In 1854, a 50-year-old French professor heard from a friend that tables were moving on their own in Paris. He did not believe it. He responded, in short, that he would only accept the idea when they proved to him that a table has a brain to think. A year later, he saw it with his own eyes. This professor was Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail, and he is the answer to the question who was Allan Kardec.
What came next was not a sudden conversion. It was a work of observation, comparison, and organization that lasted fourteen years and produced five books. This guide tells the story of the man, not the doctrine.
Rivail before Kardec: the professor
Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail was born in Lyon, France, on October 3, 1804. His father, Jean-Baptiste Antoine Rivail, was a magistrate. The Brazilian Spiritist Federation reproduces his birth certificate, where the name appears written as Denizard Hyppolyte-Léon Rivail.
Still young, he went to study in Switzerland, at the institute of Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, in the castle of Yverdon. This detail explains almost everything that follows. Pestalozzi advocated a pedagogy of observation and concrete experience, against rote learning. The student should see, touch, and compare before accepting.
Rivail took this method for his entire life. He became a professor, grammarian, and translator. He wrote textbooks on arithmetic and French grammar, published a plan for improving public education, and maintained free courses in chemistry, physics, anatomy, and astronomy. In 1832, he married Amélie Gabrielle Boudet, also a professor. The couple had no children.
At 50 years old, therefore, he was a respected pedagogue. He was not mystical, he was not a medium, he did not attend secret societies.
The turning tables (mesas girantes) and the turn of 1855
The craze for table-turning took over Europe in the mid-19th century. In 1854, the magnetizer friend Fortier told Rivail about the phenomenon. He reacted with declared skepticism.
In May 1855 he went to watch a session at the house of Mme. Plainemaison. He saw the phenomenon and changed his position, but not his method. Instead of joining, he began to study. He started attending the meetings of the Baudin family, where two young mediums wrote messages, and he began to ask organized questions.
It was there that the backbone of the work was born: not to ask out of curiosity, but to build a questionnaire and check the answers.
“From the smallest to the largest, the spirits were means to inform me and not predestined revelators.” The phrase is by Kardec himself, and it summarizes the distance between researching and simply believing.
The method: universal control of the teaching of the Spirits
Here is the part that almost no biographical summary tells, and it is the most interesting.
Rivail created a criterion to decide what entered the doctrine and what stayed out. He called it universal control of the teaching of the Spirits. It worked like this:
- The same communication needed to arrive through different mediums
- In different places, without contact between each other
- And it still had to resist the examination of reason
A beautiful message, received only once, by a single medium, did not become a doctrine. This filter is what gives his work the appearance of a research protocol and not of a revelation.
It is worth noting that this is a blog of Afro-Brazilian tradition. Praising Rivail's method is not saying that one tradition thinks and others do not. It is describing what he did, the way he did it, within the European context of the 19th century. Every religious tradition has its validation criteria, and the terreiros have theirs.
The pseudonym Allan Kardec: fact and tradition
In 1857, the book was released signed by Allan Kardec, and not by Rivail. Why?
The Spiritist tradition tells that the name came by suggestion of a spirit, and that Rivail would have lived with it among the druids of Gaul. The English Wikipedia records the attribution of the pseudonym to a spirit using the word "allegedly". In other words, it is a report of tradition, not a documented biographical fact.
There is also a practical and verifiable reason, which usually disappears from biographies. Rivail was already a known name in French pedagogy. Signing the new work with another name separated the Spiritist work from the textbooks, and protected the reputation of each.
The two explanations coexist. The honest one is to present the first as tradition and the second as context.
The 5 works of the Codification
The set that Spiritists call the Codification are five books published in twelve years. The FEB lists the works in this order:
- The Spirits' Book (1857): the bases of the doctrine, in a question and answer format
- The Mediums' Book (1861): the practical part, about mediumship and meetings
- The Gospel According to Spiritism (1864): the moral reading of the gospels
- Heaven and Hell (1865): divine justice and the destiny of the spirit
- Genesis (1868): creation, miracles and the so-called natural laws
Outside the set are complementary works, such as What is Spiritism and Posthumous Works. If you want to start reading, the guide on The Spirits Book explains where to begin.
In parallel to the books, Kardec founded two structures that sustained the rest. The first was the Revue Spirite, a monthly magazine whose first issue came out on January 1, 1858. The second was the Parisian Society of Spiritist Studies, founded on April 1 of the same year, which he presided over until he died.
A detail of rigor comes from the spiritist encyclopedia itself. The Parisian Society was the first officially regularized, but there were already mediumistic groups before it, such as one in Cadiz since 1853.
Codifier or founder: why the word matters
Kardec insisted that he had invented nothing. He said he had codified, that is, gathered, tested and organized material that came from outside of him.
But there is a lively debate within the spiritist circle itself. Researcher Dora Incontri argues, in a text from the Brazilian Association of Spiritism Researchers, that the label of "codifier" shrinks his role. Kardec was not a passive compiler. He created the method, formulated the questions and applied critical scrutiny to the answers.
The discussion is internal and is not resolved in an article. But it shows one useful thing: spiritism has a human author, a date, a country and a bibliography. It is a specific tradition, from the 19th century, French. It is not synonymous with "everything that is spiritual," and it is not an umbrella for Umbanda or Candomblé, which have their own origin, liturgy and structure.
Death and the grave at Père-Lachaise
Allan Kardec died in Paris on March 31, 1869, at the age of 64, a victim of a ruptured aneurysm. He was working until the end.
He was buried in the Père-Lachaise cemetery, in division 44. The monument features a bronze bust by sculptor Charles Romain Capellaro, signed in 1870. On the stone pediment is the inscription that became a Spiritist motto: “To be born, to die, to be reborn again and to progress without ceasing, such is the law”. Amélie Boudet, who died in 1883, is buried with him.
The cemetery's friends' association records that the grave is one of the most visited and flowered in Père-Lachaise. A tourist folklore circulates there about placing a hand on the back of the statue's neck to make wishes. It is cemetery folklore, not doctrine, and nothing in Kardec's work supports this.
Why Brazil became the most Spiritist country in the world
Kardec never set foot in Brazil. Even so, it was here that the doctrine found the largest number of followers.
According to the IBGE Census, Spiritists were 2.2% of the population in 2010 and 1.8% in 2022, around 3 million people. There was a proportional drop between one census and the other, analyzed in detail by researchers in the field. Still, a 2020 survey by the Brazilian Association of Spiritism Messengers counted about 12,000 Spiritist centers in Brazil, compared to 740 in the rest of the world combined.
Part of the explanation lies in names like Chico Xavier, who popularized the doctrine with more than 400 psychographed books and a public life of charity. The rest lies in the meeting of Kardecism with religious practices that were already circulating here.
An important historical note: Umbanda engaged in dialogue with Kardecism at the beginning of the 20th century and absorbed part of the mediumship vocabulary. This does not mean that Umbanda "was born from Spiritism." They are distinct traditions that crossed paths in Brazil, each with its own roots. To understand the doctrine itself, the guide on what is Spiritism covers the pillars, and the text on mediumship deals with the practice.
Frequently asked questions
What was the true name of Allan Kardec?
Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail. He was born in Lyon, France, on October 3, 1804, and signed all his textbooks on pedagogy, grammar, and arithmetic as Rivail. The name Allan Kardec only appeared from 1857, in the signing of Spiritist works, to separate the two productions.
Was Allan Kardec a medium?
No. This is a consensus among Spiritist and biographical sources. Kardec was the researcher and organizer of the material, and he worked with mediums from various houses to obtain and compare the communications. His role was to formulate the questions, apply critical scrutiny, and systematize the answers into books.
Why is Kardec called a codifier and not a founder?
Because he claimed not to have created the doctrine, but only gathered, tested, and organized content that arrived through different mediums. The term became a Spiritist tradition. However, there is an internal debate arguing that "codifier" diminishes his role, since the investigation method was his own.
How did Allan Kardec die?
He died in Paris on March 31, 1869, at the age of 64, due to the rupture of an aneurysm. He is buried in the Père-Lachaise cemetery, in division 44, under a stone monument with a bronze bust. His wife, Amélie Boudet, was buried in the same grave in 1883.
What are the five basic works of Spiritism?
They are The Spirits' Book (1857), The Mediums' Book (1861), The Gospel According to Spiritism (1864), Heaven and Hell (1865) and Genesis (1868). This set forms the so-called Codification. Titles such as What is Spiritism and Posthumous Works exist, but are considered complementary.
Where to find the works and study material
At Joia Mística Laroyê, you find what you need to study and to consecrate your practice:
- The works of the Codification: The Spirits' Book and the other basic titles, in various editions
- Psychographed books: titles by Chico Xavier and other Brazilian mediums
- White candles: for moments of study, prayer, and the gospel at home
- Incenses and soft essences: to prepare the meeting environment
- Statues and framed pictures: for the study corner at home
Visit our physical store in Extrema, Minas Gerais and we ship all over Brazil. If you are just starting and do not know which book to begin with, talk to us via WhatsApp.
References
- Brazilian Spiritist Federation: birth certificate of Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail
- Wikipedia in English: entry about Allan Kardec
- Brazilian Spiritist Federation: list of Allan Kardec's works
- Encyclopedia of Spiritist Light: entry about the Parisian Society for Spiritist Studies
- Brazilian Association of Spiritism Researchers: article about Kardec and the term codificador
- Association des Amis et Passionnés du Père-Lachaise: page about the grave of Allan Kardec
- Religion and Power: article about the drop in the number of Spiritists in Brazil
