Jose Rizal, Filipino Patriot
By Herbert S. Bigelow
The Public 1 (March 18, 1899).
Selections from the address of the Rev. H. S. Bigelow, delivered at the Vine Street Congregational church, Cincinnati, Sunday night, February 12, 1899. From the author's manuscript. There came into my hands, the other day a pamphlet containing a biographical sketch of a great man. Very few will ever see this pamphlet, yet its contents should be known to every American. I consider it to be my duty, therefore, to assist in publishing the facts of this life. The pamphlet contains a translation from a life of Rizal, written by a German professor in the University of Leitmeritz, Austria. It is translated by a man who knew personally both Rizal and Aguinaldo. It is dedicated to Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo, who is characterized as "the liberator of his country, a chivalrous and brave warrior." Jose Rizal was a native of the island of Luzon, of which Manila is the capital. He was therefore a Malay, with the brown complexion, black eyes and straight, black hair which are the physical characteristics of his race. He graduated from the University of Madrid as doctor of medicine and philosophy. He pursued his graduate studies in Paris, Heidelberg, Leipzig and Berlin. Returning to his home in Manila he wrote and published a novel which excited the wrath of the government by its anti-Spanish sympathies, and by its exposure of the corruptness of the church on the islands. For the crime of telling what he believed to be the truth he was banished. He came to the United States, and from here he went to London, where he devoted himself to further study. About this time he produced another political novel. He then settled as a practicing physician in Hong Kong. From here he went to Borneo, where it was his intention to found a colony of Filipinos. In 1892 he returned to Manila, presumably for the purpose of recruiting his colony. He went at once to the home of his family, leaving his baggage in the customhouse. This baggage was opened, and in it there were found certain pamphlets of an anti-Spanish character. It has been charged that these pamphlets were smuggled into the baggage by some fanatical monks, and that the type from which they had been printed were found, still set up and in the possession of these monks. However, Rizal was banished a second time. This time he was sent to the island of Dapitan, where he was held a political prisoner under the close watch of Spanish guards. While he was on this island and under the eyes of his guards, another insurrection in the Philippines broke out. Though for the last four years he had been a prisoner on a distant island and under the constant surveillance of the authorities, still, when the insurrection broke out, he was taken to Manila on the charge of having incited the uprising; and, after the forms of law had been complied with, he was condemned to death, and shot on the 30th of December, 1896. Such is the brief outline of the story of his life. Rizal was a profound student of anthropology and ethnology. He was incited to master these studies by the behavior of the Spaniards, who always treated the natives as though they were by nature inferior. As a schoolboy he was often cut to the quick by their arrogance toward his people. He could not see why he should be despised because his skin was brown and his hair straight. He took delight in standing at the head of his class, just to prove to himself that the Spaniards were no better than his own people. He observed that when Europeans came to the islands they seemed to regard the natives as a species of animal fit only for menial service. What moral right, he asked, has the white man to look down on the men who have similar thoughts and studies as they and similar abilities, just because their skin is brown, or their hair is straight? He resolved to probe the matter to the bottom and see if there was any foundation for these claims of the haughty Spaniard.
In the schools of Manila he came to the conclusion that ability did not depend upon color. While pursuing his studies abroad he kept his eyes open to see what truth there was in the doctrine that he was an inferior being -- a doctrine, which his soul hated. In Madrid he became very bitter when he saw how great a contrast there was between the freedom which Spain enjoyed and the theocratic absolutism of his fatherland. He became disgusted with the selfishness of the Spanish politicians.He noticed, also, that ninety-nine out of every hundred Europeans believed without criticism all that the editors of their favorite newspapers chose to tell them. "That also happens to my Tagals," said he, "although they have no white skin." In France and Germany he lived among the peasants for months at a time for the purpose of studying their race characteristics. He came to the conclusion at last that "the human races are distinguished in their outward habits and in their build, but not in their psychology." "White, brown, yellow and black feel and are excited by all the same passions and emotions." He repudiated the doctrine of colonial politicians, that there are races of limited intelligence who can never rise to the level of Europeans. While the inhabitants of the Philippines belong to the mildest and most cultured branch of the Malay race, the race as a whole has been described by travelers as deceitful. To this charge of moral inferiority Rizal replies: Merchants come to the tropics to enrich themselves as soon as possible. This they can do only when they buy at extremely low prices in the country. The natives, however, consider such transactions as not fair business; believing that the white race are trying to deceive them, they take their means, also, to get the advantage of the Europeans, whilst among themselves they show far more honesty. The Europeans, consequently, denounce them as liars and deceivers; but that they, as Europeans, prey upon the natives, never appears to enter their heads. On the contrary, the white race believe they are morally entitled to trade with them in immoral ways. These reflections of Rizal require no comment. Race pride and rapacity are the charges which Rizal brings against the Spaniards. And yet, as for race pride, I think history proves that the Spaniards have been not quite so bad as the Americans. There is no other nation so hopelessly prejudiced against the colored man as we. When, right here at home, the laws are ignored and men are lynched, almost daily, because of race prejudice, he must be an optimist indeed who believes that Americans will be less prejudiced 3,000 miles away from home. There are places in our country where men are supposed to enjoy all the rights guaranteed by the constitution, where, nevertheless, the colored man who should dare to vote his convictions would be shot down with impunity. This can occur at home where the rights of the negro are protected by powerful political interests. What, therefore, may the Philippines expect who are to be ruled as subject people without even a nominal claim to the protection of the constitution; who are to be ruled by men that will have 3,000 miles of ocean between them and the government to which they are responsible; and, who are to exercise control over people who cannot look to great political interests, as the negroes can, for protection? Maybe there is some alchemy in the Pacific breezes which will neutralize the race pride for which we have become infamous; but if I were a Filipino I should not care to put faith in it. A Spanish newspaper, commenting on the death of Rizal, said:
What a misfortune parliament was not sitting when the Filipino insurrection broke out! Romero Robledo would have raised his voice as he is now doing in defense of those who have fallen victims to unjust outrages; he would have closed the road to calumny and perhaps have prevented the soil of the Philippines from being stained with the blood of Rizal, impiously shot by the authorities in cold blood.... Injustice has always been the mother of odium and future wars. And this from a Spanish newspaper! Perhaps some will ask why if any considerable number of Spaniards felt in that way the authorities were permitted to carry things with such a high hand. Our author answers the question for us. And in his analysis of the situation in Spain I see a very close analogy to our own situation. There are Spaniards and Spaniards; some who represent the worst phases of official corruption; others who are keenly sensitive of the existence and deleterious effects of the vices that have crept in and are undermining the virility of the nation. These have no sympathy with the excesses committed by, or with the connivance of, the ruling authorities, but denounce them in far stronger language than I have used; unfortunately they are at present powerless to effect any improvement, and whilst the constitution of Spain remains unchanged, and the people exercise no direct control in the management of their affairs it is useless to look for any reform. Some day, perhaps, the Spanish laity will assert itself in Spain and make a clean sweep of the foul, reeking hotbed of official corruption, together with the parasites that habitually live on the budget. Then and only then will Spain be able to lift her head and take her proper place among the nations of the earth. This is indeed an unexpected place to find a demand for direct legislation; yet it appears that even Spaniards are waking up to the truth that until the people have the right to vote on these questions they are at the mercy of the designing politicians whose very existence depends upon the multiplication of offices as opportunities for plunder. In spite of the protests of humane Spaniards, then, Rizal was shot. One hour before his execution this gifted Filipino married his betrothed, a charming Irish girl, who afterward became a Philippine Joan of Arc. What a time for a wedding! How this reminds us of the last hours of Robert Emmet! The bride followed her lover to the place of execution. What a wedding march! Yet they would not permit her to give his body a decent burial. His own countrymen were compelled to do the shooting. Back of this row of Filipinos stood Spanish soldiers, ready to cut them down if they shrank from their cruel business. "Never," says an eyewitness, "never shall I forget that awful morning, nor the horror-thrill that came with the report of crackling rifles as his mangled body fell on the public promenade, amid the jeers of Spaniards and monks, who had consummated thus one of the most cold-blooded crimes registered in history since the tragedy of Golgotha. My blood boiled, and from that hour I espoused the Filipino cause."
Why did Spain shoot Rizal? Because he was found guilty of encouraging his countrymen to take up arms to secure their independence. Why are we shooting the Filipinos? Because, now that we have bought from Spain the right to lord it over those people, they are guilty of taking up arms against us to secure their independence. Our right to control the Filipinos is no better than Spain's right, unless might makes right. If Spain committed a crime in shooting Rizal, then, before God we are criminals. The fact that we believe ourselves able to govern the islands better than Spain, or better than the people themselves, does not change the moral status of the question a hair's breadth. If the conqueror is justified in conquering because he has implicit faith in himself, then there never was an unrighteous war. If national conceit, backed up by superior force, is sufficient justification for a war of conquest, then there is no such thing as right in this world and no safety whatever for any man's liberty who has not the power to defend it by brute strength. If our right to shoot down Filipinos is to be sustained by the necessities of trade and our own good opinion of ourselves, then our patriotism is only a maudlin sentiment and our Christian professions are a shameless mockery. On the day following Rizal's death his widow passed the Spanish lines at Manila, and made her way on foot to the camp of the insurgents. There she met Aguinaldo. He gave her command of a company, at the head of which this Irish bride gained more than one victory. Tonight this modern Joan of Arc may be dying on the battlefield, slain by American soldiers. Oh God! that we should have lived to see fair America, mad with visions of world-kingdoms and their glory, kneeling at the feet of him whom to serve is greed and hate and hell and death. Before he died Rizal wrote a poem which was his dying message to his native land. Can you listen to these words and not wish that all this horrid dream were over, and we were standing once more on the side of the oppressed? Can you listen to the lofty words of this gifted Tagal, and not blush for shame at our hypocritical doubts about the ability or the right of these men to govern themselves?
Farewell, adored Fatherland; our Eden lost, farewell; Farewell, O Sun's loved region, pearl of the eastern sea; Gladly I die for thy dear sake; yea, thou knowest well Were my sad life more radiant far than mortal tongue could tell, Yet would I give it gladly, joyously for thee. On blood-stained fields of battle, fast locked in maddening strife, Thy sons have dying blest thee, untouched by doubt or fear. No matter wreaths of laurel; no matter where our life ebbs out On scaffold or in combat, or under torturer's knife, We welcome death, if for our hearths, or for our country dear. Pray for those who died alone, betrayed, in wretchedness; For those who suffered for thy sake torments and misery; For broken hearts of mothers who weep in bitterness; For widows, tortured captives, orphans in deep distress; And pray for thy dear self, that thou may'st finally be free. Farewell, adored country; I leave my all with thee, Beloved Philippines, whose soil my feet have trod, I leave with thee my life's love deep; I go where all are free; I go where are no torturers, where the oppressor's power shall be Destroyed, where faith kills not, where he who reigns is God. Farewell, my parents, brothers, friends of my childhood days, Dear fragments of my heart, once to my bosom pressed Round our lost hearth. Give thanks to God in glad tranquillity, That after day's long weary hours, I sleep eternally. Farewell, beloved friends and stranger sweet; to die is but to rest.
Herbert S. Bigelow (1870-1951) was a member of the executive committee of the Cincinnati Anti-Imperialist League and a vice president of the national American Anti-Imperialist League. He delivered the opening prayer at the August 1900 Liberty Congress held by the Anti-Imperialist League to determine its strategy during the 1900 presidential campaign. Bigelow was the pastor of the Vine Street Congregational Church in Cincinnati (which he renamed the People's Church), a nationally prominent single taxer, and an associate of the progressive Ohio reform mayors, Tom L. Johnson and Brand Whitlock.
From the 1500s throughout the 1800s, Spain dominated the Philippines as a colony. The natives of the Philippines, known as Filipinos, became subjected to foreign taxes and forced labor. All Filipino families and unmarried adults were expected to pay the head tax, which brought great profits to the officials. Another Spanish government fee was known as the falla. A Filipino could be exempted from forced labor by paying the falla. Those who could not afford the fee were forced to work for the foreign government from 16 to 60 years of age. The Filipinos built roads and bridges, worked in shipyards and cut timber for no pay—just a ration of rice. Downtrodden and humiliated, the laborers did not know what it meant anymore to be Filipino. One person who helped lead the people to a sense of cultural identity was José Rizal. José was the seventh child of a family with 11 children. His father was a prosperous farmer, and his mother had been well educated.
The Importance Of Education
Fortunately, José received many opportunities at education. He attended the University of Santo Tomas in Manila. In 1882, he moved to Spain where he studied medicine and philosophy. He received not only an academic education but a political one as well. He saw the freedoms that the Spanish citizens enjoyed compared to the oppression of his fellow Filipinos back home. Leaving Spain, José continued his studies in Paris and Heidelberg—studying medicine and also writing on the side. His first novel published in 1886 was written in Spanish and titled Noli Me Tangere ("Touch Me Not"). The book was a passionate exposé about the evils of the Spanish friars in his homeland.
Reform Through Writing
Through his writings, José become the leader of what was called the Propaganda Movement. He wrote numerous articles for the Barcelona newspaper La Solidaridad. José advocated replacing the Spanish friars with Filipino priests and that Filipinos and Spaniards should be equal in the eyes of the law. He also wrote about the Philippines which existed before the Spanish invasion, giving everyone a truer sense of cultural identity. When he was approximately 26, José returned to the Philippines, where his works had been widely read and were causing a growing excitement. As a sequel to his first novel, José published the book called El Filibusterismo ("The Subversive") in 1891. This novel implied that armed revolution might be the only path to effect social change. He dedicated the novel to the three Filipino priests (José Burgos, Mariano Gomez and Jacinto Zamora) who were declared traitors and executed in Spain.
In Exile
José was charged with formulating unrest against Spain. As a result, he was exiled in 1892 to an island south of the Philippines called Dapitan. He remained in exile for four years. During that time, he founded a school, a hospital and did scientific research. He fell in love with an Irish woman named Josephine Bracken. In June 1896, Jose received a visit from a representative of the Katipunan. This was a secret society of Filipinos determined to win independence from Spain. José felt it was too early for a revolution that more funds and weapons were needed to achieve victory. The Katipuneros began the revolution anyway on Aug. 30 of that same year. As the revolution spread, even Filipinos who were not involved were arrested and placed in prison as suspected rebels. This included José who was arrested and charged with rebellion and sedition. He was brought to Manila where the Spanish military court sentenced him to death by firing squad. While in his prison cell at Fort Santiago, José wrote the poem Mi Ultimo Adios ("My Last Farewell"). By 3 a.m. 30 Dec. 1896, José had confessed to a priest and then received Holy Communion. Within a chapel at the fort, José was allowed to marry his fiancée, Josephine. The ceremony began at 5 a.m. By 6:30 a.m., they were officially married. Instead of a honeymoon, however, they would proceed to the execution site. Josephine accompanied José who was being escorted to the Campo de Bagumbayan. While in an open field overlooking the South China Sea, José was executed.
No Time To Lose
The day after the execution, Josephine arrived at a camp of insurgents. She was given command of a company of soldiers. She fought for many weeks in active combat then found José had been correct. The Filipinos did not have enough quality weapons to obtain victory. She escaped through Japan and then headed to the United States to obtain firearms. Her friends convinced her not to return to the Philippines and the certain death which awaited if she was captured. The day of execution for José is still held in solemn memory in the Philippines with 30 December as José Rizal Day.
*** P H I L I P P I N E S ***
JOSÉ RIZAL
Born: 19 Jun. 1861
Died: 30 Dec. 1896
Age: 35
'Those who cannot see where they came from will never get to where they are going.'
- José Rizal -
RIZAL, THE MORPHING HERO.
Jose Rizal has three faces. Jose Rizal for the masses. Jose Rizal for the Academic. Jose Rizal for the target shooters. Jose Rizal for the masses is pretty straightforward. He is the Montemayor Rizal (Jose Rizal, A Biographical Sketch - by Teofilo H. Montemayor). He was born in Calamba, Laguna, on June 19, 1861. He died (by musketry) December 30, 1896 at Bagumbayan. Between those years he became the Philippines' greatest hero because he agitated for Philippine independence from Spain, for which he was shot. He was a genius, an architect, an artist, businessman, cartoonist, educator, economist, ethnologist, scientific farmer, historian, inventor, journalist, linguist, musician, mythologist, nationalist, naturalist, novelist, ophthalmic surgeon, painter, physician-surgeon, poet, propagandist, psychologist, scientist, sculptor, sociologist, and theologian. He mastered 22 languages; these included Arabic, Catalan, Chinese, English, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Malayan, Portugese, Russian, Sanskrit, Spanish, Tagalog, and other native dialects. He was an expert swordsman and a good shot. I suspect that if Mr. Montemayor was courageous enough to write that on the third day after he died he arose from the dead, Dr. Jose Rizal would be that too. Period. The target shooter's Rizal is also a clear-cut face. A hero he is not. He was a promiscuous world traveler who fathered Hitler. He was America's choice of a hero for the Filipinos; and since anything America does relative to the Philippines is decadent and sinister, he therefore cannot be a Filipino hero. And because he was not for Philippine independence he was unpatriotic; because he was not for armed rebellion against Spain, he was too docile; and Filipinos need a macho hero. He recanted his anti-friar writings when faced with execution to save his skin (which did not work because they shot him anyway); and any Filipino related to Chairman Mao cannot be a hero. If this face of Rizal would concede to hero status, it is only as an accidental hero since he got killed for the wrong reason. Rizal for the academic is quite a different breed. He is a Rizal within a computer graphics program, and whoever holds the mouse to click-and-drag his image decides how he looks. How far Rizal gets clicked-and-dragged is limited by existing historical documents written by and about him; but where no such historical documents exist, Rizal's distortion is only limited by the academic's fear of loss of his own credibility to his peers. But does it really matter? The target shooters and the masses that form the far greater majority are all set with their image, and nothing in their personalities will allow anyone to change the way their Rizal looks. Any academic who ventures beyond the peer-credibility boundary to be interesting, edges dangerously closer towards the target shooter's camp; and this danger of reclassification is enough to make any academic cringe. "An Oriental Don Quixote", say Retana. "A fearless dreamer," quips Unamuno. "A victim of his inferiority complex", Radaic insists. Any other takers? "Yes, me. My name is Jose Protacio Rizal Mercado y Alonso. Profession: Martyr, and I hold the mouse. I was lucky to be born very smart. When I was a child, I was impressed by a story about a moth that got extra crispy when it got attracted to and got too close to a flame. It was a glorious death - seeking for the light. Since then, on and off throughout my life, I have had this death wish. I have rehearsed this dying act a thousand times in my mind - a dying that shall be remembered by my countrymen as the best dying act by a Filipino of all time; not like the whimpering one by father Burgos of the 1872 Cavite mutiny fame. The Jesuit priests who taught me my Catholic religion reinforced this death wish by telling me about Jesus Christ whose greatest triumph was his dignified death on cross. I grew up in an atmosphere of suppression by the Friars of my time. They and the non-cleric Spaniards in the Philippines told me that I was inferior; and indeed I had this inferiority complex. But I compensated for it well. Physically, I felt inferior at not more than 5 feet and two inches tall on my bare feet, fully grown, but I took care of that; I made Ibarra, the hero in my Noli novel, taller than most. I grew up skinny and with a big head. The last picture of me standing before the Filipino firing squad showed this bit of dis-proportionality well because I was not wearing my favorite overcoat - like the one I usually wear in my photographs to balance out my physique. Weight lifting helped some, which I kept up as much as I could during my life. Intellectually I knew I was at least as good as them, but I also knew that I had to be better if I was going to show them that I was at least their equal. I became an obsessive-compulsive, with a rigidly structured life, because I had this goal always foremost in my mind. These then were my weapons for success: intelligence and an obsessive-compulsive personality. I grew up with periods of depression. This was hinted at by my biographer Austin Coates, but picked up more extensively by the Spanish pediatrician and historian Jose Baron Fernandez. He attributed this to the many times my yaya scared me about aswangs. I guess this would make the majority of Filipinos depressed. Neither he, nor I as a physician, had any way of knowing during our respective times that this depression was really due to a periodic biochemical deficiency in the neurotransmitters in my brain, and was in essence a biochemical illness rather than a "mental" one. Had I been born a century later, I would not have to go through these periods. All I would need to do is simply pop my pill of Prozac or Zoloft, or which ever one a drug agent would provide me as samples in my clinic. But I can see an advantage to being depressive: this meshed quite well with my death wish, and dying by a depressed death-whisher at a proper time would be no sweat; it would be heaven sent. Now all I have to do is look for a good reason to die for. I grew up in a big family, with nine girls and my only brother Paciano. My mother, an intelligent and educated woman, feared that my intelligence could easily get me garroted by the Friars; for the Friars greatest threat to the way they lived was an intelligent independent thinking indio. Indio, thats what they called us native Filipinos. So she tried to blunt this threat to them to protect me by teaching me the virtues of humility and self-effacement. For example, if someone said I was prescient in predicting the take over of the Philippines by the United States, I would say I got lucky because I thought it would happen in a century instead of within three years, and besides, I was just appropriating my friend Professor Feodor Jagor's original idea; or if Leonora Rivera told me I had beautiful, romantic eyes, I would say 'you need an ophthalmologist'. My mother really made sure I would find it difficult to accept a compliment, instead of just saying thank you. I liked to absorb things by observing people and surroundings, by reading a lot of books, and by listening more than talking. In fact I preferred to express myself in writing, which I was very good at, than by talking; besides I had a lisp (Karnow), and because I was not inherently strong, I did not have the lung capacity to be talking a lot. There was no one in my immediate family who was of the oratorical type to influence me. Consequently, I found being a doctor a good profession next to being a martyr. Medicine balanced out my inherent extreme sensitivity with its requirement for rigorous objectivity. I absorbed the medical materials in silence, and when I became a doctor, all I had to say when I was with patients was hmm...hmm, wrote a prescription, and the pharmacist or my nurse would explain how it was taken. If someone needed surgery, all I would need to say was 'surgery', and except for an occasional 'scalpel, hemostat, sponge and tie' request to the operating room nurse, I could operate efficiently in silence. Talking robs me of time for absorbing knowledge. When anyone talks, it is either to impart knowledge to others, or to expose one's ignorance either by asking (which is not necessarily bad), or giving untrue information. In either case, it is time taken away from absorbing knowledge. In fact, if, in addition to the reading, listening, observing, drawing, painting, sculpturing, annotating Morga, and writing prodigiously, I had to talk, I would have needed at least another two to three years of life before I would have reached my level of knowledge, opinion, and maturity to finally start writing the Noli. And if I spent more time talking instead of writing it, it would have pushed the Noli's time table farther. This in turn would have pushed farther in time many of the other happenings around me by a few of years that I would have to be executed at Bagumbayan by, say, December 30, 1899. By then, the Spanish-American war of 1898 would be over, and the Philippines would have been sold to the United States by Spain for $20,000,000, and I would have most probably missed my destiny with martyrdom. Whew, I'm sure glad I do not talk much, otherwise I would not have been able to practice my primary profession. It would have been goodbye hero! I did not like extemporaneous speeches either, something that came so easy for my friend Lopez Jaena and del Pilar. I did not feel secure doing speeches, and I had to prepare long and hard for when I had to address a gathering. The words would have to be perfect because I did not want imperfect words to haunt me. When we were planning a party for my friends Juan Luna and Felix Hidalgo at the Restaurant Inglis on June 1884 - this was the time they won the National Exhibition of Fine Arts contest in Madrid - I secretly prepared a Toast-Speech for them. Writing the material was easy, but the presentation had to be perfect. I practiced my delivery many, many times. When I was sure I could do it well, I then requested Pete Paterno if I could give the toast instead of him. He was kind enough to let me. I got through it all right - lisp and all. The press reports glowed, it reached the Philippines, and almost gave my mom a heart attack. She was so sure that the patriotic undertones of my speech would get the attention of the Friars. She was, of course, right. But I had to start somewhere - getting the attention of the Friars, that is. You see, my brother Paciano and I had this pact - a simple one, of me going off to Spain to be educated; and eventually, by any and all means, squeal on the Friars. So off I went to Spain. Paciano was to stay in the Philippines, which he did, to take care of the family and earn money for my schooling and allowance. I was supposed to tell mother Spain, mainly by my writings, that the Friars in the Philippines were bad boys, bullying us natives. I was hoping to do it with the rest of the Filipinos who were there in Europe to get educated, like me. We made headways now and then, but in the end we really never got anywhere, so I decided to write the Noli. I figure, if I would not be getting the full cooperation of the guys in the task of squealing on the Friars, I would do it alone. Besides, I did things better alone - I was not really a team player at heart. My friend Blumentritt, as usual, was right. He advised me to write a book, instead of writing for newspapers. He figured, and I agreed, that newspapers do not stick around long enough - and in the Philippines they often ended up used in the outhouse. And there is something about writing a book that is more aristocratic. 'He wrote a book' sounds more sophisticated than 'he had an article in a newspaper'. My colleagues del Pilar and Lopez Jaena were essentially writing about the same things that I was writing about - exposing the abuses of the friars, but my book got more attention because it was a book. So, in a way, it was the vehicle and not the message that made the difference. I had a lot of difficulties surrounding the writing of my first novel. Firstly, I did not have enough money to publish it. Secondly, I was not sure what language, of the many I became proficient at, to write it in. If I wrote the novel in Spanish to tell Spain about the Friars being bad boys, Spain would just ask them if this was so - naturally they would just say 'no, who said so?'. Now, if I wrote the novel in Spanish to tell the Friars themselves that they were bad, they would just say 'we know that, so sue us'. If I wrote the novel in Spanish for the educated filipinos in the Philippines, they would just say 'so what's new? Am I in the novel?'. If I wrote it in Spanish for my uneducated countrymen, they hardly knew Spanish, so I would have to write it in Tagalog, and Spain would not know what I was talking about. And what about the Visayans, the Ilongos, the Waray's? ...oh heck. So I decided to write it in Spanish anyway, and Bahala Na!. Unfortunately Bahala Na was not enough. I should have thought this one through better, because when I ratted on the Friars, I hoped against probability that they would fall on their knees, shed tears, and say 'okay, okay, you got us. We will change, just give us a little time to make amends'. Instead they just started going after my dear family, and I almost died of guilt. But I could not let this happen - dying of guilt, because I was planning to die of martyrdom. This was my profession. So I decided to go back to the Philippines, to try to make up for what I had done to my family. When I told everyone I was coming home, everyone was against it. They told me it was dangerous, that the Friars would have me killed. Well, I did not really tell everyone - just my family and a few friends - but somehow these things have a way of getting around; and I was getting famous because of my Speech-Toast. I was not really afraid of coming home because I had a secret. As a matter of fact I had more than one secret; I had two. One, I had a death wish, and two, I was a Freemason. So if I got killed, then I get to practice my primary profession. Hopefully, it would take the heat off my family. On the other hand, my freemason fraternity brothers would afford me some protection. Many of the people who write about me just zips through this aspect of my life and just says that it is a secret society. Yes, there are aspects about it that are secret - the rites and ceremonies, but on the whole this fraternity aims to make truth seekers and charitable persons out of our members. Freemasons do not advertise their goodness, and to the best of our abilities we always extend help to our frat members; this is a very important code we follow. We also believe in God, and Catholics can be freemasons without giving up their religion. Contrast this with what the church did to me when I became a freemason. They kicked me out, and in my last days the friars so badly wanted me to denounce my fraternity. But my frat brothers were always there for me. Austin Coates picked up on the fact that my last meal was spent with my officer frat brothers in Fort Santiago. They would not set me free because they could not, but they sure were lenient to me during my stay there. My frat brothers, when I got home to the Philippines, were there to blunt the dangers directed at me by the friars. Freemason Governor General Terrero extended me protection, and even gave me a bodyguard. Terrero himself advised me to leave the country when he was getting too much heat from the friars for coddling me. This fraternity gave the Filipinos their first whiff of ideas threatening to the friars, such as liberty, equality, fraternity and independence." (Fajardo: Masonry and the Philippine Revolution). This fraternity was one of the exhilarating thing that I got into when I went to Spain and other parts of Europe. The other was the freedom to think freely and say something stupid without fear of the locals breathing down my neck or punishing me. This was the kind of atmosphere I wished for my native land, and worked for. I just wanted the Filipinos to have the same rights as the rest of the citizens of Spain. I did not want to be separate from Spain. I figure that building up a poor country from the ground up independently would take more than a century, but by being a state of Spain, on equal footing with the rest of her states, it would catapult the Philippines rapidly through the twentieth century economically and culturally. But I guess Spain found the Philippines too unimportant, and besides frequent changes in the Spanish government between liberals and conservatives did not make for a consistent policy and attention to the least of her colonies - us indios. Cuba and Puerto Rico were closer to her national consciousness - especially Cuba. She was Spain's national pride - a gift from God for driving the Moslems out of Spain back in time. Oops, I should be careful not to get too carried away with historical events around my life. Though important in its effect on my personality, too much can detract from who I am. So I went home, gained some concessions for my family's safety from the local administration of Terrero, felt the heat from the Friars, and finally, after just a few months, left again via the United States, got to Europe, annotated Morga in England, and wrote my other novel, the Fili. Same results: it stirred up the Friars like hornets. But I just could not stay in one place - I guess I get too restless. I tried to get a contingent of my fellow Calambans over to North Borneo as overseas workers for a North Borneo company, but was not successful. Good thing, because looking back it was more of an escapist mentality that made me consider the move. I then moved to Hong Kong, practiced ophthalmology a bit, earned some money, got together with some of my family, but my death wish got the best of me. I had to go back to the Philippines. And so I did - to Dapitan. Four years of my life there - four long years to test my soul. Worse than the death that I envisioned - this was a slow death. I got deported there because the friars finally got the upper hand and wanted me snuffed out. On trumped up charges, Governor General Despujol compromised and sent me there on exile. Towards the end of my stay there, the loneliness finally took its toll on my principles. A bit earlier on I had this ongoing correspondence with Father Pastells over theological matters. We were actually like two ships destined to just pass each other. He was interested in saving my soul from what he thought was my slide away from the Catholic Religion of my younger days, but I was merely interested in the didactic of a theological interchange to show him that I knew my theology - a bit arrogant of me, I must admit. But I finally got tired of it and abruptly ended the interchange. I tried to fight off my depression by doing a lot for the community. The people there loved me for it. But eventually this doing for others to do something for me got old, and I had to get out of Dapitan - even if I had to sacrifice some of my principles a bit. Jose Marti, my counterpart out there in Cuba, was rallying his countrymen to fight for their independence from Spain. He was also an intellectual, a poet, and a patriot. He wrote prodigiously for Cuban independence from Spain. He eventually became Cuba's national hero after he died in an ambush in Cuba a year before I got shot. I hated the idea, in principle, of helping to thwart his country's struggle for independence, but I was rotting inside from the effect of my isolation in Dapitan. So I volunteered to join his enemies by volunteering my service as a physician to the Spanish Military. It was not for want of patients to take care of because Dapitan had enough sick people to occupy my attention every day. I was just rotting inside. Some of my family members would visit me to cheer me up, because they knew I could not survive in that quiet torture of intellectual isolation. But that was not enough; and some of their visits inadvertently brought added depression by unwelcome news, like a brother-in-law's unfortunate state, or the death of Leonora Rivera - she who always owned a piece of my heart. I even welcomed a would be assassin sent by the friars; he never got around to finishing me off, but not for lack of opportunity. I slept through his presence in my house, and because I had gotten so depressed he would have done me a favor by killing me. But he had a change of heart, I guess, because I lived to suffer more days in Dapitan.
It was toward the latter half of my Dapitan days when I experienced first hand what the cliché 'I'd rather be lucky than smart' meant. Into my life fate sent Josephine Bracken. Oh lucky me. We wanted to get married, but the Catholic Church set up too high a price to perform the ceremony. They wanted me to undo what I had done most of my life leading up to this moment - to retract what I had worked for. I guess I could have gotten married in a Protestant church or in some other minor religion, but in spite of what the clergy said of me, I was still a Catholic. So we lived as husband and wife without church sanction. When Josephine left for a short while to bring her dad halfway back to Hong Kong, I again got lonely and depressed; but she came back. Eventually the inevitable happened - we got careless and she got pregnant (ask Austin Coates). Now, if there was anything I detested about the Friars, next to their persecution of my family, it was their indiscriminate copulation with the filipino women, in the guise of religious authority, to irresponsibly reproduce without regard for the illegitimate mestizos they created. I know this because I lived with some of these hybrids in my student days in the dormitories outside of Intramuros. That Maria Clara of my Noli was the illegitimate daughter of Padre Damaso was no coincidence. The Vatican roulette of birth control just does not do enough to population control; it just does not cut it. Being a physician, I should have known better. I just could not live with the thought of having an illegitimate child, a son, with an uncertain future; with my own future quite murky. Nor could I live with the idea that I might not be around to fulfill my parental responsibility since my death wish had been quite strong in those later Dapitan days. I finally did what I felt I had to do, with the knowledge as a physician I possessed - I aborted the further development of my genetic code. Quietly, on that dark night, I buried a piece of my soul in some unmarked earth somewhere in Dapitan. This then is what Dapitan meant to me: the lowest point in my life. The threshold to my principles had finally been breached. And so on to Bagumbayan I went, with the help of the Friars and the Spanish authorities. The revolution had already started in the Tagalog regions in my absence, but I was blamed for it. I did not mind dying, but I minded dying for something I did not do. It was all a matter of principle - or what was left of it. I had to tell everyone: LISTEN - for the record, kill me, but kill me for the facts. Do not kill me for the revolution which I had no part of and which I condemn. But my protestations for the sake of truth-in-execution was not good enough. Nothing was to be good enough. The authorities' mind was set - I was to be shot - for any reason.
December 29, 1896. I had twenty four hours to live, twenty fours hours to accomplish so many things. I needed to marry Josephine. I needed to confess my sins, and avoid wandering about in purgatory saying hi here to Andy Cunanan, and hi there to Richard Speck. I needed to say goodbye to my family, and everybody else important to me. I needed to write my Ultimo Adios. Unfortunately, I could not confess my sins and marry Josephine unless I hammered out a document with the Catholic Church, which eventually was called my retraction. This I accomplished with the Jesuit priests who kept me company and awake most of my last twenty four hours. This agreed on document - and I will explain each line so there is no misunderstanding what I meant, and I will rearrange the sequence of the sentences so that the declarations will be separate from the retractions - said: . "I declare myself a Catholic, and in this Religion, in which I was born and educated, I wish to live and die".. "I believe and profess everything she teaches, and I submit to all she orders" The first two lines are declarations of INTENTIONS AND BELIEFS that any practicing Catholic can declare. Inability to carry out each and every intention does not nullify ones Catholicism since no one is perfect. This declaration was necessary to convince the authorities that I had not become a Protestant or an Agnostic. Since I had become neither, the declarations were nothing new, so I agreed to it.
. "I retract with all my heart everything in my words, writings, publications and conduct that has been contrary to my condition as a son of the Church".
Nothing in my words, writings, and publications has been contrary to my condition as a son of the Church. My words, writings, and publications never condemned the Church. It only exposed the truth of the abuses of the Friars and a plea for reforms of equality for my countrymen. This part of the retraction therefore is a retraction of something that did not exist. As far as Josephine and my unborn son were concerned, those were not retractable situations, only regrettable ones, and therefore did not apply in the context of this part of this retraction statement.
. "I abominate Freemasonry as the enemy that it is of the Church and as a Society prohibited by the same Church."
"I abominate Freemasonry", period, is different from "I abominate Freemasonry as the enemy that it is…", etc.
The Freemasonry that the Church thinks it is and is her enemy is not the same as the Freemasonry that it really is. The Church thinks it is some kind of Satanic cult that is anti-Catholic, when in reality it is fraternity whose aims is to make better men out of men. The Freemasonry that I agreed to abominate, then, is the Freemasonry that exists only in the mind, if you will, of the Church. It is then a theoretical abomination which I have no qualms abominating.
. "The Diocesan Prelate, as the highest Ecclesiastical Authority, may publicize this, my spontaneous statement, in reparation for the scandal that my acts may have caused, so that God and men may forgive me."
The line starts with a declaration of fact: that in the organizational structure of the local church the Diocesan Prelate is the highest Ecclesiastical Authority. Since this is a statement of fact, there is nothing controversial about this point. Publicizing this document with its two innocuous declarations lines, a non-retraction retraction, an abomination of a non-existent abomination as payment for damages, so I would receive God and men's forgiveness, is a no-brainer. I accepted this part wholeheartedly. So I gladly signed this non-retraction 'retraction' on December 29, 1896, after which I got married, got to confess my sins, achieved forgiveness and peace, said my goodbye to my Motherland, and in the last stanza of my Ultimo Adios, said goodbye to my unborn son, my parents, my siblings who were the last remaining 'pieces of my soul'; and of course, Josie. There is something very unique about this profession of martyr. You only get to practice it once. The years of planning comes to one single focal moment, and on that moment hinges the verdict of history. You either die in glory and become a hero, or you flub it and become just another body. My obsessive compulsive nature came into good use: I dressed, as always, impeccably. My timely confession was a great help: I had no look of guilt about me. My fellow physician came through for me: he gave me a good pulse reading to give me an air of peace and calm. And as luck would have it, I was to be executed by musketry, thus making it very likely that I would fall down to the ground facing up to the blue skies over Bagumbayan - easily interpretable by my onlookers and admirers as an act of extreme will. A couple of years before, Spain had ordered a couple of hundred of the new 7mm Mauser smokeless powder rifle for use in the Philippines. The Mauser Company called it, good guess, the Spanish Mauser model 93. This new rifle had greater penetrating power, but being of a smaller caliber had less knock-down power than the older muskets - sort of like the difference between being impaled on a sword as against being hit splat by a moving train. So this is where my luck came in: they did not use the new 7 mm Mausers on me. They used the older muskets. All I had to do then was ask my Filipino executioners to shoot me to the left of my spine where they believed my heart to be. Because of the knocking power of the older model, the force of the projectiles twisted me to the right along the long axis of my spine, thus I ended with my face up. As I had alluded to in the past, there are times where I prefer to be lucky than smart. And so I finally get a chance to say what I have been waiting for all my life to say - just like Jesus Christ: Consummatum Est! It is finished."
CONCLUDING STATEMENTS - (sept 23, 1999)
Initially, I thought Rizal should vacate Luneta until I knew enough of him to decide on his hero status. Should Dr. Jose Rizal be a Philippine national hero? Yes, definitely - among the many. He accomplished in just 35 years what everyone else would have accomplished at twice that number of years - if at all. Is he still relevant to today's Philippines? Yes, certain aspects of him - like his single-mindedness of purpose, his discipline, his love of country, his desire for the Philippines to progress economically and mature culturally in the speediest of ways; like his views in the control of procreation and responsible population growth consistent with what each family can responsibly support. I say, put him back up on his old pedestal at Luneta. Jose Rizal was born, the seventh child of Francisco Mercado Rizal and Teodora Alonso, on June 19, 1861. His parents belonged to the middle class and lived on the tenant land ownedby the friars in Calamba,Laguna. In his early childhood, Rizal was under the tutorship of his mother who taught him the three R’s. He mastered the alphabet at the age of three. After two years of tutoring, he could read the Spanish version of the Vulgate bible. When he was eight years old, he wrote a play in Tagalog and this was presented at a Calamba fiesta. Even at an early age, he showed artistic talent in painting and sculpture. Pepe Rizal’s formal schooling started when, at the age of eleven, he was admitted into the Ateneo Municipal which was then under the supervision of the Spanish Jesuits. The curriculum of the five-year secondary course (leading to the degree of Bachiller en Artes or AB), included subjects such as Christian doctrine, Sacred history, Latin, Spanish, Greek, French, English, Algebra, Trigonometry, Geometry, Universal history, Spanish history, Latin literature, rhetoric and poetics, Social ethics, Psychology, Logic and other branches of Philosophy. Young Rizal tackled his work as a genious would. He captured many honors in literary and artistic contests. He always had an edge over his classmates and he stayed at the top even during the written and oral examinations. His report cards were usually marked sobresaliente (excellent). Whenever there was an oratorical tilt, Pepe Rizal was there winning medals as usual. He wrote a playlet in Spanish called "Junto al Pasig", which was presented in school. On the spiritual side of school activities, Rizal was also a high-point man. He was Prefect of the Sodality of Our Lady with Fr. Pablo Pastells, S.J. as the Director.