Raymond, Martini

RAYMOND, MARTINI: Spanish Dominican and rabbinical scholar of the thirteenth century. He was a native of Catalonia, and was in 1250 one of eight monks appointed to make a study of oriental languages with the purpose of carrying on a mission to Jews and Moors. In 1264 he was one of the company appointed by the king of Aragon to examine Jewish manuscripts in order to strike out from them any matter assailing Christianity. He worked in Spain as a missionary, and also for a short time in Tunis. A document bearing his signature and dated July, 1284, shows that he was at that time still living.

Raymond's refutation of the Koran is lost. There is at Bologna a manuscript of his Capistrum Judæorum, aimed at the errors of the Jews; and at Tortosa a manuscript containing, Explanatio simboli apostolorum ad institutionem fidelium has a marginal note that it was edited by "a fratre Ro Martini de ordine predicatorum." The great work with which Raymond's name is associated is his Pugio fidei, on which he was still at work in 1278. This work was used by Hieronymus de Sancta Fide in his Hebraeomastix and elsewhere, was plagiarized by Petrus Galatinus, and was one of the credited sources of Victor Porchet's Victoria adversus impios Ebreos (Paris, 1520). About 1620 Bishop Bosquet discovered in the Collegium Fuxense a manuscript of the Pugio, and from this and three other manuscripts Joseph de Voisin edited the work with numerous learned annotations (Paris, 1651; edited again with introduction by J. B. Carpzov, Leipsic, 1687). The first part treats of God and divine omniscience, creation, immortality, and resurrection from the dead; the second and third parts are devoted to refutation of the Jews. The second and third parts are still of value for missions, and also for science since there are numerous correctly cited quotations from the Talmud, Midrashic works, and other early Jewish literature. Among these cited works is the Bereshith Rabba major or magna, a work in part derived from the Yesodh of Moses ha-Darshan. In his use of this work the only charge that can be 408brought against Raymond is that he disconnected sentences from their context and assembled them in accordance with his subjective interpretation and his purpose in writing.

The question, who is meant by the "Rachmon" often adduced by Raymond, is not definitely answered, some scholars considering that it is a Hebraizing of his own name, and not a character introduced as speaking in the Talmud and Midrash.

(H. L. Strack.)

Bibliography: A. Touron, Hist. des hommes illustres de l’ordre de St. Dominique, i. 489–504, Paris, 1743; Ambrose of Altramura, Bibliotheca Dominicana, ed. Rocaberti, pp. 58, 449–455, Rome, 1677; J. C. Wolf, Bibliotheca Hebræa, i. 1016–18, iii. 989–991, iv. 968, Hamburg, 1715–33; J. Quétif and J. Echard, Scriptores ordinis prædicatorum, i. 396–398, Paris, 1719; and literature named in J. G. Walch, Bibliotheca theologica selecta, i. 609, Jena, 1757. The charge that Raymond falsified his citations from Jewish writings was renewed by S. M. Schiller-Szinessy in Journal of Philology, xvi (1887), 131–152; refutation of the charge is offered by L. Zunz, Die gottesdienstlichen Vorträge der Juden, pp. 287–293, Berlin, 1832; E. B. Pussy, Fifty-Third Chapter of Isaiah, vol. ii., Oxford, 1877; A. Neubauer, Book of Tobit, pp. vii.–ix., xx.–xxv., ib. 1878; A. Epstein, in Magazin für die Wissenschaft des Judenthums, 1888, pp. 65–99, cf. I. Levi, in Revue des études juives, xvii (1888), 313–317.