Jean Raulin

Jean Raulin (c. 1443–1515, traditionally dated 1443–1514) was a French theologian, master of the Collège de Navarre, Benedictine reformer, and preacher whose writings circulated widely through the sixteenth-century European book trade. His career connected Parisian university theology with the reform of Cluniac religious life, while his printed sermons combined scholastic exposition, pastoral instruction, and memorable narrative examples. His chronology requires qualification: the Bibliothèque nationale de France retains 1514 as his death year, whereas Nicole Lemaître gives 16 February 1515, and Guy-Thomas Bedouelle likewise places his death in 1515.

Originally from Toul in Lorraine, Raulin studied theology at the Collège de Navarre in Paris, obtained his doctorate in 1479, and became the college’s grand master in 1481. Contemporary reputation associated him with the nominalist school and with preaching directed against moral and ecclesiastical abuses. His subsequent religious vocation developed within this university environment. At the end of May 1497 he entered Cluny, leaving Navarre so abruptly that, according to Bedouelle, he had not warned his close collaborator Louis Pinelle. His correspondence preserves an account of this conversion and of his expectations of monastic life.

Raulin’s Benedictine career soon involved practical reform. On 6 May 1498 he addressed Cluny’s general chapter; in 1499 he visited religious houses in Auvergne and southern France. In 1500 he joined Philippe Bourgoing and thirteen other monks in the reform of Saint-Martin-des-Champs in Paris. Resistance there produced proceedings against him for allegedly scandalous preaching. He appealed to the papal legate Georges d’Amboise in April 1501, and his opponents eventually withdrew. His programme linked restored observance with theological education, including renewed study within Cluniac institutions.

The earliest printed expression of this programme was the Collatio de perfecta religionis plantatione, incremento et instauratione. Its editorial history already extended beyond France: an edition prepared by Sebastian Brant appeared at Basel in 1498, attributed to the press of Johann Bergmann von Olpe and dated 22 June. A Paris edition followed in 1499, printed by Guy Marchant for the Marnef booksellers. In 1502 Denis Roce issued the discourse in Paris under the title Collatio de perfecta religione divi Benedicti in conventu Cluniacensi habita, again with Brant identified as editor. The transmission of this short reforming address therefore preceded the publication of Raulin’s extensive sermon collections and placed his work within the interconnected scholarly and commercial networks of Basel and Paris.

The major homiletic enterprise began with the Opus sermonum quadragesimalium super epistolas et evangelia quadragesimalia, published at Paris by Jean Petit in two parts. Although its colophon bears the year 1511, the qualification ante pascha places publication in 1512 according to modern reckoning; parliamentary and royal privileges of March 1512 confirm that chronology. The work was a substantial quarto rather than a folio. Its production was divided among several printing houses: the colophon explicitly mentions multiple printers, while surviving typographical evidence identifies André Bocard, Berthold Rembolt, and a third, unidentified workshop. A woodcut represented Raulin presenting his book to Jacques d’Amboise, abbot of Cluny and recipient of its dedication. This edition demonstrates Petit’s coordinating role as publisher and the distribution of manufacturing work among separate presses.

Raulin’s best-known title, the Itinerarium Paradisi, followed in 1513, although its colophons read 1512 ante pascha. Berthold Rembolt printed it for Jean Petit. Despite its evocative title, the work is principally a collection of sermons on penance, treating contrition, confession, satisfaction, and prayer. It was accompanied by sermons on marriage and widowhood, separately signed and foliated, and dedicated to Louis Malet de Graville, admiral of France, whose arms appeared behind the title page. A further edition followed in 1514, with additional reissues in 1518, 1519, and 1524. The distinction between its penitential core and its associated matrimonial sermons is essential to understanding both its original construction and its subsequent use.

The matrimonial material comprised twelve sermons supplemented by three on widowhood. As Lemaître has shown, these texts addressed questions about the dignity, obligations, and religious meaning of marriage that were already being debated before the Reformation. Raulin’s dedication indicates that he had written them earlier, so their appearance in print should not be treated as evidence that they were newly composed in 1513. His pastoral interests consequently extended beyond monastic discipline to the religious responsibilities of household life.

Raulin’s preaching employed elaborate divisions, scriptural interpretation, and exempla drawn from familiar social situations and animal narratives. The third sermon on widowhood contains the celebrated story of a widow who consults her priest about marrying her servant. Advised to listen to the church bells, she hears encouragement corresponding to her wishes; after the marriage proves disastrous, the same bells seem to deliver the opposite counsel. The story exposes the influence of desire upon judgment. Its association with Rabelais’s Tiers Livre belongs to Raulin’s literary reception, although Lemaître cautions against treating the broader debate over whether to marry as an invention or exclusive possession of this preacher.

Publication continued after Raulin’s death through the work of identifiable editors and publishers. The Opus sermonum de Adventu, edited by Pierre de Montmartre, appeared on 8 November 1516, printed by Rembolt for Petit. The same printer–publisher partnership produced the Doctrinale mortis on 29 April 1518. Often described through its subject as the Doctrinale de triplici morte, it examined bodily death, death through sin, and eternal punishment. Its prefatory dedication bears the initials “R.R.”, tentatively identified in the BnF catalogue as Robert Raulin; a definite attribution to a named relative is therefore unwarranted. Both publications drew upon a royal privilege granted to Petit on 24 July 1515.

The correspondence appeared as the Epistolarum … opus, issued by Antoine Aussourd and Jean Petit with a printed date of 1 January 1521, correctly understood as 1522 in modern style. The volume also transmitted the reforming Collatio, bringing Raulin’s letters and his earlier monastic programme together. Further additions to the printed corpus involved other businesses: in June 1524 Antoine Bonnemère printed the two-part Sermonum de festivitatibus sanctorum totius anni for Damien Higman, with Pierre de Montmartre again serving as editor. Its manufacture is supported by a printing contract dated 4 August 1523. The Sermones dominicales reached their first edition considerably later, appearing at Paris under Oudin Petit’s imprint on 6 April 1541 in octavo. Raulin’s published corpus thus accumulated over decades through successive editorial undertakings.

His international reception remained active well beyond the first generation of Paris editions. At Venice, Giovanni Battista Somasco issued the Sermones quadragesimales in 1575, advertising correction of the text and a substantial index of subjects. At Antwerp, Gaspar Bellerus published Opera omnia quae inveniri potuerunt in 1611–1612, while editions of individual sermon collections also appeared under Jan van Keerbergen’s imprint. These later publications document the continued usefulness of Raulin’s Latin preaching materials within Catholic religious culture almost a century after their author’s death. Their apparatus of correction and indexing also records how publishers adapted an inherited homiletic corpus for new generations of readers and preachers.