Que nos diz a certidão de nascimento dos cursos jurídicos no Brasil sobre linguagem jurídica?

Abstract

On the eve of an ephemeris, namely the bicentenary of the creation of the first two law courses on Brazilian soil (today we have surpassed the twelve hundred mark), we ask ourselves Unde venimus? (Where did we come from?), an exercise that takes us back to the Law of August 11, 1827, which I name as the birth certificate of legal and social sciences courses in Brazil. This law, by which Dom Pedro I made it known to the then subjects that he would create them in the cities of São Paulo and Olinda, established a list of six propaedeutics knowledge, whose proficiency had to be demonstrated as a condition for admission, three of which (Latin grammar, logic and rhetoric) were directly related to the universe of language. This article argues that that set of three propaedeutics knowledge, when included in the creation law of the legal courses, was intended to meet a kind of principle of solidity (firmitas) of the Vitruvian triad, in building the legal knowledge of those who would operate the Law notably through language. Three main arguments support this assertion. Firstly, the law in question was not unprecedented, but in fact adopted a practice that had been common since the creation of the first universities in the Middle Ages, which had classical education as the basis for higher studies in Medicine, Theology and Law, such as the University of Coimbra. Secondly, the incorporation of Latin grammar, logic and rhetoric as preliminary studies seemed to recognize the centrality of language for law, the main mechanism by which it operates. Finally, the explanatory memorandum of the statutes annexed to the legal text states not only a few reasons, but also that those who did not excel in preparatory studies, which would be the master key to all the others, would not be able to take advantage of the major studies, and only after them could one have a mature and willing mind to well conceive the subjects of legal science and discuss them with more mature reflection.