“Of Rizal and Of Nationalism…

from different Perspective”

Reading One. Rizal from the Perspective of Sen. Claro M. Recto
After the fierce battles to gain approval, the Rizal bill finally
becomes a law. Two years after its passage in the National Writers’
Conference in Baguio City the law’s author outlined once again his
ideals of a hero in the person of Rizal and the latter’s fictive works.
Rizal’s love of his country made him very careful and wary in his
moves and decisions against the conquerors. He knew the
capabilities of his people and the might of Spain that fighting the
conquerors by force was a form of suicide. The situation radiates to
the decision of America’s black novelist Richard Wright when asked
to participate in the communist movement of his country. He said I
like their passion to fight, the heat inside that pushed them, but I feel I
am not confident of the depth of their understanding about the cause
they are fighting for. What we had at the time were fighting farmers
without background on armies and training in warfare. They were
peace – loving ordinary peasants and farmers driven to fight by the
hardships they encountered every day.
 Rizal was careful, he saw what it would be to leave his people
under the leadership of a man who like the farmers possessed nothing
but his own pure idealism. Bonifacio had nothing in his mind and heart
than to free the country from the Spaniards by any means. But a
Spanish free country was only a pure idea as there was no concrete
goal to achieve it. Owing to this observation Sen. Recto described
these two great Filipinos by calling each as idealist and realist .
Bonifacio is the idealist while Rizal the realist. Such descriptions are
in a polar opposite to what people commonly perceived as Bonifacio
the realist while Rizal should be the idealist, that Rizal should be the
thinking man while Bonifacio the acting. But the Senator justified his
points.
Rizal was the realist while Bonifacio the idealist. How a man who is
used to thinking and reflecting could be labeled realist while the man
of action is called the idealist. Rizal never put anything into action
without a possible victory. He based his decisions on facts and he
never drive into some conclusions without considering the possible
outcome of such an action. He knew very well the capacity of the
Filipinos against the Spaniards; to fight the Europeans was indeed a form
of suicide. He plans before he executes anything, so he was a realist. He
looks at the prevailing reality.
Now what of Bonifacio? He was a good man, a good Filipino who too
can inspire the modern - day Filipinos. But to compare him to Rizal on
matter of attitudes and orientation toward achieving Philippine
independence, he indeed was an idealist. First, he always wanted total
autonomy of the country from Spain. He had his aspiration while other
Filipinos like Rizal and other propagandists clamored to recognize the
country as genuine part of Spain. Second, he was aware of the plight of
his people against the well - armed Spaniards. It was bolo against
cannons, bamboo made arrows and spear against the bursting cannon
balls. He was aware it was a form of suicide, yet he went on with the
desire burning inside him to fight and nothing else but to fight.
Rizal did not directly support the revolution; he proposed instead a
peaceful resolution. To achieve such goals, he proposed education as the
true and genuine vanguard of a nation. This aspiration was demonstrated
in the life of the hero and in the fiction he produced.
 Sen. Recto identified the characters of the Noli and Fili who carried
the aspirations of Rizal. The hero wanted the Filipinos to be educated; he
put up a school in Dapitan. In the Noli he is Ibarra, a man of refinement
and culture who did all his best to put up a school. Isagani, Padre
Florentino and among all others all clamored for a peaceful resolution to
the colonial problems of the Filipinos. Sen. Recto declared that it is true
that the novels of Rizal have characters like Cabesang Tales and
Capitang Pablo who are robbers. Yet the senator said these characters
are not at all war mongering at the start. The cruel and tenacious
circumstance of their lives forced them to bear arms against the
oppressors.
At the end of the novels, peace suppressed cruelty. Padre Florentino
threw away the box of treasures and cried “for a greater purpose may
the bowel of the sea vomits you out.” The conquering power of the pen
and not the sword overpower everything. Sen. Recto quoted Rizal
saying the resolution of the Filipinos was baseless and resulted to
nothing; it was beyond the hero’s knowledge; it was a disgrace to the
people and dismay to those people who wanted to help the Filipinos.
 It is the liberal ideas of the people that a country can stand from its
own fall. The senator saw Rizal and his works as framework in educating
the Filipinos toward attaining this liberal idea. The novels of Rizal
described the harsh human condition when a race is grappled by a
foreign power. But the novels are clear such a harsh life did not readily
spring from the brutality of the conquerors. There is in the people that
made the race so prone and weak to the human predators. Rizal called
it “social cancer”; in our time we call it ignorance. Arcilla (1992) the
novels of Rizal were not written solely for the Spaniards. It was also
meant for the Filipinos. Arcilla (1992) said the novel of Rizal particularly
the Noli was not simply a work that condemns the evil of the Spaniards;
it was a novel that gives commentaries on attitudes of the Filipinos which
Rizal called the cancer.
Senator Recto went beyond suggesting it. He authored a bill that
turned out into a law after the tedious legislation. It is now an Act that
requires the readings of the two novels of Rizal repeatedly mentioned
ahead.
Reading Two. Rizal from the Perspective of Sen. Jose P. Laurel
Sen. Jose P. Laurel had reasons for sponsoring the Rizal Law. Few
paragraphs later we have what he said. Right here it is worthy to
remember and a necessary information to know what Rizal had
spoken so much about the youth and he implored their significance
to nation building.
It is the youth then other Filipinos. As of this writing according to
(HTTPS://GOV.PH/) the Philippines has a student population of 377,025
distributed in the 4,258 colleges and universities scattered around the
archipelago. In few years - time these students shall be the country’s
entrepreneurs, politicians, teachers, engineers and so on to all the
various professions the country has.
But a great percentage of these future graduates will leave the
country to work for the rich in the countries where great grandchildren
of those who came to the Philippines as masters and oppressors are
now living. The situation raises a question if something has changed
after a century of the master - servant relation.
 But at any rate, Rizal did not clamor for a total autonomy of the
Philippines from Spain. He even said there is enough room for every
one in the Philippines. He only asked for two conditions. The first is to
educate the Filipinos. Second is to reform the abusive Spanish
government.
The reason why Rizal wanted the Filipinos to be educated before
they can work with others is clear. It is to stop the master – servant
relation. He implied that other people can work in the Philippines as
partner and no longer on the master – servant. The preposition used is
“with” and not “for”. Unfortunately, to work “with” others is impossible if
these two others are not in balance between their education.
Imbalance in education will always result to subjugation where one of
the others will work as servant while the other will do the managing and
eventually maligning. In business there is no other aspiration than to
maximize income which should be achieved by any means maligning
or not.
 More than hundred years since Rizal lauded his aspirations for his
country almost every Filipino is now educated. It is seen on the number of
schools offering basic and higher education around the country. The
Filipinos now work and paid according to agreement that is between
employer and employee. What is important more now is that almost every
Filipinos desire for a quality education. They have found education the
answer to their personal needs particularly financial.
They are educated, but the kind of education they received is still to be
determined if it hits the desire of Rizal. There is an education that does not
end in financial fulfillment. Those politicians convicted of plunder and
corruption bragged to be graduates from prestigious schools of the
country. There is an education that holds the service to the country a
priority, a kind that produces women like Spartan mothers who as
described by Rizal shed no tears when informed that their sons died in
defense of the country.
Rizal dreamed that every Filipino will find beauty and discover self
fulfillment in his or her service for the country. It is the ideals he died for
and the Rizal Law asks everyone to look after him as model.
 Former Sen. Laurel supported the move in the legislative branch to
ratify the proposal to make the course Rizal a requirement in the college
education. He argued that Rizal was the forerunner in the action to carve
the Filipino nationalism. The independence achieved by the country and
its eventual nationhood was owed to him. It is just inevitable for the
citizens of this country particularly the young to absorb the principles that
brought the hero to Bagumbayan in the morning of December 30, 1896.

Reading Three. Rizal from the Perspective of Fr. Horacio de la Costa S. J.

Few years before the Rizal Law was approved Bishop Rufino J. Santos,
D.D. Archbishop of Manila sent a pastoral letter representing the stand of
the church toward the proposal of making the reading of Rizal’s novels a
requirement in college. A bishop’s letter was then drafted and among the
names with part in drafting the pastoral letter came out Fr. Horacio de la
Costa S.J. He was a Filipino Jesuit, a historian and a former dean of
Ateneo de Manila’s College of Arts. He was a scholar and a literary figure.
 According to Schumacher (2011) it appears that de la Costa was asked by the
bishop to draft the pastoral letter. Several drafts were made and some changes
were made. But de la Costa was still believed to be the major author of the
pastoral letter.
The Jesuit priest maintained that the national hero was a man of outstanding
moral character with a strong adherence to truth. His works specifically the novels
that speak of truth shall become the foundation of the political and societal
standard of the Filipino people.
Based on the outlooks of Rizal as perceived by de la Costa, and if the Filipino
really like to build up a nation, then making Rizal and his works as blueprint is
inevitable. He was morally upright, and he was devoted to the truth. No race can
settle into a nation without those characteristics of its people. So long as the
Filipinos aspire for nationhood, so long as they continue to dream of cultural
autonomy, they need Rizal and his works.
On the contrary signs of losing cultural autonomy and failing effort to obtain a
nation of their own are seen on the people’s disregard to the ideals implanted on
them in the past. Leaders show a continued dependence on other countries, the
people’s disrespect to culture and their blatant defiance to orders represented by
laws, are clear signs of moral depravity. What will happen next are crumbled
people dependent on the crumbs the rich can toss into them.
 Nation building is attained to by first, strengthening self - pride, then,
imposing nationalism. It is the path to a genuine independence, and
independence is the most important fiber of a nation. Again, from the
same source according to de la Costa, Rizal devoted himself to educating
the people as the only means to safeguard them from any form of tyranny
and dominion in the future. Rizal also worked hard to lift up the ethical
standard of the Filipinos; he wanted the Filipinos to fight back against
injustices imputed unto them by the foreign power of Spain.
When Senator Recto introduced the Rizal Law in 1956 the controversies
of the bishop’s statement became apparent. De la Costa, the said drafter
of the pastoral letter was not in the Philippines when the law was debated
and the said pastoral was even available ahead of 1956.
The pastoral letter explained about the mandatory reading of the said
novels in both private and public schools. The first draft which was solely
written Fr. De la Costa glorifies the national hero and his novels. But tone
changed in the following drafts when an interlocutor believed to be Fr.
Jesus Cavanna surfaced. It then contains some claims that Rizal through
the actions and voices of his characters he attacked the church.
 At the end a unified conclusion was reached. Schumacher (2011) it was
declared that the novels were found no serious dangers to faith and morals
of the Catholic. It further says that it conforms to the teaching of the gospels
and right reason. It was only recommended the novels shall not be given to
the young readers without strict guidance of important adults particularly
teachers. Important recommendation was further highlighted, to come up
with annotated text of the novels. Annotation will explain the contents of the
novels that involved the Catholic faith. Its basic purpose is to guide the
readers particularly the young who have no trainings in reading historical
fiction and besides young readers are prone to immediate acceptance of
what is on print.

Source: Tabotabo, C.V. Corpuz, R.M.& Gavilino, J.C.(2019).Jose P. Rizal:

Readings On Heroism. Quezon City: Pan Asia Book Exchange , Incorporation