed by distributive justice, human dignity according to Ledesma illustrates the ways in which human beings are preserved in the world and answers to two questions: how does a human being really say that he is free when he carries out an action and in what way is this freedom fully ‘free’? Secondly, what guarantees that each individual freedom respects the freedoms of others and contributes to the creation of a completely free human being?.