Lully, RAYMOND, 'the enlightened doctor,' was born at Palma, in Majorca, in 1234. In his youth he led a dissolute life, and served for some time as a common soldier; but, a complete revulsion of feeling taking place, he withdrew to solitude, and gave himself up to ecstatic meditations and the study of the occult sciences. This sudden change of life produced in Lully a fervid and enthusiastic state of mind, under the influence of which he formed the project of a spiritual crusade for the conversion of the Mussulmans, an idea he never afterwards abandoned. In pursuance of this project he commenced an earnest study of theology, philosophy, and the Arabic language, and after some years published his great work, Ars Generalis sive Magna, which has so severely tested the sagacity of commentators. This work is the development of the method of teaching known subsequently as the 'Lullian method;' a mechanical aid to the mind in the acquisition of knowledge and the solution of all possible problems by a systematic manipulation of certain fundamental notions (the Aristotelian categories, &c.). He even invented a machine (of tin or pasteboard) to assist in this great task. Yet in this departure from scholastic logic, and his zeal for a true interpretation of nature, he was really a precursor of Bacon.
Lully subsequently published another remarkable work, Libri XII. Principiorum Philosoph. contra Averroistas, and, full of the principles which he had developed in this book, he went to Tunis in 1292 to argue with his Mohammedan opponents. Ere long he was thrown into prison and condemned to banishment. After lecturing at Naples for several years he proceeded to Rome, thence to his native island of Majorca, thence to Cyprus and Armenia. In 1306 he again sailed for Africa, entered the city of Bugia, now Bougie (q.v.), in Algeria, was again thrown into prison, and again banished. At Paris he lectured against the principles of Averroes. But his missionary zeal could only be satiated by martyrdom. Sailing once more for Africa, at Bugia he was stoned and ill-treated so that he expired a few days afterwards on board a Genoese vessel (1315). The Lullists combined a religious mysticism with a belief in alchemy.
See Helfferich, Raymond Lull (1858); Canalezas, Las Doctrinas de R. Lullo (Madrid, 1870); and the editions of his works by Salzinger (Mainz, 1742) and Rossello (Palma, 1886 et seq.).