Joan Gilabert Jofré
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Joan Gilabert Jofré (1364–1417),Historia de la asistencia psiquiátrica: (origen y organización de los manicomios españoles). Mariano Górriz, 1936. 44: 244 also known as Padre Jofré or Pare Jofré, was a member of the Christian religious Order of Mercy and the founder of what is claimed Historia bibliográfica de la medicina española, Antonio Hernández Morejón, Madrid, 1942. Morejón says in page 245: 'One of the successes that belongs exclusively to the Spaniards is the moral treatment to combat mental illnesses and the establishment in the fifteenth century of comfortable and adequate buildings for the admission of this class of unfortunates'The foundation in Valencia of the first psychiatric hospital in the world
Lopez Ibor J. J., 2008.
'The History of Psychiatry: An Evaluation of Psychiatric Thought and Practice from Prehistoric Times to the Present', Franz Alexander and Sheldon T Selesnick, 1970. Alexander and Selesnick quote Bassoe confirming Ullesperger's opinion that "the cradle of psychiatry was in Spain, where the first convenient and adequate buildings were built to hospitalize the insane" to be the first psychiatric care institution in Europe, in
Valencia Valencia ( , ), formally València (), is the capital of the Province of Valencia, province and Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Valencian Community, the same name in Spain. It is located on the banks of the Turia (r ...
,
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, in
medieval Spain Spain in the Middle Ages is a period in the history of Spain that began in the 5th century following the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ended with the beginning of the early modern period in 1492. The history of Spain is marked by waves o ...
. Joan Gilabert was born in Valencia on June 23, 1364."La Asistencia Psiquiátrica anterior al Siglo XVIII"
/ref> Having studied in
Lleida Lleida (, ; ; '' see below'') is a city in the west of Catalonia, Spain. It is the capital and largest town in Segrià county, the Ponent region and the province of Lleida. Geographically, it is located in the Catalan Central Depression. It ...
, he returned to Valencia where he joined the Order of Mercy in 1370 and entered the Monastery of El Puig. He was ordained priest in 1375 and became a preacher. He eventually became Superior of the Order in Valencia. From 1391 he dedicated himself to the redemption of captives, for which he had royal privileges. A commitment to the poor led him to establish institutions to care for the mentally ill, abandoned children, and indigent pilgrims. After his death, he became a subject of religious veneration and he has been proposed for canonization as a saint of the
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.


The Order of Mercy

The Order of Mercy, founded in 1218, was one of the numerous popular institutions concerned with charitable works and motivated by religious piety that were established throughout Europe during the 12th and 13th centuries. The Order's founder, the Catalan
Peter Nolasco Peter Nolasco, O. de M. (''Pere Nolasc'' in Catalan, ''Pierre Nolasque'' in French and ''Pedro Nolasco'' in Spanish; 1189 – 6 May 1256) was a Catholic nobleman known for founding the Royal and Military Order of Our Lady of Mercy of the Rede ...
, tutor to King James I of Aragón, had fought in the wars of the Christian reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula. The
Kingdom of Aragón The Kingdom of Aragon (; ; ; ) was a medieval and early modern Monarchy, kingdom on the Iberian Peninsula, corresponding to the modern-day Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Aragon, in Spain. It became a part of the larger ...
bordered on
al-Andalus Al-Andalus () was the Muslim-ruled area of the Iberian Peninsula. The name refers to the different Muslim states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492. At its greatest geographical extent, it occupied most o ...
(Muslim Spain) and Peter Nolasco was aware of the plight of impoverished Christian captives in Muslim hands. Aristocrats and the wealthy were often able to negotiate and purchase their freedom but ordinary prisoners lacking the funds needed to obtain their release were condemned to indefinite slavery. Peter Nolasco dedicated the Order to the work of ransoming these ordinary captives. The 1327 Albertine ''Constitutiones'' in force at the time Pare Jofré joined the order, established religious worship - the Divine Office - and the redemption of Christian captives as the Order's ends and fundamental principles."Mercedarian Historical Survey II. Until The Beginning Of The Evangelization Of America (1317-1492)- 2. FATHER RAIMUNDO ALBERT’S CONSTITUTIONS (1327" Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy, Mercedarian Friars website
accessed 11 July 2001
The ''Constitutiones'' were modeled on the constitutions of the major orders of preaching friars. The friars of the order were required to preach and collect
alms Alms (, ) are money, food, or other material goods donated to people living in poverty. Providing alms is often considered an act of Charity (practice), charity. The act of providing alms is called almsgiving. Etymology The word ''alms'' come ...
for a redemption fund, to be used only for redeeming captives. Initially, the Order's work was carried out in Valencia and the Balearic Islands, because of their proximity, but as the Spanish ''
Reconquista The ''Reconquista'' (Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese for ) or the fall of al-Andalus was a series of military and cultural campaigns that European Christian Reconquista#Northern Christian realms, kingdoms waged ag ...
'' of the Iberian Peninsula proceeded, captives were redeemed from slavery further afield, in Andalusia and North Africa. Pare Jofré earned a reputation as an effective administrator, a good preacher and a successful redeemer of captives in Spain and North Africa. Even while holding the relatively lowly office of vicar of the Mercedarians' convent in Lérida, he was a sufficiently respected figure by 1391 to be able to appeal to King Juan I for support for his efforts to redeem captives and hostages. While committed to the cause of the poor and abandoned, he was politically astute and in 1409 he was appointed the Order's ''comendador'', or Superior, in Valencia (the start of a fruitful preaching partnership with St
Vincent Ferrer Vincent Ferrer, Dominican Order, OP ( ; ; ; ; ; ; 23 January 1350 – 5 April 1419) was a Kingdom of Valencia, Valencian Dominican Order, Dominican friar who gained acclaim as a preacher, missionary and logician. After supporting Antipope Benedic ...
, with whom he travelled across
Valencia Valencia ( , ), formally València (), is the capital of the Province of Valencia, province and Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Valencian Community, the same name in Spain. It is located on the banks of the Turia (r ...
,
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,
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, Castile and
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.)


Mission to the troubled and abandoned

The contemporary Christian view tended to view the psychologically troubled as possessed by the devil. Pare Jofré's missions to rescue captives in Muslim Spain and North Africa are thought to have given him an insight into the different way the mentally ill were treated in Islamic communities. On 24 February 1409, as he was on his way to the Cathedral in Valencia to preach the homily for the first Sunday of Lent, he saw two young men brutally attacking a madman. After rescuing the injured victim and taking him back to his convent, he returned towards the cathedral and preached a memorable sermon that urged the establishment of a charitable institution to care for and treat the mentally ill and other outcasts. At the end of the sermon a group of 11 Valencians, headed by Llorenç Salom, joined to fund this initiative. Backed by papal authority (a
papal bull A papal bull is a type of public decree, letters patent, or charter issued by the pope of the Catholic Church. It is named after the leaden Seal (emblem), seal (''bulla (seal), bulla'') traditionally appended to authenticate it. History Papal ...
of the
Antipope Benedict XIII Pedro Martínez de Luna y Pérez de Gotor (25 November 1328 – 23 May 1423), known as () or Pope Luna, was an Aragonese nobleman who was antipope with the regnal name Benedict XIII during the Western Schism. Early life Pedro Martínez de Lu ...
, dated 26 February 1410) and with royal approval from King Martin of Aragon, Pare Jofré proceeded to found what was the world's first hospital for the mentally ill, the Hospital dels Ignoscents or Hospital of the Holy Innocents, also known as the Hospital dels Folls, or Hospital of the Mad, dedicated to the Virgin Mary under the title of "Our Lady of the Innocents". The hospital eventually became what is now the Hospital General Universitario, or University Teaching Hospital, in Valencia. Pare Jofré's other social works included the founding of a hospice for abandoned children in Valencia in 1410 and the establishment of a hostel for impoverished pilgrims at El Puig in 1416.


Joan Gilabert's plan expansion throughout Spain

Joan's initiative, which provided the mentally ill with medical treatment, albeit precarious, and with a residence where they could live safely, was not an island in an ocean of indifference but rather spread to other parts of Spain, giving continuity to a way of assisting these patients. After the Hospital of Innocents, in Valencia, other hospitals followed and were built in Zaragoza (1425), Seville (1436), Valladolid (1436), Palma de Mallorca (1456), Toledo and Granada (1527), which were commissioned by the Spanish Catholic Monarchs themselves. All of this made Spain the most advanced country in the treatment of the alienated at the end of the 15th century, as Javier Aztarain Díez, from the University of Navarra, tells in his study 'Psychiatric care prior to the 18th century': «The conversion of the kingdom of Spain into an empire, after the discovery of the American continent, did nothing but reinforce the role of Spain in the development of psychiatric care. The humanitarian way of treating the mentally ill has been recognized internationally as one of the characteristics of the hospitals for the insane founded in Spain in the 15th century”, he recalls.


Veneration and canonisation

Pare Jofré died on 18 May 1417 at the Monastery of El Puig, where his remains are buried. He was venerated after his death and a cult of devotion emerged. Efforts to secure Pare Jofré's canonization as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church were frustrated in the early 19th century and the 1930s when the supporting documentation was destroyed, on the first occasion by invading Napoleonic forces and on the second in anti-religious disturbances at the start of the
Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...
in 1936. More recently the process was revived and in 2007 after the diocesan stage of the canonization process in Valencia was completed the cause of canonization was referred to the Holy See in Rome."Concluye fase diocesana del proceso de canonización del Padre Jofré" (in Spanish; "Diocesan stage of canonization of Padre Jofre Completed") publ. ACI, 8 February 2007
accessed 11 July 2011


Bibliography

* Ramajo Aliste, Félix (1998). ''Vida y obra del padre Juan Gilabert Jofre'' (in Spanish; "Life and Work of Father Juan Gilabert Jofre"), publ. by Diputación Provincial de Valencia. .


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jofre, Joan Gilabert 1350 births 1417 deaths Clergy from Valencia 14th-century Spanish Roman Catholic priests Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy 15th-century Spanish Roman Catholic priests