Noli

Me
Tangere
Jose Rizal

Noli Me Tangere

La.n phrase which means touch me not

taken from the Gospel of Saint John (John 20:17)

Touch me not; I am not yet ascended to my Father, but go to

my brethren, and say unto them, I ascent unto my Father,
and your Father; and to my God and your God

Synopsis of the Novel

The plot revolves around Crisostomo Ibarra, mixed-race heir of a
wealthy clan, returning home aNer seven years in Europe.
In their celebra.on, Ibarra gave a favorable impression to the guests
except for Padre Damaso who was rude to him.
Ibarra went straight to the hotel and met the kind Lieutenant.
The next morning, he visited Maria Clara, his childhood sweetheart and
had a roman.c reunion.
In his town, he met several interes.ng people and one of them was
Tasio the Philosopher whose ideas were advance.
The most tragic story is about Sis who was a rich girl who later became
poor because of her gambler husband.

 Ibarra saved Elias life.

In San Diego, Elias warned Ibarra that there is someone who wanted to
kill him.
ANer which, the story of Elias was told. His life was like of Sisa.
The novel ends with Maria Clara an unhappy nun in Santa Clara
nunnery.

When and How the Noli was wriVen

Inspira.on: Harriet Beecher Stowes Uncle
Toms Cabin
portrays the brutali.es of American slave-
owners and the pathe.c condi.ons of the
unfortunate Negro slaves

January 2, 1884

reunion in the Paterno Residence in Madrid
Rizal proposed the wri.ng of a novel about the Philippines by
a group of Filipinos.
approved by:
Paternos ( Pedro, Maximo and Antoia)
Graciano Lopez Jaena
Evaristo Aguirre
Eduardo de LeVe
Julio Llorente
Melecio Figueroa
Valen.n Ventura

However, Rizals project did not materialize due to the

following reasons:

Those people who agreed to Rizals proposal did not write
anything. Almost everybody wanted to write on women.
He was also disgusted because his companions wasted
their .me gambling and ir.ng with Spanish women instead
of working seriously on the novel.

 Because it was impossible or at least dicult to co-

author a book, Rizal decided to write the novel by
himself.

He worked for about 2 years day and night for a
period of many months
He started wri.ng it in 1884, when he was living in
Madrid as a student of medicine and philosophy and
leVers

He nished half of the Noli in Madrid, one fourth in Paris,

and the other fourth in Germany.

The atmosphere in Germany, far from the tensions and the

poli.cal and cultural conicts of Madrid, helped him
introduce revisions, nuances and trim the original.

It is very probable that Rizal worked during the summer of

1884, a .me when he would be free from his usual student
chores.

What is, and what does the Noli intend?

Rizal himself provides a complete and manifold answer to this ques.on.

He wrote an in.mate friend:

Noli Me Tangere was
. the story of the last ten years. I answer all the false concepts
with which they have tried to humiliate us. I hope you will understand it
rightly. Noli me tangere is a saEre and not an apologia. Yes, I have
painted the social wounds of my country There is in it pessimism and
blackness because I see much infamy in my country; there the
miserable equal the imbecile in numbers. I admit I have not tasted any
biIer saEsfacEon in bringing to light such shame and embarassment, but
in painEng with the blood of my heart, I wanted to correct and save the
rest.

But perhaps it is in the well-known leVer to Felix Resurrecion

Hidalgo wriVen on March 5, 1887, that Rizal best expresses the
novels aim:

Noli me tangere, words taken from Saint Luke, mean do not touch
me. The book contains; therefore, things about which none of us have
spoken unEl now; they are so sensiEve that they cannot be touched by any
person. As far as I am concerned, I wanted to do what no one has dared. I
wanted to answer the calumnies which for so many centuries have been
heaped on us and on our country. I described the social situaEon, the life, our
beliefs, our hopes, our desires, our complaints, our sorrows. I unmasked the
hypocrisy which, under the cloak of religion, was impoverishing and
brutalizing us.

I disEnguished the true from the false religion, the supersEEous, the
one that trades in the holy word to extract money in order to make us
believe in sorcery, of which Catholicism would blush were it aware of these. I
have raised the curtain to show what is behind the deceiOul, eloquent words
of our governments. I have bared to our compatriots our defects, our vices,
our reprehensible and cowardly indierence to the misery there. Wherever I
have found moral strength, I have proclaimed it to give it its due, and
although I have wept when speaking of our misfortunes, I have laughed
because no one wants to weep with me over the unhappiness of our country,
and laughter is always good to hide the pain. The facts I relate have
happened and all are true. I can provide proofs. My book will contain ( and
does contain) its faults from the arEsEc or estheEc viewpoint. I do not deny
it: but what cannot be doubted is the imparEality of the narraEon.

 April June 1886

In Wilhemsfeld, he wrote the last few chapters of
Noli

February 1886
In Berlin, he made the nal revisions on the
manuscript of the Noli.
During this .me, Rizal was sick and penniless.

Before Christmas Day of 1887

Maximo Viola arrived in Berlin.

Maximo Viola agreed to nance the prin.ng cost of

the Noli. He also loaned Rizal some cash money for his
living expenses.

March 21, 1887

The Noli was nally ready for prin.ng.
Rizal and Viola went to dierent prin.ng shops
in Berlin to survey the cost of prin.ng.

Berliner Buchdruck-Ac.on-GesselschacN
- prin.ng shop they found which charged the
lowest rate


300 pesos for 2,000 copies

Symbols and their meaning

SilhoueVe of a Filipina
- believed to be Maria Clara or as the "Inang Bayan

Cross/Crucix
- represents the Catholic faith
- it also symbolizes suerings and death

Pomelo Blossoms & Laurel Leaves

- they represent faith, honor and delity
- pomelos are used to scent the air commonly during
prayers and cleansing rituals
- laurel leaves are used as crowns during Greek
Olympics for honoring the best

Burning Torch
- in reference with the Olympic torch
- pertains to the awakening of Filipino consciousness
- it also sheds light to the text of the manuscript
- rage and passion
Sunower
- symbolizes a new beginning
- enlightenment especially the youth
Feet
- symbolizes the power of the friars

Shoes
- represents wealth
- footprints leN by the friars in teaching Catholicism
Hairy legs
- symbolizes the Legend of the Wolf
- the wolf shape-shiNs just like how the friars hide their
true nature and character
Helmet of a Guardia Civil
- represents the arrogance of those in authority

Whip
- symbolizes the abuses and cruel.es done by the
Spaniards and friars depicted in the novel

Flogs
- just like the whip, it represents the cruel.es of the
Guardia Civil

Chain
- represents slavery and imprisonment

Rizals Signature
- shows that Rizal experienced and witnessed the ills
and abuses that happened during his .me
Bamboo stalks
- represents resiliency of the Filipinos

Dilemmas and Perspec.ves

Ibarra and Elias: Contribu1on to the Revolu1on

Represents the conic.ng ideas of Rizals beliefs and ideologies, although
desiring to create a symbol to obtain such freedom, Ibarra even admits, I
was not brought up among the people, and perhaps I do not know what
they need.

Ibarra debates with the mysterious Elias, with whose life his is intertwined.
The privileged Ibarra favors peaceful means, while Elias, who has suered
injus.ce at the hands of the authori.es, believes violence is the only
op.on.

Elias believes that there can be no light without liberty, and thus, no
liberty without gh.ng, and Ibarra believes there can be no liberty without
light.

The Death of Elias

The civil guards re at Elias under the mistaken impression that he is
Crisostomo Ibarra.

The mistake makes an important dierence:
Even the most unjust society makes a pretense of legality.

But in this instance, Ibarra is the condemned man. But in execu.ng the
wrong man, society has shown that aside from being arbitrary, it is also
inecient: it loses its last refuge, that of order. This marks the moment
which makes revolu.on a moral and logical necessity.

Padre Damaso and Capitan Tiago: Representa1on of

Oppression

Oppression of Filipinos through Spanish poli.cal and religious forces, as
well as the breeding of the Social Cancer.

Fray Damaso is not so mysterious as they were. He is full of merriment, and if the tone
of his voice is rough like a man who has never had occasion to correct to himself and who
believes that whatever he says is holy and above improvement

As a representa.on of the church and clergy ocials, Padre Damasos
portrayal exemplies the resentment of Rizal and the oppression of the
Filipino people as a result of the Spanish coloniza.on.

Crisostomo Ibarra

As the protagonist of the novel, Crisostomo Ibarra is the character in
whose character the main conict resides. It is easy to iden.fy the
external conicts:
Ibarra versus the society of his .me
Its values and its prejudices

Ibarra versus father Damaso and, indirectly, with the other friars
Ibarra versus Kapitan Tiago whose very strong sense of self-preserva.on
puts him in direct conict with the love between Maria Clara and Ibarra.

Maria Clara
Maria Clara did not really resolve the conicts within her; she
chose to escape, by entering the convent as a nun.

Rightly or wrongly, Maria Clara has been held as the ideal
Filipina which, perhaps, is the reason why many Filipinas
prefer to be or pretend to prefer being a Maria Clara type
with all its dubious virtues.

Other conicts

Other conicts, mostly internal reside in other characters such as Sisa,

Dona Victorina, Dona Consolacion, and Elias. However, the more
internal conict within Ibarra is the more interes.ng one, as it expresses
the dilemma of present-day Filipino: the conict between tradi.onal
values and ones personal values that had been developed through
.me.

 The country during Rizals .me was weak and helpless

People were misguided
Direct and indirect oppressions were everywhere especially those
done by friars (depicted by the characters Padre Damaso, Padre
Salvi, Padre Camorra, and Padre Sibyla)
His novel illustrates, through his characters, Spaniards abuse,
oppression, greed, and manipula.on done to the Filipinos

 The country during Rizals .me was weak and helpless

People were misguided
Direct and indirect oppressions were everywhere especially those
done by friars (depicted by the characters Padre Damaso, Padre
Salvi, Padre Camorra, and Padre Sibyla)
His novel illustrates, through his characters, Spaniards abuse,
oppression, greed, and manipula.on done to the Filipinos

 Friars became the main oppressors in the novel. Government

ocials were under these friars and all these represent the
superstructures of community (base), in which they
con.nue to spread their power, their abusive manipula.ons
by using the weaknesses of Filipinos (the proletariats) to fulll
their own interests. The friars have the greatest power in the
community capable of collec.ng taxes, purng a par.cular
person to death, dicta.ng how towns and communi.es
should be run, and becoming a poli.cal leader themselves
through the help of course by the Governor Generals and
Civil Guards.

Though the main reason why Rizal wrote the novel was to expose
oppressions, he, however, did not approve bloody revolu.on as a
primary sugges.on for elimina.ng these oppressions. He
addresses revolu.on as only an alterna.ve if reform is not
possible for a shout for independence. Famous Charles Dickens
also addresses reform as ini.al move. This belief was represented
through Ibarra himself during his talk with Elias.

 Rizals ideology about revolu.on would later spark an

uprising led by Andres Bonifacio. Though Rizal never
approved the idea of a revolt as a primary ac.on to
independence, it was shown in Ibarras character that he
might do the same if the need arises. Rizal s.ll believed
through Ibarra that the Spaniards would reconsider their
ac.ons and treat Filipinos fairly, and if Spain wouldnt do so,
he called for revolt as an outright solu.on.

Noli me Tangere was just a beginning of Rizals

exposi.on and call for reform in the Spanish rule

References:
hVp://unveilingrizal.weebly.com/mystery-of-the-cover.html
hVp://studyaboutrizal.blogspot.com/p/famous-novels.html

THANK YOU!