Raymond of Peñafort, Saint (RAIMONDO DE PEÑAFORT, SANTO) - Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. X, p. 302

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

RAIMONDO DE PEÑAFORT, saint. — Dominican, born in Barcelona in 1175, died there on 6 January 1275. He studied and then taught rhetoric and logic in Barcelona. He subsequently studied at Bologna (1210–16), where he was promoted doctor of law in 1216. Returning to Barcelona at the wish of his bishop (1219) and appointed penitentiary canon and then provost of the cathedral Chapter, he entered the Dominican Order shortly thereafter (1222). He played a significant part in the foundation of the Order of Mercy, for which he compiled a large part of the Constitutions and obtained their approval (1235).

He accompanied and assisted Cardinal Giovanni di Abbeville on his legation in Spain (1229), and was subsequently commissioned by the Pope to preach in the provinces of Arles and Narbonne in support of the expedition against the Moors in Majorca. Gregory IX appointed him his confessor, chaplain, and penitentiary, and entrusted him with compiling the new authentic collection of Decretals, which was officially promulgated by him in 1234 (5 September) and presented to the Universities of Paris and Bologna (v. Corpus Iuris Canonici). During this same period, in the Pope’s name, he gave numerous responses to legal consultations, known as the Dubitalia, edited by Schulte (Die canonischen Handschriften... Prague 1868, pp. 98 ff.). He refused the archbishopric of Tarragona. Elected master general of the Order (23 May 1238), he accepted only with great reluctance; he compiled a version of the Dominican Constitutions, which remained essentially in force until the revision of 1924. In 1240 he resigned the office of master general in order to devote himself to the conversion of the Jews and Moors in Spain and Africa. Through his efforts, a school of Arabic was founded in Tunis (1250) and one of Hebrew in Murcia (the first of their kind), to prepare missionaries adequately. He insisted that s. Tommaso d'Aquino write the Summa contra Gentiles. Canonized in 1601. Feast on 23 January.

Among his works, the following should be recalled: the Summa iuris (partially preserved in the manuscript of the Vatican Library Borgh. 261), written at Bologna (1216–19), a manual of law compiled according to the order of the Decree and of the First Book of the Compilations of Decretals (ed. J. Rius, Barcelona 1945); more famous is the Summa de poenitentia, which enjoyed a wide circulation. It is an excellent guide for

Article illustration — RAIMONDO DE PEÑAFORT, saint. — Fresco by Beato Angelico — Florence, convent of S. Marco.
(Alinari photograph)

confessors, highly practical and useful for correcting and guiding every category of penitents. The first three parts of this work seem to have been written in Barcelona between 1222–28 or 1229, certainly not completed before 1227, and published before 1234; the fourth part (de matrimonio) was compiled around 1235–36 and is a reworking of Tancred’s Summa de matrimonio. He also wrote glossae on the Decretum (cf. St. Kuttner, Repertorium der Kanonistik..., I, Vatican City 1937, pp. 20 ff., 100 ff., 438–52). The influence exercised by R. d. P. through his Summa de poenitentia is manifest in the very numerous editions, in the glossae added to it, and in the compilations made from it, which bear the name Summulae de summa s. Raymundi or Summulae abbreviatae s. Raymundi. Less important is the Summa pastoralis, a kind of manual for bishops or archdeacons on visiting the diocese, edited by L. Delisle (Catalogue des manuscrits, I, Paris 1849, pp. 592–649).

BIBL.: Acta SS. Ianuarii, I, Paris-Rome 1868, pp. 404–29; A. Danzas, Etudes sur les temps primitifs de l'Ordre de St Dominique, S. R. de P., I, Lyon 1885; H. Demille, Die Constitutionen des Predigerordens in den Reduction R. von P., in Arch. für Littre. u. Kirchengeschichte des M. A., 5 (1889), pp. 530–64; F. Balme, C. Paban, Raymundiana seu documenta quae pertinent ad s. R. de P. etiam et scripta (Monum, O. P. hist., 6, 1 e 11), Rome-Stuttgart 1889–1901; E. Vacas Galindo, S. R. de P. fundador de la Orden de la Merced, there 1919; B. Altaner, Die Dominikanermissionen des 13. Jahrhunderts, Habelschwerdt 1924, pp. 81–114; A. Teetart, La Summa de Poenitentia de S. R. de P., in Ephrem. theol. Lavanienes, 5 (1928), pp. 40–72; J. M. de Garganta, L'obra literaria de s. R. de P., in Bulletin del seto centenari de les Decretals, Barcelona 1934, p. 8 ff.; T. M. Schwermer, C. M. Antony, S. R. de P., Milwaukee 1935; A. Walz, S. R. de P. auctoritas in re poenitentia, in Angelicum, 12 (1935), pp. 346–396; A. Teetart, s. V. in DThC, XIII, II, cols. 1806–23. Alfonso D'Amato