How is selling the use of a house not usury but selling the use of wine, separately from the wine, is?
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St. Thomas Aquinas, *Summa Theologica* II-II q. 78 a. 1 co., says that usury is to sell the use of a consumable good separately from the consumable good itself:
>To take usury for money lent is unjust in itself, because this is to sell what does not exist, and this evidently leads to inequality which is contrary to justice. In order to make this evident, we must observe that there are certain **things the use of which consists in their consumption**: thus we consume wine when we use it for drink and we consume wheat when we use it for food. Wherefore in such like things the use of the thing must not be reckoned apart from the thing itself, and whoever is granted the use of the thing, is granted the thing itself and for this reason, to lend things of this kin is to transfer the ownership. Accordingly if a man wanted to sell wine separately from the use of the wine, he would be selling the same thing twice, or he would be selling what does not exist, wherefore he would evidently commit a sin of injustice. On like manner he commits an injustice who lends wine or wheat, and asks for double payment, viz. one, the return of the thing in equal measure, the other, the price of the use, which is called usury.
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>On the other hand, there are **things the use of which does n̲o̲t̲ consist in their consumption**: thus to use a house is to dwell in it, not to destroy it. Wherefore in such things both may be granted: for instance, one man may hand over to another the ownership of his house while reserving to himself the use of it for a time, or vice versa, he may grant the use of the house, while retaining the ownership. For this reason a man may lawfully make a charge for the use of his house, and, besides this, revendicate the house from the person to whom he has granted its use, as happens in renting and letting a house.
But that explanation makes no sense to me. Just because the use of wine consists in its destruction, I do not see how this implies that the sale of the use of wine also implies the sale of the property itself.
I see no significant difference between using a house as a dwelling and using wine for drinking. If the sale of the use of the house can be separated from the sale of the property itself, then the sale of the use of the wine can also be separated from the sale of the property itself.
Asked by Guilherme de Souza
(155 rep)
Dec 5, 2022, 09:20 AM
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