Eguiara y Eguren, Vicente López y san José: devoción personal y devoción oficial al santo en el siglo XVIII novohispano

Juan José de Eguiara y Eguren (1696-1763) seems to have been clearly devoted to St. Joseph. In order to show this, the following pages will take a look at his Tratado sobre el Santísimo José, Esposo de la Madre de Dios (which includes two interesting paratexts by his friend, the Jesuit Vicente López), published in volume 1 of Selectae Dissertationes Mexicanae…, a complete treatise on Theology written for his students at the Mexican University. Eguiara´s debts to previous European and Spanish scholarly tradition on Saint Joseph will be pointed out, as well as his personal contributions to this tradition. Finally, a bibliographical review of this New Spain bibliographer and theologian’s homiletic production on Saint Joseph will be made, as well as of the books on Saint Joseph that were printed at his own printing house (Imprenta de la Bibliotheca Mexicana) during Eguiara´s lifetime. Finally, among Eguiara´s works dedicated to Saint Joseph, a manuscript anthology of sermons on the saint written by different European authors is pointed out, and the possibility is suggested that this work may be the one of similar characteristics that has been attributed to Vicente López and which is now considered lost.