NICOLAI, JEAN. – Dominican theologian and controversialist, born at Mouzay near Stenay in 1594, died in Paris on 7 May 1673. He was prior (1661–64) and for many years professor of theology and regent of studies at the convent of St. James. He was a member of the commission of doctors of the Sorbonne that in 1649 condemned the five propositions attributed to Jansen, and of the commission that in 1655 condemned Arnauld’s response, which sought to exonerate Jansen from those errors.
For these controversies he wrote: Iudicium seu censorum suffragium de proposizione A. Arnauld (Paris 1656) and the theses Thomisticae orthodoxae de Gratia divina veritatis iansenianis erroribus ac dogmatibus oppositae (ibid. 1655). Arnauld and P. Nicole accused him of antinomianism. In 1663 N. published Aquinas’s Summa theologiae with historical and dogmatic notes, often directed against the Molinists; he engaged in lengthy controversies with Launoy concerning fasting and the ancient practice of Baptism; he also edited other works of St. Thomas: Catena aurea (Paris 1657); Commentaria in IV libros sentantiarum (ibid. 1659); Quodlibetales quaestiones (ibid. 1660).