ramón lull was born in palma, the capital of majorca, on january 25, 1235. his father had taken part in the conquest of majorca from the saracens some six years earlier, and for his services had received the gift of an estate, which his son inherited. the boy was brought up as a page in the royal court of majorca, and, in spite of a sound religious education and the interest and favour of the king, he had[3] hardly reached years of discretion when he began to lead a careless and dissolute life. his biographers tell of how the king, to stop his degrading practices, married him to a certain da. blanca pica?y, but without thereby reforming him in the least. lull was chiefly enamoured of a genoese lady, so passionately that he dared one day to ride on horseback into the church of st. eulalia, where she was engaged in devotion. eventually she herself arrested his intrigues. receiving from him some gallant verses on the theme of her bosom, she called him into her presence, and, uncovering herself before him, disclosed a malignant cancer by which her breast was slowly being consumed.
this terrible shock marked the first stage in lull’s conversion. he went back to the palace another man—as taciturn and sombre as he had formerly been gay and jovial. the tradition may well be true that he saw at this time a vision of the crucified, saying, ‘ramón, follow me’: he himself in some lines of autobiography tells us of five such visions, though when they occurred is not certain. be this as it may, he turned from his evil life and fixed his affections on god:
when i was grown and knew the world and its vanities, i began to do evil and entered on sin. forgetting the true god i went after carnal things. but it pleased jesus christ in his great pity to present himself to me five[4] times as if crucified, that i might remember him and set my love on him, doing what i could that he might be known through all the world and the truth be taught concerning the great trinity and the incarnation. and thus i was inspired and moved by so great love, that i loved no other thing but that he should be honoured, and i began to do him willing service.[1]
from the first, as these lines significantly bear evidence, lull’s new ideals were directed towards specific objects. he was set upon the conversion of the jews and mohammedans who figured so largely in thirteenth-century spain. and setting aside emotional methods as resolutely as the idea—so general then—of conversion by force, he began to ponder what he conceived to be worthy means of compassing his aim—a progressive and unanswerable appeal to the reason. a sermon heard on the feast of st. francis (october 4, 1266) supplied the spark which kindled lull’s plans into action. he sold all his land, with the exception of a portion retained for himself and his family, gave up his position of seneschal in the royal palace, and retired first to a cistercian monastery and later to mount randa, near palma, living there a life of study and meditation with the object of fitting himself to become a missionary to the moslems.
the record of lull’s life in mount randa is one not only of prayer, fast and vigil, ecstasy and vision,[5] but of the study of arabic and the elaboration of his scheme of a book which was to illuminate and convert the world. he believed this art general to be directly inspired by the holy spirit. once it was sufficiently developed he turned in his practical way to means by which its study could be advanced. to king james ii of majorca were explained the scholar’s vast plans for the conversion of islam; the king submitted them to one bertram de berengario, a professor of theology, and, when satisfied of their orthodoxy, endowed a college in miramar for the training in sciences and languages of thirteen franciscan missionaries to the saracens (1275). thus one part of lull’s ideals was realised.
for a short time he remained at miramar, teaching arabic and the art general. but before long we find him lecturing on the art in montpellier, which was part of the majorcan kingdom. then he is at rome, where his enterprise is sanctioned by the pope, and a school of oriental languages founded. he spends two years lecturing in the university of paris, learning all the time as well as teaching. a college is founded in navarre through king philip of france. lull goes farther afield—to palestine, egypt, ethiopia and morocco. in 1282 we read of his being back in france again, at perpignan. success continues to attend him, but not in a measure that can satisfy his ardent soul.[6] ever burning for more triumphs, he resolves at last to put the lukewarmness of europe to shame, and to go himself to africa as an apostle of the faith.
after some delay (the chronology of this period is very uncertain[2]) he set sail from genoa, and landed in tunis about 1291. professing only a desire to learn the truth—to convert or be converted as events might prove—he began to debate in public with the moslems, following his own logical method. he was only too successful. many of the infidels, attracted by his reasoning, embraced christianity; but the monarch began to fear for his throne, and before long lull found himself in prison. condemned to death for his preaching, he was reprieved by the intercession of a saracen of influence, and banished from africa, leaving tunis amid insults and blows, on pain of being stoned to death should he ever return. for a time he evaded his enemies and remained in the country, but a year of this life showed him its futility, and he returned to naples. here he remained writing and teaching for a time; then he went to rome (c. 1296), attempting unsuccessfully to obtain sanction for new missionary projects; again we find him in genoa, next in paris (1297-8), back in majorca, once more in genoa (1300), then on a new campaign in cyprus[7] and armenia (1300-2), back via rhodes and malta, where he made stays, to genoa and paris (1303), palma, barcelona, lyon and montpellier (1305).[3] here he saw both the king and pope clement v. with the former he planned a crusade for the holy land, but the latter, much occupied in other affairs, gave him no support.
everywhere and always evangelisation filled his thoughts. no difficulty or objection, as the records of these years show, could curb his zeal; the thought of imprisonment or torture made no difference to his plans, while to die a martyr’s death when his work should be done was his great ambition. ‘foolish lover,’ says an imaginary opponent to him in his little classic, ‘why dost thou weary the body, throw away thy wealth and leave the joys of this world, and go about as an outcast of the people?’ and his reply is the simplest imaginable. ‘to honour my beloved’s name, for he is hated and dishonoured by more men than honour and love him.’
in 1306 lull determined to make an attempt to preach once more in africa. at the outset he was successful, founding a school at bona, where he[8] first went. but on proceeding to bugia, and beginning to preach in the market-place, he was promptly arrested, all but stoned by the crowds, summarily tried, and imprisoned in a loathsome dungeon with a view to later execution. something in lull’s personality, however (or, as some say, the pleas of certain catalan and genoese inhabitants), saved him once more; he was even allowed the privilege of a disputation with a mohammedan champion, and eventually was exiled again in the same year of his leaving italy.
the ship in which he was returning suffered shipwreck off pisa, where he landed and remained for two years. in pisa he wrote a book incorporating his memorable dispute with the saracen apologist and other experiences in africa. but it would seem that these experiences had been modifying his belief in intellectual conversion, for he approached pope clement v again with proposals for a new crusade. enthusiasm for crusades, however, was a thing of the past, and neither the pope nor italy as a whole gave the scheme any support.
so this dauntless fighter went once more to paris, which at that time was in the grip of averroism, and hence provided a new field for missionary effort. seventy-three years old as he was, lull lectured, wrote, and taught unceasingly against the infidel philosophy, and won for himself fresh glory,[9] accomplishing in europe what only physical force withheld from him in africa. king philip, his royal admirer, gave him the name of docteur illuminé, by which, in one or another of its translations, he is still known to-day.
the council of vienne (1311-2) gave lull another of those opportunities which he was never slow to take. the picture of the venerable missionary at the feet of the head of the church, pouring forth his impassioned pleas for those enterprises which authority so hesitated to allow, is indeed a moving one. he painted the glory of recovering the holy places, the plight of the christians in armenia, and the peril which the greeks were in from the turks—themes not exhausted even after seven hundred years. these, however, were but a few of lull’s representations. the number of his requests which were granted was relatively small, but among them was a wider scheme than any yet sanctioned for a system of colleges for the teaching of missionary languages. this earnest of the continuance of his work must have encouraged beyond measure one who, in the natural course of life, was nearing the end of his activities.
perhaps it was this, indeed, which inspired him to cross once more to africa, to brave its terrors and to suffer martyrdom for the faith at last—as from his conversion he had wished—if it might be the will[10] of god. and the will of god it proved to be. on august 14, 1314, he set out from palma for bugia. on his arrival he began his work less openly than before, and for some months contrived to preach secretly, make conversions and confirm the faithful of earlier days. he passed to tunis, where he had further success, but for some unknown reason was compelled to return to bugia. success made him bold. feeling perhaps that the hour of supreme effort—even if it meant the supreme sacrifice—had come, he threw prudence to the winds, assembled a vast concourse, and, proclaiming himself that same ramón who had formerly been condemned in bugia, he preached once more the faith of the saviour. this time the crowd broke loose, and not only clamoured for lull’s death, but took him out of the city and stoned him (june 30, 1315), even as a jewish mob had stoned the first of christian martyrs.
various accounts are given of his burial. it seems that two genoese merchants begged his body and carried it to majorca, but some versions have it that a great pyramid of light aided them in their search for it, that life remained in the body until it reached palma, and that adverse winds forced the vessel, which was making for genoa, to land at lull’s birthplace. here the body was received with the greatest sorrow and mourning, and buried with[11] due solemnity in the sacristy of the convent of st. francis of assisi.
ramón lull was beatified by pius ix. the title-page of his great romance, blanquerna, calls him ‘doctor illuminate, martyr unconquered of jesus christ, master universal in all arts and sciences.’ but in his own country lull receives the simpler homage of a saint.
