Retracing The Shadows, Refracting The Light

Retracing the Shadows, Refracting the Light
2
fter all, historical research is not
only informed by a survey and reflection of those that actually
happened, as in names, dates and places, and fitting all these
together like a jigsaw puzzle...
Historical research is better informed by deep reflections
of the possibilities, the contradictions and the ironies of the
what-could-have-beens and the what-never-have-beens of a
particular period not only to shed light on the tip of the
iceberg so to speak, but to grapple with iceberg itself, and
understand the undercurrents which it either withstood or
followed the direction of.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

FERNANDO VILLARCA CAO graduated in 1986 from
the University of the Philippines in Diliman with a
degree in Journalism. While writing for various
publications, he studied for a masteral course in
Philippine Studies and alternately also studied Law.
His literary writings have twice won recognition in
the Palanca Awards. While a member of the faculty
of the UP Department of Filipino, he compiled and
annotated the book of readings The Rizalista’s
Rizal. He left the academe in 1995 to pursue the
printing and publishing business. He is a Mount
Banahaw pilgrim.
3
H I S T O R Y
ISBN 971-91682-0-X
To my parents,
Epifanio Taruc Cao & Felicidad Villarca,
public school teachers,
sons and daughters of peasants,
whose simple, honest and quiet lives
have always inspired in me
bold profundities
Copyright 1996
by Fernando V. Cao and Oraciones Printworks
All Rights Reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or in any manner without the written
permission by the author/publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a
review to be printed in a magazine or a newspaper. However, if this book is downloaded through
www.pantas.ph, permission is granted to the individual to print the book for his/her individual
consumption within the limits of fair use. Needless to state, this permission excludes mass print
production which remains the sole right of the author/publisher.
ISBN 971-91682-0-X
This manuscript was originally titled “Retracing the Shadows, Refracting the Light: A
Historical Treatise on Reform and Revolution, The Centuries Before and the Century After”
and which was submitted to the 1992 JOSE W. DIOKNO ESSAY AWARDS sponsored by the
Jose W. Diokno Foundation and the Philippine Center for Policy Studies. The Essay Awards was
meant to commemorate the 100th year of the founding of the Katipunan.
The manuscript won Third Prize.
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PREFACE TO THE INTERNET EDITION
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p a g e s 6 - 14
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ORIGINAL PREFACE
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INTRODUCTION
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S E C T I O N 1
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S E C T I O N 2
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p a g e s 31- 6 4
S E C T I O N 3
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p a g e s 65 - 105
S E C T I O N 4
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p a g e s 106 - 118
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Preface to the
Internet Edition
UNTIL NOW, THIS book has been largely unavailable to the
general public, except to a handful of academics who bought
copies when it was launched in a small gathering sometime in
February 1996 at the Faculty Center in UP Diliman. The unavail-
ability was deliberate and for this I sincerely apologize. I had
intended the manuscript for this book to be my last academic
piece on the subject matters contained here. At that time, I was
already out of the academic circuit and was set to put in opera-
tion some of the most important conclusions I have arrived at. I
thought then that the last thing I needed was to be drawn back
into deeper archival research just to prove or defend my argu-
ments against would-be critics and detractors. Putting out this
book in print was therefore nothing more than a duty to posterity
that I felt I simply had to fulfill. I had already contented myself
with the thought that somehow, sometime in the far future a gen-
eration would posthumously discover this book and continue or
improve these research outlines. Needless to say, at that time, I
had already given up on the infantile proclivities of Philippine
intellectual life and had assigned myself sane, smaller tasks that
were more intellectually rewarding. And were it not for two impor-
tant events that I would elucidate here, I would never have thought
of coming out of this self-imposed intellectual exile.
The first has something to do with the so-called EDSA Dos
and EDSA Tres phenomena which I view with so much distress
as a doctor perhaps would consider a patient who had just un-
derwent a series of near-fatal epileptic seizures. I distinctly re-
member the time when I dropped all my intellectual work: it was
the mid-90s, the country was in relative stability and progress,
and the people was relatively calm despite the messiah-like
figure of an Erap Estrada looming large in the political landscape.
6
Preface to the Internet Edition
I had this naïve hope that the lessons of the first EDSA should
have by then already seeped through the collective conscious-
ness. I had hoped that a people who had just saved itself through
its own devices a few years back and managed along would no
longer be easily seduced by political charlatans and religious
snakecharmers.
But of course, succeeding events would cruelly dash this wish-
ful thought as they would all excruciatingly lead to the twin cli-
maxes that were the EDSA Dos and EDSA Tres phenomena.
And though my participation in both instances was that of a mere
TV viewer, seeing 1986 replayed not once but twice over was
anything but nostalgic. On the contrary, it was something that
bordered on the surreal and macabre. And though I am still at a
loss as to whether three EDSAs (so far) in one lifetime is a curse
or a blessing, I am certain that the rest of the Filipino people are
not as ambivalent. Just as I am certain that the next day is tomor-
row, I have no doubt that the pace of the Diaspora from this tragic
country will henceforth increase even as a greater number of
charlatans and snakecharmers must surely have been inspired
to come out of the woodwork and dream of political power.
But what makes the situation even worse is that up to now the
nature of the intellectual production concerning these phenom-
ena have not gone beyond journalistic accounts and coffeetable-
book types of analyses. While I don’t mean to give offense to
journalists and columnists who have done their share of analy-
ses and “histories in a hurry,” I certainly take to task professional
intellectuals of whatever political persuasion for their seeming
lack of interest to probe deeper into these events. After all, how
many near-fatal seizures must we allow a patient to have before
we attend to that patient’s illness, or much less, to even attempt
to come up with a correct diagnosis? It is in this spirit that I finally
offer this book to serve as a starting point of future discussions
on the matter. It is not important that we all arrive at the same
answers or conclusions; it is important enough that we start to
recognize the variables in the equation and begin to understand
the processes that underlie each element. After all, since the
mixture of curses history had bestowed on this tragic land are
7
already too potent—what with an absolutely rapacious elite, a

completely predatory bureaucracy and a terribly confounding
citizenry—let us not allow the historically irrelevant nature of the
Filipino intelligentsia be added further to this brew.
But if anything, this task of making the Filipino intelligentsia
historically relevant only underscores the importance of the
second event that I earlier mentioned: it has something to do
with the advent of the e-book technology using the internet as
the mass medium.
Allow me to elaborate by digressing a little. I left the academe
in the mid-90s and consequently ventured into publishing be-
cause I did not wish to debate any longer with the intelligentsia of
my time. Instead, I wanted to contribute to the process of creat-
ing a new generation of intellectuals who can at least match the
patriotism, integrity and thoroughness by which Rizal’s (and
Marcelo Del Pilar’s) generation became known. And in my mind,
the best way to contribute to this process was to start propagat-
ing such values at the most basic level. Thus I turned my full
attention to children’s book publishing. Simultaneously, my outfit
published the works of several kindred spirits or so-called “angry
young men” who all saw that something was grossly wrong not
only with the culture of the establishment but with the countercul-
ture of the anti-establishment itself! And though I was under no
illusion that such a process would take only a few years, I felt
that to contribute something to this process was already worth a
lifetime’s work.
And since I knew that I was in for the long haul, the first thing
I did was to establish a small printing press. Together with my
wife, we studied every detail of the printing business because it
was important to us that we have control over the means of pro-
duction insofar as such control, in turn, translate into a degree of
control on the resulting economics of the entire venture. Unlike
most start-up publishers, we did not have any money to burn on
the venture, much less sustain it, so we decided that whatever
profits we could squeeze out of the commercial activities of the
printing press will be used to bankroll the venture. And for a time
when the country’s economy was stable, the whole thing worked
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out. But when the first wave of the Asian financial crisis broke out
and adversely affected most businesses, the viability of the en-
tire enterprise was seriously jeopardized. After all, aside from
having a steady supply of grand ideas, the whole enterprise also
needed a steady supply of mundane things like ink, paper, as-
sorted chemicals, machinery and labor power whose prices kept
on rising without let up. And just when we were about to post-
pone indefinitely the whole thing and wait for more opportune
times, we stumbled upon the exciting possibilities of the emer-
gent e-book technology using the internet as a mass medium.
Part of our excitement with the e-book and the internet has
something to do with the fact that such a digital technology solves
a great part of the pressing logistical, manpower and distribution
problems we encountered as traditional publishers. And if the
most ardent trumpeters of the technology are to be believed, the
e-book is bound to reshape the world in the same manner that
Gutenberg’s invention of the movable type revolutionized knowl-
edge forever. For someone who seriously studied the ins-and-
outs of the printing business to the point of learning how to
actually operate different printing machinery, I could only agree
with such a projection. Immediate proof of this is the fact that
you, dear audience, whoever and wherever you may be, are read-
ing this preface in real time.
But more than this, my personal excitement stems from the
hope that the pervasiveness of this new technology may just spell
the end of this historically pervasive element of Philippine
society which has been both its greatest boon and bane. I am
referring to that lingering oral tradition which serves as a key
fundamental reason why this country for the longest time has
wallowed in such misery.
I have explicitly stated in this book that the intelligentsia had
historically misunderstood the hopes and aspirations of the Fili-
pino people. Needless to state, my view was that no real progress
and development will ever be achieved under such conditions
because, in the first place, intellectuals are supposed to be the
champions of modernity from whom the rest of society, espe-
cially existing governments or governments-in-waiting, derive
9
guidance for its programs and actions. But to be fair, this histori-
cal misunderstanding is not the fault of the intelligentsia alone.
The fact is that the stubbornly oral tradition of Philippine culture
makes it a sort of difficult hurdle that prevents each time such an
eventual meeting of the minds. To illustrate: one of the main rea-
son why the so-called “marginal voices” in Philippine history have
never been incorporated into the standard textbook history was
that these voices were not predisposed to write and keep records
of their deeds or intentions, if at all. Thus the history that was
foisted on all of us can only be, naturally, the elite’s version
because they were the ones who have written and kept records
that are any historian’s most important datum. It could have been
a perfectly normal situation insofar as it would be reasonable to
expect that the writing of history could not each time possibly
reflect everything that happened in an exhaustive manner. But of
course, the trouble lies in the fact that oftentimes the sentiments
of these “marginal voices” are nothing but the echoes of the sen-
timents of a significant portion, if not the majority, of the popula-
tion! Imagine if, for example, a personality like Macario Sakay (or
much more, an Andres Bonifacio!) left a written memoir of his
deeds and intentions, then perhaps later generations would never
have been told any of those fairy-tale versions of the 1896 Revo-
lution. And then again perhaps, despite the eventual outcome of
that Revolution, we would all have been living now under an alto-
gether different set of conditions and circumstances.
Viewed at the opposite end, the point I’m belaboring is that it
is here in this pre-literate nature of our culture where the whole
cast of past and present political and religious messiahs, sham
or otherwise, had always drawn their seductive prowess. Like a
dark and damp environment, it breeds fungi of all sorts, sizes
and toxicities. Thus for any real progress to effectively take place,
this dark and damp crevice in the collective consciousness must
ultimately be sanitized by the sun of scientific rationality. Admit-
tedly, while this is a long, gradual and tedious process, small
crucial steps in the right direction can and must be taken. Just as
the deep divide between alchemy in the age of magic and the
chemistry of the modern times was bridged by innocuous written
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records kept in ancient libraries, so must Philippine society be

changed accordingly.
This is where the importance of the digital technology of the
e-book and the internet comes into play. At the very least, rare
and out-of-print books and other important unpublished records
can now be preserved and accessed more conveniently and more
democratically. And at most, here finally is that historic opportu-
nity to prepare and make available something which has been
long denied to generations of Filipinos including the present one:
an exhaustive and thorough collection of primary sources and
materials for the use of future generations who will surely need
the lessons of the past in order to master their own circumstances.
Before I end this preface, however, it is with regard to this
spirit of the above-mentioned scientific rationality that I feel
compelled to finally make available my comments on Marxism,
that system of ideas whom its adherents like to presume as the
acme of scientific rationality. I had originally intended to include
a special chapter on Marxism but unfortunately, I never had the
luck to retrieve some important documentary materials that would
have lent weight to my discussions and conclusions. While this
compulsion derives from the primary fact that Marxist ideas had
always figured preeminently among the most committed segment
of the Filipino intelligentsia across generations, starting from the
generation of that maverick pensionado of the American colonial
era, Crisanto Evangelista, up to the present, there is something
else personal. Before I rediscovered for myself the real relevance
of a Rizal, a Bonifacio or even an Apolinario dela Cruz, I started
my intellectual journey climbing up and down the tortuously
elegant peaks and the vast and expansive valleys of the Marxist
worldview. Never a true believer in radical orthodoxy, or any other
orthodoxy for that matter, I had many questions that in the after-
math of the original EDSA attempted to answer by studying the
lives and works of characters as disparate as Trotsky, Bukharin,
Rykov, Fidel Castro, Chu Teh, Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser
and even Lysenko to name a few, aside of course from the stan-
dard Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao. There was even a
time when I retraced the progeny of Marx’s philosophical stand-
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point where I started with the simple empiricism of the British

philosophers and ended up with the complicated and obscure
philosophy of Hegel.
It was a difficult but exhilarating journey. But in spite of this, I
have nevertheless come to the conclusion that the main problem
with Marxism as an elaborate system of ideas that lays a rightful
claim to make several universal prescriptions is that its intellec-
tual roots is as localized a phenomenon as in post-Enlighten-
ment Continental Europe and as in England in the throes of the
Industrial Revolution. While the former is a set of special circum-
stances where a once-mighty religion lay in ruins, the latter is a
set of special circumstances where mankind finally got a glimpse
of the tremendous potentials of what technology and social
engineering could do in the production process. It was no doubt
a great era for mankind and one that could account for the kind
of hubris that underlined a lot of Marx’s and Engels’ universal
formulations.
Of course, Marx and Engels warned against any mechanical
application of their theories without any regard to actually
obtaining conditions. But here lies the rub. Since as a social project
Marxism and its adaptations necessarily had to involve a great
number of people, however complex and supple a Marxist formu-
lation is in the beginning, it has this great tendency to become a
gross caricature in the end. And once a Marxist formulation
becomes a caricature on the level of practice (which usually
becomes the only way it could operate at that level), the notori-
ous hit-and-miss cycles henceforth usually begin—with the usual
staggering human cost that accompanies every cycle. For a
system of ideas whose adherents declare with near-religious
convictions the scientific nature of their formulations, these
unavoidable from-the-frying-pan-into-the-fire situations ought not
to be easily dismissed as mere errors in procedure, as one would
in a laboratory experiment; they ought to heavily figure somehow
on the level of the theoretical.
And if anything, it is this staggering human cost that attends
every Marxist project that makes up my greatest beef against
Marxism. For though phenomena like an Enlightenment or an
12
Industrial Revolution became important watersheds in the

history of many European societies, the fact is that such phe-
nomena never became universal occurrences as the rest of the
world plodded along according to the internal logic and dyna-
mism of their respective societies. It is a fact that in many societ-
ies, religion (or at least a worldview dominated by religious ide-
als), far from being a hated enemy, became instead a refuge or
even a rallying point of many liberation movements. Such was
the case in this country over a century ago, as this book had tried
to demonstrate among other things. In short, there is something
already fundamentally wrong the moment one puts on the Marx-
ist binoculars in analyzing Philippine society, or most other pre-
literate societies in any case, no matter how flexibly one adjusts
the metered sights. And for various reasons contained in this
book, I am not counting on this so-called process of “indige-
nization” either.
Let me illustrate one of these reasons by way of relating an
insight on an incident during the 1896 revolution which dumb-
founded me the first time it struck me and continues to do so up
until now. The incident happened during the Tejeros convention
where in the course of the heated debate as to whether or not
the Katipunan should finally be liquidated, several members of
the Cavite principalia successfully deconstructed (to use a con-
temporary term) the revolutionary movement that started every-
thing. How did they do it? Irony of ironies, they used as some sort
of a sharp rapier this political emblem that elsewhere during that
period stood precisely as a synonymn for revolution or liberation:
the idea of a republic! Of course, Agoncillo’s account of Bonifacio’s
rather lame defense of the Katipunan did not help the Revolution’s
cause any since majority of the men who had gathered there
already had their minds made up. But please consider the anti-
mony for just once: forget about how Rizal and the rest of the
ilustrado-propagandista supposedly transmitted Enlightenment
ideas to this benighted country; count out even how masonry
definitely provided an organizational role-model for the Katipunan
to emulate, and focus your attention as to how this political idea
derived directly from the Enlightenment period interacted squarely
13
with a local circumstance. Indeed, what could be more ironic than

a universal revolutionary idea such as a republic serving as some
sort of a noose by which the 1896 Revolution was hanged? Ours
is truly a sad, tragic land!
October 2001
14
Original Preface
THOUGH I WROTE this manuscript sometime between June

and August in 1992 with the immediate intent of submitting it to
the Jose W. Diokno Essay Awards held that year to commemo-
rate the Katipunan centennial, my formal and informal researches
for this manuscript started almost a decade earlier. My motiva-
tions were personal in nature: it was mainly to scratch an intel-
lectual itch that was born at EDSA in February 1986 and just
wouldn’t go away.
Being privileged enough to belong to that fortunate genera-
tion of UP students who were there at EDSA during those his-
toric days, we initially saw EDSA as a fleeting rarity, one of those
times when everything seems to be on your side one moment
and then on your opponent’s the next. Reared in the kind of
activism UP is known for, we were initially scared stiff. Being
veterans of the protest movement in the aftermath of the Aquino
assassination, we knew that Marcos’s back was against the wall.
It therefore was, to us, Marcos’s most dangerous moment. But
upon surveying the millions of EDSA crowd who had gathered
there---many with their toddlers, as if it was a picnic!---our cyni-
cism on the entire scenario simply had to give way to genuine
surprise, and then, to hope. At the back of our minds, that old
adage about an immovable object meeting an irresistible force
kept hammering us to our senses.
And so it was. The crowd finally went home but not before
toppling Marcos, installing Cory as president and presaging a
new era for the generations to come. It was a time of great learn-
ing, and also a time of great unlearning. One of the most painful
episodes for us occurred during that night when Marcos finally
fled Malacañang Palace. The whole afternoon that day, our UP
contingent was there at the foot of Mendiola bridge, taunting the
15
Marines who were guarding Marcos. For the first time during those
historic days, it was the afternoon when we felt that our lives
were really on the line. The Marine guards looked like they meant
real business and appeared jumpy every time the crowd made
an attempt to push through the barricades. But we thought, it was
well worth it: after all, weren’t UP students the first ones who
made the historic first march to Mendiola after Martial Law? And
a decade further back, wasn’t the famous First Quarter Storm a
movement led by UP students? We thought that if there was a
group who had the birthright to storm Malacañang, UP students
had to comprise its majority. But we thought wrong. At about seven,
the crowd began to thin, and the next moment, we heard the late
Lean Alejandro imploring the crowd to disperse and prepare for
tomorrow’s another fight. And so we did. Little did we know that it
was to be our most painful decision during those historic times.
While the passenger jeepney we took was cruising the inside
streets of Sampaloc on the way to Fairview, we suddenly heard
over the radio the news that Marcos had finally fled. We initially
thought it was another psywar ploy inasmuch as the day before a
similar news also broke out. We simply didn’t believe the news
until we reached our UP dormitories. It turned out that the news
was real. Then, we silently wept as the images of the last few
hours haunted our entireties: we, who had been there all after-
noon, inside a passenger jeepney on the way to God-knows-
where while the sea of people we saw on the opposite direction
were joyously on their way to Malacañang. We must have all
slept unsoundly that cruel, cruel night of great learning and un-
learning.
The morning after, just like the mornings-after ever since, was
however different. I guess all of us in that contingent emerged as
different persons. As for myself, I pledged that I would exert all
my efforts to understand the spectacular and dizzying historic
phenomenon just before my hitherto unbelieving eyes. Thus
began my intellectual journey of sorts.
In this book, I believe that I have come to a full understanding
of what really transpired during those days: that far from a
fleeting rarity, EDSA was actually nothing more than what has
16
Original Preface
moulded this nation’s history in the past centuries. In fact, if the

reader will derive the secondary and tertiary implications of the
arguments I have presented here, he or she will see that EDSA
in 1986 and the Katipunan in 1896 actually share a kinship inas-
much as both phenomena displayed a particular religiosity that
was compelling and at the same time, politically powerful.
Though I was not formally trained as a historian, I am confi-
dent that the historical views I have presented here would stand
the test of inquiry and verification. And should readers find an
incongruent detail or a loose remark here and there, I advise
them to kindly mind it not too much if it doesn’t detract from the
general flow of discussions. After all, I have intended all these to
be mere outlines that shall serve as guides for researches and
studies. And besides, for the purpose of sweep aggravated by
the pressure of the competition deadline, I may have inadvert-
ently missed out on a lot of other perspectives and studies by
previous authors.
This preface would not be complete if I would not thank
the people who through the years have supported my views, in-
terpellated my discourses, gave me strength and confidence, and
stayed with me all night when we were finishing the production of
this book. My thanks therefore go to my Philippine Collegian
generation, my former colleagues at the Department of Filipino
and Philippine Literature, Third World Studies Center and
Tambuyog Development Center, the “Narra Boys,” my brods in
the Sigma Kappa Pi Fraternity, the people in my outfit Oraciones
Printworks, and most importantly, to my family--- my daughter
Alexandra Nadya, my still-unnamed child, and my wife Opet who
shared with me the anguish of that cruel, cruel night of February
1986.
February 1996
E
17
Fernando Cao and the Veneration

of Precapitalist Consciousness
By PN Abinales
THERE IS ALWAYS something intriguing and controversial

about Fernando Cao and his political writings. The first time I
read one of his long essays---way back when we worked together
at the UP Third World Studies Center---he was involved in a de-
bate with student activists on how to re-animate a lifeless UP
student movement. In that debate, Cao suggested that the rea-
son for the decline of the movement was the failure of activists to
grasp the existence of a new student consciousness and adjust
their politics accordingly. Cao argued that the students of the 80s
were not the same UP students of yore. Unlike their politically-
sensitive predecessors, the new generations were experiencing
college life amidst powerful depoliticizing political and social struc-
tures. Martial Law did not animate political resistance. Instead, it
enhanced a culture of poverty characterized by triviality, petti-
ness, individualism and a personalist approach to life--- all these
being elements of the petit bourgeois that can co-exist with their
being critical, romantic and radical.
Whatever politics there was of the 80s generation was petty
and impressionable, and failed to develop the same substantive
mien as their forerunners. It had become, as one commentator
observed, a “politics of good looks.” Even the protest aftermath
of the 1983 Aquino assassination was not the product of an intel-
lectual understanding of Philippine politics. Most joined because
they were angry, their emotions carried them to rallies and dem-
onstrations, rather than their intellect. This explained, for example,
why the iconization of Ninoy Aquino---a politician as equally bru-
tal as Marcos in his heydays---prevailed over the struggle to truly
democratize Philippine society.
18
Introduction
Left-wing elitism, borne out of the romanticism of the past

and a distorted understanding of vanguard politics, indirectly
encouraged this consciousness. For intead of dealing with what
was, as it was, there, activists developed an arrogant, holier-
than-thou attitude to the Martial Law generation. Declaring them-
selves of the proletariat (or in parallel terms, the peasantry),
student activists ended up immersing less with their “masa,” pre-
ferring to merely mocking them of their petit bourgeois pettiness,
as if the mere act of mocking can bring enlightenment. This empty
arrogance easily translated into sectarianism, and thus we are
witness to the phenomenon where activists shout slogans or con-
duct “mass” (sic) actions amid a sea of student indifference. There
is also an air of eeriness when watching groups like the League
of Filipino Students claiming to represent the studentry when the
conservative Campus Crusade for Christ has more members than
the decrepit activist group.1
Given these depressing conditions, Cao offered a possible
way out. He suggested that activists can restore their hegemonic,
popular and legitimate position by sincerely confronting this con-
sciousness, seeking its proper level and carefully nurturing it to-
wards a higher, more politicized plane. He proposed that activ-
ists scale down their goals and take aim at issues that students
of the 80s could easily be mobilized in given that these are close
to their hearts. He intimated that activists become students again.
Cao received divergent responses. The orthodox radicals, as
expected, scoffed at his analysis, calling it reformist flirtations. A
faction of disgruntled activists, however, was receptive to his
ideas: they thought it made sense. In 1988, they broke away from
the dominant activist coalition SAMASA and formed the Alterna-
tive Student Action (ASA) party that advocated a return to basics
as a way of reanimating the UP studentry. ASA won the student
council elections during that year. It won on the platform that
promised a fight for basic student needs (“repair of stinking toi-
let,” an end to “terror teachers,” to reforms in the curricula) and
not the larger but distant issues of “imperialism, feudalism and
bureaucrat capitalism” that SAMASA was mired into. Cao was
vindicated. The ASA party did not last long, however, due more
19
to its leadership’s lack of imagination than a failure of strategy

and tactics. Later on, SAMASA and the LFS had made a Bona-
partist comeback and the rut that the UP activist politics is in
right now continues.
Cao’s ideas, however, continued to draw interest. He would
refine these in a number of award-winning essays, short stories
and plays while settling down as a member of the faculty at the
UP Department of Filipino and performing his duties as husband
and father. This time, for those who followed his career, one
theme began to stand out: his plea that we give serious attention
to deciphering and understanding popular consciousness and
its complex interaction with political agents seeking societal
change.
At the heart of Cao’s works is an argument that follows up on
themes popularized by a diverse group of historians, ideologues
and social thinkers. Cao, like these authors and activists, has
consistently held that a major reason why Filipino Marxists have
failed to mobilize a large segment of the population lies in their
inability to relate to that consciousness. Left-wing activists,
schooled mostly in Marxism’s secular tradition, have become
blinded by their own frames of reference when confronted with
such phenomena as “folk Christianity” and cultism.2 Cao avidly
cites instances of this left-wing perplexity when Marxists could
not explain nor challenge phenomena like the El Shaddai or the
Good Wisdom movement, both of which appear to be able to
mobilize more people than a BAYAN rally.3
In this fine work Retracing the Shadows, Refracting the
Light: Critical Notes Toward a New Historiography which was
originally submitted for the essay competition on nationalism held
by the Jose W. Diokno Foundation and the Philippine Center for
Policy Studies to commemorate the Katipunan Centennial, Cao
re-articulates this theme but also refines it in order to distinguish
his own views from those earlier argued by authors like Reynaldo
Ileto, Vicente Rafael and the polemicist Domingo Castro de
Guzman. Cao’s arguments basically boils down to two major
points: (a) that a systematic frame of thought informs mass
articulations of popular consciousness; and, (b) that this frame,
20
Introduction
its modes of expression and the symbols they spawn reflect also
a resilient consciousness that has withstood both structural and
conjunctural transformation in Philippine society. This enduring
consciousness becomes the “standard” by which people would
seek to explain their lives, the changes in their conditions, and
the actions they take to change or not change things.
In effect, Cao intimates that a cultural longue duree operates
inside the minds of the people, particularly the disadvantaged
classes. It helps them as they attempt to survive material and
psychological depredations wrought upon them by an iniquitous
system, be it capitalist or state socialist. This frame of mind
derives its roots from pre-capitalism: in the Philippines, more
specifically in the peasant base that has managed to survive and
adapt to capitalist transformation in the country. Its pliancy is a
major explanation for the unity and commonality of actions by
different mass movements--- from the Katipunan of Bonifacio to
the Sakdalistas of Salud Algabre; from Isabelo delos Reyes to
Valentin delos Santos.
In this extended essay, Cao may, at first glance, appear to
restate the old Maoist argument regarding the masses. Yet upon
closer look, there is a fundamental area of disagreement. While
he may agree with Maoists on their populist notions of the mass,
he will surely disagree with them when it comes to describing
popular consciousness. Maoists are still, in the end, Leninists
who believe that popular consciousness is a mixed-bag of
unsystematized thought and ideas. Thus it becomes necessary
for the vanguard to, as it were, go in and systematize and orga-
nize that clutter to better mobilize the masses for social change.
Thus the policy of the “mass line.” Cao disagrees. He insists in
this work that far from being a jumble, popular consciousness is
a systematized and is indeed an organized frame of viewing,
explaining and changing the world. Revolutionary vanguards
occasionally are successful in tapping at this frame, especially
when it corresponds to the revolutionary project. Yet, they could
also be frustrated by it, at times when the mass sees no corre-
spondence between their interests and aspirations with that of
the vanguards.
21
There is a stubbornness in Cao that evokes echoes of aca-

demics like James Scott, Robert Darnton, Ranajit Guha (and the
sub-altern school). And while he disagrees with Reynaldo Ileto
in this essay, Cao must admit that his arguments are fraternally
intimate to the author of the famous book Pasyon and Revolu-
tion. Where Cao, however, sets himself separate from them is
when he pushes the argument further by suggesting that this
popular and systematized frame of mind predates powerful influ-
ences like Catholicism and liberal democracy. Pace Ileto and
Rafael, in particular, Cao argues that the lineages of Filipino
peasant consciousness could be traced to the pre-colonial
period where community-identification (as in being Tagalog, for
example) became the foundation for national imaginings in the
colonial era.
My intractable intellectual-political preference for structural-
materialist thinking has, of course, led to long and exciting ex-
changes with my friend and colleague. I confess to finding
Fernando Cao’s stubbornness a little strange, quixotic and in-
timidating. To suggest that Filipino nationalism needs to go back
to its pre-colonial roots, for example, is something a student of
such “modern” structures as the nation-state (or for that matter,
colonialism) will find hard to accept. Moreover, I sometimes find
myself spooked by his argument when it brings memories of the
agenda of the Marcos dictatorship’s Tadhana project. The
absence of any historical case where Narodism was victorious
also kept my cynicism in place. Yet, I somehow find myself being
drawn back to this complex explanation of Fernando Cao be-
cause it is one of the few more interesting and challenging expli-
cations left in radical academic discourse in the Philippines. Cao’s
obstinacy to giving the historical bases for his explanation has
also a seductive ring to one who was once formally trained as a
political historian.
In this work, Cao tries to go up a notch higher from his previ-
ous writings by trying to unravel the core logic of popular
consciousness. The essay takes the initial form of a debate with
authors and historians like Ileto. Cao, however, uses his critique
as a springboard to give us a purview of his insistence that popu-
22
Introduction
lar consciousness is a systematized consciousness with founda-

tions predating colonial rule. Oftentimes his presentation can be
a tad tedious: Cao has a propensity to write long elaborate sen-
tences. The reader, however, is advised to remain patient. For
underneath the intricate sentences is an argument worthy of our
proper and serious consideration. It is an honor to introduce this
work for him.
October 1993
Ozamiz City (Misamis Occidental)
and Ithaca (New York)
E
NOTES
1
This feeling was there again over the summer when I belatedly realized
that groups like the LFS-UP had ceased to be “leading organizations” of the
studentry, but instead had become just “one of those associations” which
merited a coconut hut outside the Arts and Science building.
2
Despite the influence of liberation theology. This dilemma was posed by
Francisco Nemenzo in his perceptive outline, “Questioning Marx, Critiquing
Marxism,” in Kasarinlan Quarterly of Third World Studies, 1992, Vol.8 No.2.
3
Or for that matter, to go back a few years, the “spiritual” attributes of the
EDSA uprising.
4
In that project, mercenary-historians from the UP Department of History
sought to justify autocratic nationalism as real nationalism by tracing its ori-
gins back to baranganic society. Cao appears to be unaware of just how dan-
gerously close he is to this fascist justification.
23
the angel of history
His face is turned towards the past.

Where we perceive a chain of events,
he sees one single catastrophe
which keeps piling wreckage
upon wreckage and hurls it
in front of his feet.
The angel would like to stay,
awaken the dead, and make
whole what has been smashed.
But a storm is blowing from Paradise;
it has got caught in his wings
with such violence that the angel
could no longer close them.
This storm irresistably propels him
into the future where his back
is turned, while the pile of debris
before him grows skyward.
This storm is what we call
Progress.
--- Walter Benjamin,

The Angel of History
24
25
ON JUNE 22, 1992, there occurred another one of those

events which just keep on happening in the course of the history
of this nation, yet, just the same, is never fully understood by
scholars, historians and urban pedestrians all at the same time.
It was a humid day, the site was at EDSA fronting the two military
camps which, years ago, were the site of the so-called “People
Power” Revolution that toppled the Marcos dictatorship, and there
was this mass of people that filled the two opposing lanes, chant-
ing what were heard to be incomprehensible, if not totally weird,
slogans. Suddenly, shots rang out, the people dispersed and the
police eagerly ran after the fleeing crowd. Moments later, the
streets were back to normal again, as if nothing happened.1
And so too was the case with Philippine history.
The following day, newspapers and tabloids invariably car-
ried this headline runner---”mysterious march”---along with news
stories detailing how many were killed, injured, or simply, lost.
For, apparently, most of the people who trooped there were not
from Manila nor from the outlying suburbia. An enterprising tele-
vision crew interviewed some of them and reported that many of
them came from the Bicol Region, Zambales and the North. Many
also were without money, either for food or for transport; and
when asked what they were really doing there, they answered
they don’t know. Or at least, not with the way things eventually
turned out. They narrated that they came to Manila because they
were promised jobs at a construction site. They paid the neces-
sary “placement fees,” given odd T-shirt uniforms, and were sim-
ply told to wait for further instructions. As such, they naturally
found it hardly comprehensible why, the day after the violent dis-
persal by the police, the newspapers carried bits of quotations
that they allegedly were egging the top military echelons to take
power for themselves and “rescue people power from the politi-
cal elites.”
Expectedly, intellectuals and media people who remember
the Lapiang Malaya phenomenon decades ago pounced on the
news. This new group, or sect, they learned, was called the “Good
Wisdom For All Nations” and had, as its leader, a balding old
man with long white frocks of remaining hair, called Alelio Ber-
26
Just Another Critique or a Critique of the Critiques?
naldez Pen. Apparently, Pen was simply demonstrating against

the government which, he perceived, was preventing him from
carrying out “God’s plan.”And that the plan apparently was this:
his group was commissioned by “God” to build a temple on the
mountains of Zambales. The temple supposed would be large
enough to accommodate and house all representatives of
nations throughout the world whom God would summon to the
Philippines in these latter days to be instructed on an important
message. Indeed, as the name of their group suggests, this mes-
sage is nothing but this God’s “good wisdom for all nations.”
Be that as it may, a television talk show soon enough brought
to sharper focus the fantastic plans of this group before the in-
credulous viewing public. Before long, the television-crazy popu-
lace of Metro Manila were fixated on what appeared to be a lively
exchange of opinions between a professor of history and the talk
show host (who is also a professor of sociology himself) as con-
sisting one panel; and four articulate members of the “Good Wis-
dom” group consisting another. Though several times, tempers
and credulity neared breaking point, each time the discussions
would simply end up resolving nothing at all. For instance, after
the “Good Wisdom” group finished expounding on the basis of
their “commission” and pointing out, in effect, that the constitu-
tional provision on social justice consisted as yet another proof
of their destiny, the talk show host would project on his face an
utter disbelief in what he was hearing. And upon informing his
television guests that, in the first place, he personally knew the
drafters of that particular constitutional provision, and that sec-
ondly, he was certain that the interpretation the group “Good Wis-
dom” was giving was not the manifest intent of the said provision,
it then became the turn of the guests to project on the screen a
look of utter disbelief. Simply put, these similar reactions by the
opposing panelists merely indicated that, on the level of ideas,
an abyss of sorts separated them both.
And which may well be the case, upon deeper consideration.
For if there is anything all-too-certain that can be said of this
country, it is that the deep misunderstandings of the centuries,
far from being bridged by groups of people, have actually wors-
27
ened and, contemporarily, appear to be already unbridgeable.

For instance, at this time when the nation is supposedly com-
memorating the birth centennial of the Kataastaasang Kagalang-
galangang Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan, what ought to be
anachronistic lies and distortions regarding its true nature not
only persist but find resounding affirmation in society as a whole.
And in this, no other example can be more poignant than the
narration above.3
But then again, recent developments in scholarship and histo-
riography have already brought to attention what may well be
more accurate descriptions of the KKK, the Revolution it was
able to set in motion, and the groups it eventually gave birth to;
descriptions which on deeper thought could have revealed this
rather shallow and all too-evident reality that ultimately, the
object of this year’s centennial cerebration shares more kinship
with an Alelio Bernaldez Pen and his “Good Wisdom for All Na-
tions” than with the rest of what is heretofore thought to consist
“mainstream” Philippine society. If only to dramatize the point
further, inasmuch as in this issue of Reform and Revolution which
the organizers of this contest have forced this paper to confront,
there now appears to be an unwelcome tautology—where the
inadequacies and failures of Reform breed revolutionaries, in the
same vein the inadequacies and failures of Revolution breed
reformists—it must be finally asked: what shall reform Reform,
revolutionize Revolution, educate the Educators, and save the
Saviors themselves from extinction?
Definitely not a kind of thinking, nor an education, nor a his-
tory that would make one give an impassive, disbelieving gaze at
an articulate, nay, an ingenious, member of the indio class. And,
furthermore, definitely not a type of analysis that would allow
another to call, pejoratively, a similar Good Wisdom-like kon-
frontasi decades ago in the Sakdalista Uprising as some sort of
an “alsa puto.”4 For immanent in such disbelief, and its converse
in such pejorative remarks, is a total belief and total reverence
for itself and, if history is looked into with a deeper eye, only
itself. For if anything, an Alelio Bernaldez Pen and his Good Wis-
dom for All Nations, a Sakdalista Uprising in 1935, and, ultimately,
28
Just Another Critique or a Critique of the Critiques?
a Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga Anak

ng Bayan are bound up not so much by their more obvious differ-
ences but by their latent similarities. And the least that can be
said of these similarities is this: at their own respective moments,
they have each represented for the indio not only a movement
where he belongs nor a movement which he could join but the
movement of his salvation.
And again if anything, this situation can only reverberate what
Eduardo Galeano, contemplating the tragic fate of Latin Ameri-
can movements, have said in this regard:
...I think we can face what has happened realistically, so

that discouragement does not produce more discourage-
ment but rather serves as the basis for a new examination
of reality grounded in solid prospects and not merely on the
good intentions of small groups of well-meaning people who
want, a bit like Messiahs, to save others. I think the era of
Messiahs is over, and that the object is no longer to save
anybody. The people will save themselves when they de-
cide to save themselves.The most one can do is to help this
process develop and come to pass.5
And just what this paper will endeavor to prove and show: as
the Filipino people have shown each time, all the time, and per-
haps in the times yet to come, they have the capacity to save
themselves. It is in this wise therefore that the contest require-
ment that papers such as this must contain a “critique of the multi-
faceted crisis in the country” will simply have to give way to a
discussion that partakes of the nature of a “critique of the critique
of the crisis” which might, in the final analysis, just be the one to
bring to end this endless cycle of messiahs and situations that
call for messiahs.
Needless to say, Philippine history has to move forward---
somewhere, somehow.
E
29
NOTES
1
Philippine Daily Inquirer, June 23, 1992.
2
ibid.
3
Sociologists and historians, after all, are considered experts when it
comes to any social or historical phenomenon in society. The fact that the
learned panel demonstrated genuine surprise can only denote one thing: that
the “Good Wisdom” group and all that it represented were simply beyond
whatever theory of Philippine society these academicians have.
4
Refer to the thoroughy dogmatic Armando Liwanag article entitled “Rec-
tify Errors and Reaffirm Our Basic Principles.” Such sarcasm uncannily re-
sembles the sarcasm by the Cavite principalia a century ago when they called
Andres Bonifacio’s sojourn in Cavite as alsa balutan.
5
NACLA Report on the Americas, Vol.20 No.5, Sept-Dec.1986, p.16.
30
31
SOMETIME IN JULY 1896, a few weeks before the un-

timely discovery of the Katipunan and the propitious start of the
Revolution, the powerful Secret Chamber of the society urgently
convened for what might well be a curious meeting. Composed
of only three members—Andres Bonifacio, Emilio Jacinto and
Dr. Pio Valenzuela—the chamber deliberated and decided on
what it considered as two important tasks before it. The first
concerned the designation of an emissary to confer with million-
aire Francisco Roxas in the hope of securing his support for the
Revolution while the second concerned the assassination of the
parish priest of the Tondo district, Father Mariano Gil.1
The significance of the first task may be easily understood. It
might be remembered that, a month earlier, the Secret Chamber
sought the advice of Jose Rizal in Dapitan who, after agreeing
to the justness of revolution, nonetheless thought it necessary
for the secret society to secure first the support of the rich
principalia who could provide it with arms and ammunitions. A
revolution without arms, he said, was doomed to failure and the
Spaniards, once conquerors, would not hesitate to annihilate all
patriotic Filipinos. In Rizal’s view, such eventuality could only be
tragic, for it would only make a new revolution more difficult to
stage than the first.2
It is the second task, however, where the curiosity resides
because, unlike the first, its significance may not be as easily
understood, or much less, explained. For while there can be no
doubt that the notoriety and viciousness of the character of
Father Gil (whom his equally notorious friend, the Spanish writer
Wenceslao Retana once called as “sinister”) made him liable for
such a task from the Katipunan,3 the significance of the task itself
seems not only out of bounds with, but in direct contravention of,
the first. For if the first task can indeed be considered as the well-
known sobriety and prudence of a Rizal dawning at last upon the
impatient men of the Katipunan, then such a plan to asssassinate
the parish priest of a leading district in Manila can hardly be con-
sidered as a sober and prudent plan. In fact, when consulted on
what to do after the plan did not materialize out of mere lack of
opportunity, Apolinario Mabini could only laconically reply that if
32
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
the Katipunan was indeed prepared to stage a revolution, then

the priest could be killed. But, otherwise, the plan should no longer
be carried out because there definitely would be the consequent
persecutions after the assassination, and that, he warned, “would
be the real beginning of the revolution.”4
Meanwhile, the men tasked to carry out the assassination plot,
who were none other than the members of the Secret Chamber
themselves, patiently waited for three moonlit nights to execute
what had been decided during that meeting.5 Armed with revolv-
ers and daggers, they kept vigil in front of the convent where the
notorious priest was supposed to take his customary promenade.
Night after night, they eagerly prayed that the hated priest would
be enticed by the beautiful moonlight to take a stroll down the
pavement and meet the fate they thought he so deserved. But
unfortunately for the Supremo and his confrere, Dr. Pio Valenzue-
la, the priest during these nights did not oblige them by coming
out and taking a walk. And on the fourth day, with his determina-
tion wearied and his hopes frustrated,the Supremo was there-
fore in a perfect position to listen to Mabini whom Dr. Valenzuela
solicited for advice. Little knowing they would have been pushed
just the same by this priest to Revolution a few weeks later, the
Supremo and his associate finally cancelled the plan.6
A reflection on the significance of the Supremo during these
moonlit nights might prove to be of utmost significance. For here
is a poignant portrayal of the Supremo, which most scholars had
barely noticed nor hardly reflected on: anxiously lurking in the
shadows of the night, armed with a dagger and a revolver, grimly
staking out a would-be prey, and impelled as he was with mo-
tives yet to be fully explored, with nary a great care whether the
Revolution had sufficient arms or not. Was this but another dem-
onstration of the Supremo’s alleged characteristic imprudence
and mindlessness? But if that were so, what could explain the
curious meeting in the first place where it was also decided that
the secret society should follow the advice of Rizal, that is, to
prudently and carefully tread its revolutionary enterprise until it
had acquired the sufficient arms? Moreover, what could explain
the apparent importance they gave to this assassination plot that
33
they, the leading members of the secret society, tasked them-

selves with its execution?7
If anything, this line of questioning should invite a more thor-
ough and realistic appraisal of what really were the workings of
the Supremo’s mind. For if one is to follow Mabini’s warning: had
they succeeded with their plot, the fire of the Revolution could
have been lit right then, there. And considering the proximity of
these nights to that fortuitous day when Teodoro Patiño betrayed
the secrets of the Katipunan (which was a matter of six weeks or
less), it is not at all unreasonable to suggest that events would
have still followed the same course they actually took—as there
would have also been a hurried meeting of Katipunan members,
a stakeout in the deep woods, a desperate but courageous proc-
lamation of independence, the tactical military losses due to the
material unpreparedness of the whole enterprise. Yet there would
have been a crucial difference, nonetheless, insofar as the Revo-
lution would have been brought about this time, not by the defen-
sive reaction resulting from its discovery that it was, but instead
by an offensive action willed and consciously planned by the
Supremo Andres Bonifacio and his close associates. And per-
haps, in this light, a more realistic and conclusive approximation
of the Katipunan could be had, stemming this time from a more
conclusive view of what the Supremo was really like, bereft as he
was of the usual attribution of overbearing ilustrado influence,
and a man thinking, plotting and acting entirely and rightfully on
his own.
Needless to say, the sad fact is that nearly one hundred years
later, Bonifacio, the movement he organized and led, and that
most crucial moment of the Revolution which only he can per-
sonify, remain either shrouded in obscurity or imputed motiva-
tions and characteristics totally alien from their real selves.8 To
use an analogy, the actor in moro-moro which Bonifacio at one
time was, would rather be seen by historians as a member of the
supporting cast and not the leading man in 1896. And yet in case
he is rightfully considered as the leading man, he is nonetheless
seen as delivering not his own lines which he himself has writ-
ten, but other people’s lines, or in the face of a correct appraisal
34
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
of incontrovertible evidence suggesting the first, his own lines

albeit with the criticism that he delivered them in such a poor,
unartistic, and incomprehensible manner.9 Hence, in any analy-
sis of Bonifacio, the usual custom is to scrutinize his ideas against
the grain of the then ilustrado thinking whose leading light in the
person of Rizal he once associated with and sought advice. And
if ever analysis comes near the point of acknowledging the integ-
rity of the man’s ideas, given their alleged incomprehensibility or
their impropriety, they are seen as having just the same needed
ilustrado imprint if only to assume “explicit forms.”10 And, hence,
inasmuch as the failure of the La Liga Filipina is seen to be inte-
gral to the development of the Katipunan, the “liquidation” of
Bonifacio and the Katipunan are likewise seen to be integral to
the development of the ultimate entity, the 1898 Republic. Mean-
while, there is nonetheless the expressed grief, token or other-
wise, over the ultimate fate of the Supremo, the outright or quali-
fied condemnation of the betrayal by the ilustrado, and the over-
all sympathy for the fate of the irreconcilables like Mabini, Ricarte
and Sakay.
This paper, by calling for a reflection on the meaning of
Bonifacio’s July nights, is not merely suggesting what more per-
ceptive historians have suggested before: that sharp discon-
tinuities do exist to constantly nag such a neat presentation of
the events during that period.11 Rather it is suggesting something
more: that it is in the act of viewing these “discontinuities” as
indeed discontinuities which consists the main reason why past
and contemporary accounts have never really advanced the com-
prehension of 1896 and the other events it was able to set in
motion. In other words, it is only through a deeper and more real-
istic appraisal of Andres Bonifacio that the path of an alternative
historiography of the 1896 Revolution can be treaded, and one
which might as well uncover this altogether different continuity in
Philippine history which remains still uninvestigated but whose
power of explanation not only promises to resolve finally the fester-
ing issues of revolutionary historiography but point out as well
the too obvious realities of past and contemporary Philippine
society.
35
There can be no better demonstration of the fact that the power

and efficacy of past and current historiography have reached their
cul-de-sac in the seriously flawed and totally revisionist account
of the Revolution like that of Jesuit priest John N. Schumacher’s,
which at the moment, surprisingly remains systematically unchal-
lenged or, worse, implicitly accepted by contemporary scholars
and historians alike.12 Hence, when Schumacher, among others
apologetics, ultimately downplays the crucial role played by anti-
friar sentiments in the Revolution by asserting that these senti-
ments were present only among the cosmopolitan elite and the
native clergy13 not only does he miss the all-important signifi-
cance of the Aglipayan Schism as an integral and logical devel-
opment and not as an aberration in the history of this nation, but
he also considers without utter historical relevance these July
nights when the Revolution could have very well been actively
and offensively commenced by a totally un-ilustrado act by the
Supremo.14 That, indeed, in the absence of a realistic and more
thorough appraisal of Andres Bonifacio caught in such a poi-
gnant situation, the thought escapes a historian like Schumacher
that his cardinal proposition and the others he derives from it
sorely rest on the tenuous and absolutely fortuitous circumstance
of Father Mariano Gil, for some reason or another, not going out
to take his usual walk during those anxious July nights! Imagine
had Father Gil obliged just for once the cold and determined
daggers of Bonifacio and Valenzuela, and so rendering conclu-
siveness to what otherwise would appear to Schumacher as
merely a fleeting motif of the Revolution: his reported thirty five
years of research on the subject would never have come into
being or, at least, would have still needed a few decades more.
After all, historical research is not only informed by a survey and
reflection of those that actually happened, as in names, dates
and places, and fitting an these together neatly like a jigsaw
puzzle, acts which are Schumacher’s strongest points as a histo-
rian incidentally. Historical research is better informed by deep
reflections of the possibilities, the contradictions and the ironies
of the what-could-have-beens and the what-never-have-beens
of a particular period in order not only to shed light on the tip of
36
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
the iceberg so to speak, but to grapple with the iceberg itself,

and understand the undercurrents which it either withstood or
followed the direction of.
But not so surprising is the fact that in fairness to Schumacher,
however blatant his ultimate denial of the obvious and the suffi-
ciently obvious may have been, he has been nonetheless led to
these revisions by a conscientious and thoughtful appraisal of
the complex and contradictory issues and problems presented
by existing revolutionary historiographies.15 In this regard, par-
ticularly revealing among his critical appraisals was his sharp
riposte to Ileto’s otherwise pathbreaking account of the Revolu-
tion. While acknowledging the importance of lleto’s contribution
which brought into focus how the masses perceived actively and
differently the events and personalities of the period, all primarily
in terms of the pasyon, Schumacher complained rightfully that
nonetheless it was simply “one of the strains of mass participa-
tion, not the only one, and probably not the most important one.”16
Considering the fact that, however unsuccessful it eventually
turned out to be, the Revolution of 1896 had a national charac-
ter, and considering also that the pasyon could have been avail-
able and operative only among the masses in the Tagalog re-
gion, Schumacher recognized trenchantly that “the larger part of
mass participation in the Revolution had to be explained on other
grounds.”17
He therefore elucidated on what could supply the lack in Ileto’s
formulations: that insofar as Ileto had demonstrated that religious
perceptions and motivations animated the masses’ participation,
and that since at the core of these perceptions and motivations
were the religious sanctions exerted by the Spanish friars, the
revolution was possible only if Filipino consciences could be
undermined by a “countervailing religious force.” And for him,
this religious force is none other than that influence exerted in
turn by the local clergy on the population. And while Schumacher
had been very cautious in actively presenting what might be taken
as his own full version of the Revolution, judging from his ap-
praisals and critique of other accounts, it could be summarized
therefore in this manner: the revolution, far from “coming from
37
below” or being another instance of “class struggle” or, still, a

result of the widespread “anti-friar” resentment on the part of the
people, or better yet, a “mass-idea of utopian socialism,” was
actually nothing more but a conspiracy that came about with the
convergence of the cosmopolitan elite’s interests and ambitions
with that of its rural counterpart, and last but definitely not the
least, with that of the ambitious native clergy. And that, as a
clincher, Schumacher would not hesitate to warn that “mass sup-
port (in the Revolution) should not be exaggerated” by historians
inasmuch as peasants in general demonstrated adherence to
Spain and her religion, and that they “did long for peace” when
the conspiracy between the elites and the native clergy became
very apparent.19
The point that this paper is belaboring should be all-too-
apparent at this point. The fact that the 1896 Revolution, once it
has passed Father Schumacher’s scholarly appraisal and priestly
scruples, will appear to be scarcely a revolution at all ought to
have served as enough warning for other scholars to question
their scholarship or even their own historiography. The most con-
spicuous thing that can be noted in Schumacher’s essays and
formulations is that the revolutionary organization, which started
the Revolution in the first place, is hardly given the length and
breadth of discussion it deserves. And thus, one sees this sad
spectacle of the conduct of Schumacher’s research which exam-
ines and discusses at great length and detail, for instance, the
Masonic circles in Spain and in the islands or the purported Burgos
novel La Loba Negra or even the writer Wenceslao Retana him-
self, en route to a discussion of the 1896 events, all the while
maintaining a deafening silence over Andres Bonifacio and the
Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga Anak ng
Bayan he established, much less the July nights elucidated above,
as if they hardly mattered at all or had no significance whatso-
ever in the absence of a complete and faithful consideration of
these prior or contemporaneous events.
Hence, insofar as it was indicated that Schumacher only fol-
lowed the paths indicated by the previous historiographies, any
attempt to apprehend the fullest significance of the 1896 Revolu-
38
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
tion faces not only a facile revisionism on the part of Schumacher

but will have to deal directly and squarely with past and present
historiographies. And while it may be said that, owing to the utter
scarcity and inaccessibility of Katipunan documents which may
easily afford one a completely new or alternative historiography,20
this fullest significance of the Katipunan cannot, as yet, be com-
prehensively and exhaustively investigated, there can be cited
nonetheless certain crucial elements present in these historiog-
raphies which may suffice to serve as meaningful starting points
of re-evaluation and re-creation.
And so, the questions have to be posed: what are these ele-
ments in ordinary historiography which prevent an apprehension
of the full significance of Bonifacio’s July nights, the Katipunan
itself, and, ultimately, the 1896 Revolution? What are the factors
that predispose one not to see the more fundamental continuity
which lies behind any perceived “discontinuity”?
In general, it may be cited that the single answer to all these
lies in that customary schema among historians of the period
which considers the 1896 Revolution as, in essence, nothing
but the logical or direct product of the Reform movement, a move-
ment which, in turn, was brought about by events invariably
characterized as belonging to that so-called era of the “rise of
nationalism.”21 These events are as follows, ordered as they are
according to their perceived “line of march”: first, there were the
economic and social developments that conditioned the rise of
an ambitious and restless native principalia class; second, there
was the attendant agitation for political and religious reforms
resulting from the adoption of the leading members of this class
of the liberal or “Enlightenment” ideas current at that time, the
most notable being the agitation conducted by the La Solidaridad
group of propagandists; and, last, with the utter failure of these
reformist agitations due to the resistance of and persecutions by
the colonial authorities, the times were set for the emergence of
radical action, and so Bonifacio, situated like an heir to all these
developments, responded appropriately with his Katipunan
organization dramatically founded as it was on the night when
the news of Rizal’s deportation became known.
39
And while some historians have correctly diagnosed the fact

that a consideration of Bonifacio as an “heir” to ilustrado lega-
cies is hardly without serious problems, whatever these prob-
lems are, they are in the end seen as having no major signifi-
cance if only to upset this general lineage between Reform and
Revolution, the La Liga and Katipunan, a Rizal and a Bonifacio.
Hence, apparently among historians, inspite of the fact that
Bonifacio, in the ultimate analysis, might not have been and never
was an ilustrado, an examination of the philosophy and organi-
zational principles of the Katipunan he founded would nonethe-
less bear out certain imprints one could consider as unmistak-
ably and truly ilustrado legacies. These alleged legacies are, as
follows: first, the alleged Masonic origin and character of the
Katipunan’s initiation rites; and second, the alleged immanence
of the philosophy of the Propagandist movement in the procla-
mations of the Katipunan in the single issue of its newspaper
Kalayaan.22
And so, given these “proofs” considered with later develop-
ments, it is not totally surprising to hear from authors like Fast
and Richardson (if anything, Schumacher’s counterparts on the
other end of the ideological spectrum) such utterly preposterous
judgment to the effect that the 1896 Revolution was after all a
“bourgeois revolution,”23 that the Katipunan lacked “social radi-
calism,24" and that the career of the Supremo “depended largely
upon his willingness and ability to carry out (Aguinaldo’s) orders.25”
With the possible exception of Ileto, it may be said that it is in
the unquestioning acceptance among historians and scholars
of the truth of these “legacies” which consist the greatest stum-
bling block why, one hundred years later, there has still been no
advance towards a full understanding of the Katipunan, the 1896
Revolution, and the more fundamental continuity in Philippine
history referred to earlier. But while an Ileto would disagree with
other historians in matters of detail—that is, he asserts that if
ever the masses through Bonifacio and the Katipunan also be-
came heirs of these supposed ilustrado legacies, however tem-
porary, they did so actively and only according to their terms—he
nonetheless would be willing to accept these statements of
40
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
“proofs” as ultimately true.26 And thus, inasmuch as an Ileto,

trapped as he was in the realm of language, the pasyon, was not
able to see through the real substance behind these “legacies,”
it still has to be supplied what could then constitute as the real
substance, the hidden secret, of what hitherto was considered
not as the Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga
Anak ng Bayan but, rather, as Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang
Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Ilustrado at Principalia.
According to Agoncillo’s classic account, which cited earlier
works, the Katipunan ritual of initiation was usually performed in
the following step-by-step manner:
With his padrino or sponsor, the neophyte, in black habi-

liments, enters a small room. He is brought before a cabi-
net draped in black, while in front of him, on the walls, are
posters with the inscription “If thou has strength and cour-
age, thou mayst proceed,” “If curiosity brought thee here,
proceed not, ‘If thou knowest not how to control thine bad
inclinations, proceed not: the door of the Powerful and Most
Respectable Society of the Sons of the People will not be
opened to thee. The neophyte is then seated near a small
table, dimly lighted and on which are a revolver, a bolo, a
skull and a formulary containing the questions that he must
answer satisfactorily. The questions are: First, What was
the condition of the Philippines in early times? Second, What
is the condition today? Third, What will be the condition in
the future? Coached previously by his sponsor, the neo-
phyte answers that the Filipinos at the coming of the Span-
iards had their own civilization and political liberty, their own
religion and alphabet, and had commercial intercourse with
the nations of Asia...As to the second question, the neo-
phyte answers that the so-called friar missionaries have done
nothing to civilize the Filipinos...They had done nothing more
than teach the forms of Catholicism in its shallow trappings,
blinding the Filipinos with the apparatus of magnificent reli-
gious festivals which cost them so much and benefit only
the friars.The third question is answered by saying that with
41
faith, courage and constancy, all the brutalities and inequi-

ties of the Spanish authorities will be remedied in time and
freedom will be redeemed...The questions answered to the
satisfaction of the members present, the mabalasik, or mas-
ter of ceremonies, tells the neophyte to back dawn if he
does not have the courage to proceed with the rites, since
the society does not have any use for cowards. If he per-
sists, he is blindfolded into another room where his courage
is put to a test, and as in a Masonic rite, he is tried by ordeal
to prove if he is made of the stuff demanded by the rigid
regimen imposed by the rules of the Katipunan. Passing
the physical tests, he is next led into another room where
the final rites take place. A scalpel is introduced, an inci-
sion is made in the left forearm of the neophyte, and
with his own blood he signs the oath of membership.27
(emphasis supplied)
Whether or not these rituals were, indeed, masonic in origin

or in form is not the primary point since the original founders of
the Katipunan, at one time or another, involved as they were in
the Masonic lodge Taliba, could have indeed adopted and/or sim-
plified certain Masonic elements in these rituals.28 The primary
point is that whether or not these rituals could have possibly ex-
tended the philosophy of the ilustrados to the rank and file to
such an extent as to render plausibility to the claim of virtual
ilustrado parentage of the Katipunan and of 1896. If at all, these
rituals may be considered as unquestionably the venues of en-
lightenment of the ordinary masa.
Hence, the question is: by virtue of these rituals, were the
Enlightenment ideas of the ilustrados, acquired, as it were, in
Europe or in the universities in the islands and conditioned, as it
were, by the economic developments of the early nineteenth cen-
tury, transmitted to the so-called pobres y ignorantes, most of
whom never have even been in Manila, much less attended its
universities, and never have benefitted from the confluence of
economic and social developments which have created the
principalia and its ilustrado offspring as a class?
42
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
Agoncillo had noted the “deep emotions” and “enthusiasm”

generated by these rituals on the part of the neophytes,29 and if
anything the real substance of the Katipunan could be found in
an investigation of what were these “deep emotions” and what
were their bases in fact. In this light, there is so much truth in
Ileto’s assessment that these rituals were apprehended by the
neophytes like they were a religious experience.30 But whereas
Ileto, in his investigations of this religious experience, would have
to strain his arguments by having to refer first to a 1900 variation
of this ritual, and from there leaping the distance of Hermano
Pule and his Cofradia de San Jose in 1840, only to illustrate the
point that “Masonic forms” necessarily do not transmit “Masonic”
(read: ilustrado) substance, this paper believes that there can be
found in the account itself elements which are beyond the issue
of language and definitely more illustrative of the resultant non-
ilustrado substance generated bv these rituals. For indeed, even
if it may be granted that the influences of Masonry are apparent
and unmistakeable when it comes to the general sequence and
conduct of these rituals, one still is at a loss on how to explain the
presence of a strange, totally un-Masonic, and un-ilustrado rite
such as the blood rite, the finality of whom ought to be indicative
of the utmost importance given to it by the Katipunan?
A survey of Masonic literature current then would yield no
information or clue which might enlighten one regarding this
“strange” feature of the Katipunan rituals, and much less, regard-
ing the possible reasons why the Katipunan made it a corner-
stone of its initiation rites.31 And, as such, Ileto’s assessment of
the importance of these rituals makes the situation even more
compounded. According to him, Bonifacio’s downfall could be
traced to his preoccupation with the “sacred ideals” and “moral
transformation” immanent in these rituals as they were found by
others to be unworkable in a time of massive recruitment of revo-
lutionaries. Ileto cited the example of an old-time Katipunero,
Roman Basa, who was expelled or withdrew from the Katipunan
because, among other things, he wanted to do away with the
“tedious process of initiation which Bonifacio never wanted to
give up.”32
43
“Sacred ideals” and “moral transformation” themes in a

“strange ritual,” producing therefore in the neophytes the stirrings
of their “deep emotions” and the stirrings of which Bonifacio never
wanted to give up---could the brilliant and courageous but often-
times luckless campaign for reforms by Propagandists in faraway
Spain really have anything significant to do about these “deep
emotions,” especially since the masses who experienced them
could barely understand the Spanish language by which these
campaigns were conducted?33 But perhaps the Masonic lodges
in the islands which, in general, counted among its ranks the
most prosperous, most educated and, not coincidentally, the most
snobbish of the indios among the local population, and who jus-
tifiably denounced the Katipunan upon its discovery with their
protestations of innocence?34
The answer of course lies in that strange ritual where after
indoctrinating the initiate, he was made to dramatize his willing-
ness to give up to his own life for the Motherland by means of a
blood declaration. And, if anything, this act of declaration could
only produce nothing else but “deep emotions” since the indio,
under those circumstances, was only performing once more that
rite which his ancestors before him had performed all-too-often!
Indeed, what is referred to here is that ancient rite of the blood
compact which the natives solemnly performed in sealing impor-
tant negotiations of friendships such as those that Legazpi and
Martin de Goiti later on reneged with Sikatuna in Cebu and Ra-
jah Soliman in Manila.
The Spanish chroniclers who were part of the sixteenth cen-
tury conquests took notice of how the natives seemingly had too
much preponderance or respect for this solemn rite.35 They graph-
ically described this rite as follows:
The ceremony is considered inviolable. This is observed in

this manner: one from each party must draw two or three
drops of blood from his arm or breast and mix them, in the
same cup with water or wine. Then the mixture must be
divided equally between two cups, and neither person may
depart until both cups are drained.36
44
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
Apparently, the ceremony had undergone a modification in

the hands of Bonifacio and the Katipunan, and though the ques-
tions precisely how and why, much more the question of its sur-
vival and reemergence, sadly remain still the object of further
research, the indications should be clear enough. Given a mass
of people unassimilated as they were in the emergent ilustrado
or principalia culture, much less the pure Hispanic culture of the
peninsulares and the insulares, their revolt could only have taken
root and been propelled by the ideas and traditions that day in
and day out have animated their sordid lives. If at all, here lies
the strength and worth of an Ileto searching for “discontinuities”
to nag conventional accounts which placed too much emphasis
on the importance of ilustrado influence, virtually rendering the
masses as an unthinking, passive and idiotic entity. Yet for rea-
sons which will be extensively discussed later, the susceptibility
of Ileto to Schumacher’s sharp riposte mentioned earlier lies in
the fact that he has not touched on the historical continuum far
enough so as to recognize in the Katipunan not only the pasyon
interpretation at work but the active resurrection by the mass of
its pre-colonial past.
And if only to provide another indication of what may well be
a very prudent, if not insignificant, influence of ilustrado thinking
on the Katipunan, great attention must be given to the divergence
in the language of the two entities. In the Agoncillo account quoted
above, there is actually a gross mistranslation of the Katipunan
questionnaire insofar as the original mentions “Katagalugan” and
not “Philippines.”37 And inasmuch as a general survey of Ma-
sonic and Propagandist literature at the time would bear out the
fact that nowhere was the country mainly referred to by a “tribal”
name such as “Katagalugan,” this distinction must be drawn of
all its significance. In this regard, given the fact that the apellation
“Filipinos” were, for a long tirne, reserved only for the insulares,
tremendous significance should be given to this active insistence
on the part of the Katipunan to still call with a “tribal” name a very
proper noun despite the fact that Propagandist campaign had
already broken through this elitism to rightfully include the
natives. At the very least, just like his July nights, this insistence
45
can only bear out a Supremo thinking, acting and plotting as his
own man.
But if at all, this only brings to focus the alleged second “proof”
of ilustrado “legacy”: the alleged “immanence” of Propagandist
philosophy in the public declarations of the Katipunan. While this
may also be said of the questionnaire referred to above, what is
specifically referred to here is that essay by Bonifacio entitled
“Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog” which appeared in the only
issue of the paper Kalayaan. But while scholars, including Ileto,
all agree that here is direct ilustrado influence at best insofar as
the arguments elucidated by Bonifacio in this essay resemble so
much the points raised earlier by Rizal, these scholars are not in
agreement as to which among Rizal’s work did the essay resemble
so much, and more importantly, how. Hence, inasmuch as a ref-
erence by Fast and Richardson to Rizal’s essay “On the Indo-
lence of the Filipinos”38 would have to contend with Ileto referring
to Rizal’s annotations of Morga’s Sucesos delas Islas Filipinas,39
a Schumacher implying intellectual overdependence because
Bonifacio’s essay simply “reads like a summary of Rizal”40 would
also have to contend with a more benevolent view by Constantino
that Bonifacio, having had enough education, was capable of
“transmitting” a Rizal in his own writing.41
If the tentativity of these scholars is therefore any indication,
aside from the fact that Bonifacio was also capable of an equally
beautiful (if not a more beautiful) poetry in “Pag-ibig sa Tinubuang
Lupa,” let the divergence in language again bear out what may
not be a simple summary or restatement or inspiration on the
part of Bonifacio. Which may well be the case since it is this
essay that the Supremo was in his insistent best. In an active
resurrection of the pre-colonial past, he wrote:
Ytong Katagalugan na pinamamahalaan ng unang panahon

ng ating mga tunay na mga kababayan niyaong hindi pa
tumutuntong sa mga lupaing ito ang mga kastila ay
nabubuhay sa lubos na kasaganaan, at kaguinhawahan.
Kasundo niya ang mga kapit bayan at lalung lalo na ang
mga taga Japon sila’y kabilihan at kapalitan ng mga kalakal
46
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
malabis ang pagyabong ng lahat ng pagkakakitaan kaya’t

dito’y mayaman ang kaasalan ng lahat, bata’t matanda at
sampung mga babae ay marunong sumulat ng talagang
pagsulat nating mga tagalog. Dumating ang mga kastila at
dumulog na nakipagkaibigan. Sa mabuti nilang hikayat na
di umano, tayo’y aakain sa lalung kagalingan at lalung
imumulat ang ating kaisipan, ang nasabing nagsisipamahala
ay ng yaring nalamuyot sa tamis ng kanilang dila sa paghibo.
Gayon man sila’y ipinailalim sa talagang kaugalian ng
mga tagalog na sinaksihan at pinapagtibay ng kanilang
pinagkayarian sa pamamagitan ng isang panunumpa
na kumuha ng kaunting dugo sa kanikanilang mga ugat,
at yaoy inihalu’t ininom nila kapua tanda ng tunay at
lubos na pagtatapat na di magtataksil sa pinagkayarian.
Yto’y siang tinatawag na “Pacto de Sangre” ng haring
Sikatuna at ni Legazpi na pinakakatawan ng hari ng
España. (emphasis supplied)
If at all, it is this portion of Bonifacio’s essay which constitutes

the meat of the allegation by scholars of direct ilustrado “parent-
age” of the Katipunan. Whereas Schumacher would say one could
see here “the role of the Propagandist’s philosophy in supplying
the legitimation for the actual protagonists” of the 1896 Revolu-
tion,43 Fast and Richardson would, on the other hand, say that “in
a condensed and popularized form, (the) Katipunan thus restated
the central themes of the Propagandist critique.44”
But is this really so? The following discussion ought to prove
something conclusive. Aside from the fact that the above quota-
tion displays once more Bonifacio’s insistence on the noun Kata-
galugan, and not Filipinas as his ilustrado counterparts would
have it, and likewise from the fact that one has here a concrete
demonstration that Bonifacio knew very well what was it in the
Katipunan’s “tedious” ritual which he was not willing to give up,
the greater consideration is that the Supremo could never have
possibly learned of this account from reading a Rizal and hence
much less “restate”/”summarize”/“transmit” a Rizal because
of the simple reason that NOWHERE in the essay “On the Indo-
47
lence of the Filipinos” nor the annotations of Morga’s Sucesos

can there be found this very important and very integral account
of the blood ritual between Sikatuna and Legazpi in the first
place!45
This very important detail is one grievously missed by an Ileto
who would rather extrapolate on the significance of the words
Kasaganaan, Kaginhawaan, Katwiran and the like in pointing out
the continuity between a Bonifacio and the host of non-ilustrado
rebels and prophet-kings in Philippine history.46 But inasmuch as
words, taken out from their context as such, tend to remain as
mere words, Ileto’s analysis unavoidably suffers a susceptibility
from another trenchant riposte from Richardson this time that
inasmuch as Rizal also used similar words in his “Letter to the
Young Women of Malolos,” perhaps lleto could write a sequel to
his Pasyon and Revolution book, and which shall now have to be
entitled as Pasyon and Bourgeois Revolution.47
But there is a deeper continuity that is beyond such an Ileto
extrapolation and this Fast and Richardson sally. Even if one is
to grant these scholars their unjust allegations on the Supremo,
their assertions have to contend fully with what Dr. Pio Valenzuela
in his memoirs noted as the powerful effect of the Bonifacio
essay on the part of the people. According to him, even Bonifacio
himself was “surprised at the rapid growth of the society.” From
the time of its founding in July 7,1892 to January 1,1896, the
Katipunan did not have more than 300 members. But since
the publication of the Kalayaan about the end of March up to
August that year, or just a matter of five months, the Katipunan
ranks swelled up to 30,000.48 If anything, these 29,700 new
members should be the starting point of any analysis. What would
account for this startling number? Was their act of coming in
droves to the Katipunan ranks a mere result of Bonifacio’s play
with words? Or was there something already in them that made it
so easy for them to recognize the content and the responsibili-
ties that Bonifacio’s words demanded or implied?
Yet in answering these questions, inasmuch as there is a dire
lack of any written testimony on the part of those who composed
the Katipunan rank-and-file, this paper will therefore have to re-
48
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
fer the reader to the year 1935, the year of the Sakdalista upris-
ing, and find clues in the responses of a direct participant therein,
Salud Algabre.49 This reference may well be instructive. Salud
Algabre, more popularly known as the “Generalla,” was one who
would proudly declare herself to be a ‘pure Tagalog’ in spite of a
very fair skin and insinuations of her interviewer to the contrary.
According to her, her father, her grandfather and her uncles
were all soldiers who had fought under General Cailles from 1896-
1897 or the period she termed as the “War of the Katipunan.”And
if anything, the influence these kins had on her could only be
considered as overpowering because when queried as to the
alleged Japanese connection in the 1935 uprising, she would
dismiss the insinuation as “Foolishness! Foolishness!” because,
if at all:
What we did was our heritage, from our fathers and our
fathers’ fathers. My family has always resisted. Some were
put into exile merely for refusing to kiss the hands of the
priests. Some were exiled to Jolo, that’s where some died.
During the early revolutions, to rise up was voluntary to one’s
will. Someone in the family was always involved. For these
activities, they were dispersed to Laoag, to Nueva Ecija,
some to Pampanga, some to Rizal. In my visits to those
places, I found out that they were all Sakdalistas, and that
they were all our relatives. 50
Further on, when questioned as to whether nationalism and

rebellion then went hand-in-hand in her family, she would thus
state eloquently:
From the beginning. That is why I can really be proud

of Cabuyao. Cabuyao would never allow tyranny to be
unchallenged. Even when I am gone, when we are all
gone, someone from Cabuyao will stand up and protest.
Why? Because the king of all Laguna ruled from Cabuyao.
When the Spaniards came, there was no Santa Rosa,
no Biñan, no Calamba, no San Pedro. The emblem of
49
our municipal building is Tabok, King Tabok. There, ac-

cording to my father and my father’s father, the King of
Tondo would discuss with the King of Laguna the prob-
lems of the country. There, near the shore of Laguna,
they would discuss the problems of the people and find
solutions.51
But apparently, they were not only doing all these to reclaim
King Tabok’s sovereignty inasmuch as they had “practical
reasons” as well:
It is an old town, a very old town. In fact, there is a golden

bell. I shall point it out to you. During summer when the
water was clear, you could see down through the depths,
down to where it stood. The reason why they disposed of
it was because mothers, early in their pregnancy, would
give birth prematurely upon hearing its toll. One of the
reasons why my ancestors rebelled was to protest against
the church that held the bell. When the Spaniards came,
they forced the people to build the church. Many were
killed by the Spaniards, flogged to death, there on the
shore where the church was built.52
Reading all these would make one think it was not Salud
Algabre alone who was being interviewed. It could very well have
been her father, her grandfather and her uncles who were all
participants in the 1896-1897 “War of the Katipunan”! Which might
have well been the case since, upon being asked where she
learned all these information, the Generalla would answer “from
my father and my father’s father.”53
This ought to bring home the point regarding the previous
discussions. Even if one is to grant the contention of scholars
that Bonifacio got from Rizal and the ilustrados the historiogra-
phy he propounded to the people, this contention already strained
as it is, might only account for the 300 members of the Katipunan
during those four years before March 1896. But the succeeding
months until the outbreak of the 1896 Revolution, and the possi-
50
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
bly more than 29,700 new recruits are entirely a different matter
altogether! The point that should be made in all clarity is this:
these Katipuneros would never have needed ilustrados telling
them what their former legacies were since from tales such as
these, handed down to them by their “fathers and father’s fa-
thers,” they were already fully aware of what their heritage were.
And it was this knowledge, this long memory as it were, vary-
ing in depth and details as it must have been across the different
towns and municipalities at that time, and the traditional responses
attendant to this knowledge, which Bonifacio, in his essay “Ang
Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog,” stirred to activity, gave focus
and, ultimately galvanized to create what indeed was in history
the Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga Anak
ng Bayan. And it could only be a very sad spectacle to see histo-
rians missing the significance of long memories such as these,
preferring instead to reckon with the scholarly memories that
ilustrados like Rizal and Paterno sought to “infuse” into what
otherwise would be considered as a completely dazed and
idiotic mass.54
It is in this regard therefore that what Ileto in his Pasyon book
examined as the context of what proved to be the fatal accusa-
tion against Bonifacio while he was in Cavite—that the Supremo
acted like he was “king”—could be examined in a better light. In
examining such a behavior of Bonifacio, Ileto noted that while
“our sympathies in this modern age tend to lie with Aguinaldo,”
who was the one who made possible a “national” revolution, the
behavior of the Supremo was nonetheless perfectly understand-
able.
After all, Ileto would suggest, Bonifacio himself along with
other leading members of the Katipunan climbed Mount Tapusi
in Montalban on a Holy Week to cloth themselves with the aura
of Bernardo Carpio, the legendary “King of the Tagalogs,” and
therefore, when the common people of Cavite welcomed the
Supremo, it was not surprising at all that he was greeted by shouts
of “Mabuhay ang Hari!”55
As far as this examination of Ileto is concemed, the disagree-
ment of this paper lies not so much in his “sympathies,” which
51
ultimately depict the Supremo as though he was indeed a mere

manipulator of mass perception who was incapable of staging
a national revolution, and thus, justifiably had to be done away
with in favor of Aguinaldo. The disagreement is based more on
the limited drift of his investigation which traced the category of
“king” only as far back as Apolinario de la Cruz and the Bernardo
Carpio epic. For apart from a King Tabok, who animated a Salud
Algabre and who might otherwise be considered merely “legend-
ary,” history would tell that this category of “king” dated further
back in actual fact. For instance, well before the earliest avail-
able edition of the Bernardo Carpio epic in 1860, one Spanish
report in the year 1643 is an eye-opener:
In the district of Malolos in the province of Bulacan, an

Indian named Don Pedro Ladia, went about promoting
sedition. He proclaimed that to him belonged the right of
being king over the provinces of Tagalos, alleging that he
was a descendant of Raja Matanda, the petty king whom
the Spaniards found at Manila in the year 1571. With these
and other impostures, aided by wine and with consultations
with the demon which always figure on these occasions, he
kept many villages of that district disquieted. 56 (emphasis
supplied)
If anything, a continuity as early as this should merit a second

look at these “modem sympathies” which lleto, unfortunately,
agreed with. For, as will be discussed more extensively later, it
will appear that Ileto’s misjudgment on the incapacity of the
Supremo to stage his own “national” revolution is nothing else
but an echo of the same historiographies he disagrees with, in-
sofar as these historiographies assume that the rise of the
principalia as a class also conditioned the so-called rise of “na-
tionalism.”
Be that as it may, Ileto nonetheless also shed adequate light
on the role played by anting-anting and amulets in the 1896
Revolution and beyond. Agreeing with earlier authors, Ileto right-
fully called the Katipuneros as “men of anting-anting,” denoting
52
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
thereby that the revolutionaries were not dependent on nor guided

by the ilustrado emblems of “liberalism” and “republicanism.”
For even Aguinaldo himself, Ileto noted, had this curious boy
always at his side, “dressed as a page and “seemed to be con-
sidered as a person of no little importance by the others.” lleto
explained this curiosity as such: “by keeping a boy of unusual
anting-anting at his side, Aguinaldo hoped to absorb some of his
power; and if Aguinaldo does not believe in the anting-anting (an
unlikely fact), he had to conform to what his peasant soldiers
believed a man of power like him should have.”57 And yet in
explaining the over-all significance of why the anting-anting
figured in all these, Ileto would rather go the circuitous way of a
Benedict Anderson explaining the notions of power in a Javanese
society, and from there to a Wenceslao Retana extrapolating on
the significance of the “half a Christian conscience” exerted in
the natives by the Conquest, and, ultimately, to his thesis of the
pasyon and Holy Week “further reshaping the indigenous
notions of power.” And if only to temper a friar-aggrandizing or
friar-patronizing Ileto statement like this—“surely the friars did
not intend the pasyon themes of self-purification and renewal to
amplify indigenous notions of concentrating the ‘creative energy’
of the universe in one’s loob”— a statement which implicitly
assumes that the anting-anting’s origin was indeed traceable to
what Retana observed as “half-a-Christian conscience,” it must
be pointed out to Ileto that such a circuitous route is wholly
unnecessary. This is because accounts such as this one from
Bohol in the year 1622 would suffice to explain more accurately
the exact origins of anting-anting:
The divata, or demon, appeared to some Indians in the

woods, its face covered like that of one taking the discipline,
and commanded them to quit the gospel ministers and the
Spanish vassalage, and take refuge in the hills, and to build
him a chapel, where he would aid them and give them what-
ever they needed to pass their lives in happiness and abun-
dance...Two or three of these Indians became priests of
this divata (and told the people that) if they would attack the
53
Spaniards, the divata would cause the mountains to rise

against their foe, that the muskets of the latter would
not go off, or else the bullets would rebound to those
whofired them; that if any Indian should die, the de-
mon will resuscitate him; that the leaves of trees would
be converted to saranga (which is a large fish); that
when they cut bejucos, these would distill wine instead
of water; that from banana leaves, they would make
fine linen; and in short, all would be pleasure, enjoy-
ment and delight.59 (emphasis supplied)
Or that, furthermore, a reflection on the significance of a

Bancao in the same year in Leyte would adequately point out the
reasons why anting-anting and oraciones became so conspicu-
ous in any Katipunan battle:
He was baptized and, although a young man showed that

he was loyal to the Christians; but conquered by the enemy
(of souls), he changed sides in his old age. This man lived
in the island of Leyte, and with a son of his and another
man, Pagali (whom he chose as a priest of his idolatry),
erected a sacred place to the divata, or devil; and induced
six villages to rebel. In order to remove from them their
fear of the Spaniards, these men told their followers
that they could change the Spaniards into stone as soon
as they saw them, by repeating the word bato; and that
a woman or a child could change them into clay by
flinging earth on them.60 (emphasis supplied)
Immediately, therefore, that “half a Christian conscience”

Retana alludes to and which Ileto unquestioningly took in as
the foundation of the origin of the anting-anting falls flat in the
face of a Bancao who, in his prime, was a baptized and “loyal
Christian,” but who in his twilight years had been conquered
by the “enemy.” In this wise, what another scholar had observed
in his footnotes as “suppressed racial feelings” asserting them-
selves in 1896 when rebelling villagers smashed the Caucasian
54
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
noses of religious images61 could only indicate further that this

“half a Christian conscience” must have indeed been a gross
over-estimation or was simply a put-on on the part of the con-
quered natives. And if only for its uncanny similarity with events
of earlier centuries, this 1621 Spanish report is worth quoting at
length:
The insurgents did not cease until they had roused all the
villages in their vicinity. As men abandoned of God and di-
rected by the devil, they were guilty of horrible sacrileges.
In the village of Abuatan they sacked the church and the
sacristy, and made a jest and derision of the things which
they found there. They treated irreverently that which they
had a little before reverenced: the women put on the frontals
as petticoats (sayas), and of the corporals and palls of the
chalices they made headkerchiefs. They dressed them-
selves in the habits of the religious, and even went so far as
to lose their respect for the virgin. The feet and hands of
this image were of ivory, and it was one of the most beauti-
ful in all that province and in all the islands. There was one
man who dared give it a slash across the nose, saying, “Let
us see if she will bleed!” 62
But if anything, this only brings this paper to its own approxi-
mation of what the 1896 Revolution, indeed, was all about: it was
not a “bourgeois revolution” insofar as liberalism and republi-
canism were not its guiding motifs, and insofar as the “bourgeoi-
sie” did not consist the main nor the leading revolutionary entity;
it also was not a “people’s war under elite leadership” insofar as
the spontaneous uprisings that marked the entire event were in
direct contravention of the strategy and dicta of “people’s war” as
a military-political concept; it also was not a mere “conspiracy”
between the cosmopolitan and provincial elite together with the
native clergy because though it may have indeed developed as
such later on, it was first and foremost an event brought about by
a mass-based Katipunan; and lastly, it was not a “revolt of the
masses” if by “masses” is meant an entity primarily animated
55
either by a “mass-idea of utopian socialism” or by the pasyon;

for, if at all, the 1896 Revolution was primarily that long-awaited
revolt of the Tagalogs.
There can be no doubt that, on the eve of 1896, Tagalog
society, situated as it was at the center of Spanish colonialism,
was the most culturally and politically integrated, hence, the most
brutalized, ethnic community all throughout the archipelago.63
Unlike his other ethnic kin, the Tagalog had virtually lost his former
self in face of the deluge of Spanish cultural influences, so much
so that until now the epic he formerly had is still considered as
missing.64 Furthermore, whereas other communities throughout
the duration of Spanish colonial rule had, from time to time, prided
themselves by revolting and reasserting their real selves, the
Tagalog could therefore only wallow in grief and shame for the
obesience and silence he displayed for about two centuries.65
His general dispossession was such that excepting a Salud
Algabre and her kins who all had a definite focus in their tales,
the ordinary Tagalog, following Ileto, would even find in the pasyon
and the Bemardo Carpio epics what would take the place or
approximate that belief-system which formerly defined himself
and which throughout the centuries he had grievously lost. In
this regard, a consideration of the Bernardo Carpio epic is most
enlightening. Ileto has noted that the earliest available edition of
this epic is one dated 1860.66 And yet, the fact that the appropria-
tion of Bernardo Carpio by the Tagalogs already figured in Rizal’s
El Filibusterismo,67 published in 1891, could only suggest one
thing: either Rizal was not the avid and faithful observer of Phil-
ippine (or more appropriately, Tagalog) society he undeniably
was, or such a speedy appropriation was indicative of the depth
of this “great thirst” on the part of the Tagalog for conceptual
tools which, on the one hand, helped him explain the miseries of
the society that confronted him, and, on the other hand, struck in
him the hopes of his salvation.
If at all, it was precisely this “great thirst” of the Tagalogs which
the association Kataastaasan Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng
mga Anak ng Bayan responded to and satiated to the utmost.
Given a public declaration in the essay “Ang Dapat Mabatid ng
56
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
mga Tagalog” of that pre-colonial legacy which Tagalog society

once had and shared with the rest of its ethnic kins, the Katipunan
was able to tap deep inside the soul of the ordinary Tagalog and
actively awaken what hitherto might have existed inside him as a
latent, incoherent feeling of identity. And given the association’s
initiation process which made the neophytes swear according to
ancient rituals, this awakened feeling of identity was given defi-
nite focus, forged as a fighting force, and provided a glimpse of
what kind of happy life awaited it if only the neophyte could, in
the first place, master it. And so, if anything, here lies the “deep
emotions,” the “sacred ideals,” and the “moral transformation”
which the Supremo was all-too-unwilling to give up, much less
consider as dispensable even in view of the need for speedier
and more massive recruitment of members.
But as history would tragically have it, it was this “great thirst”
among the Tagalogs as translated into thousands upon thousands
of prospective recruits lining up for Katipunan membership which
may have contributed to the ultimate undoing of the Supremo
himself. As earlier cited, Pio Valenzuela noted that Bonifacio him-
self was surprised at the rapid growth of the Katipunan after the
publication of the essay Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog.
Simply put, the Supremo, along with the other leading members
of the association, must have been thoroughly unprepared for
such a fast and unexpected development. Hence, on the verge
of panic that the grossly unprepared Revolution would break out
anytime, they sent for Rizal’s advice on the matter. But advice or
no advice, it was only a matter of weeks before the secrets of the
Katipunan were finally discovered, and the Revolution, hesitant
and desperate as it were, finally proceeded to take the course of
events it actually took—the Cry at Pugad Lawin, the fallback at
Marikina, the great losses at the Battle of San Juan, the revolt
in other Tagalog provinces, the Tejeros coup, and finally, the
executions at Mount Buntis.
It is in this context therefore that the last knot of alleged
ilustrado and principalia linkage with the Katipunan, especially
that which pertains to the so-called “phases” of the Revolution,
can finally be disentangled. For it has always been the case that
57
the aftermath of these Bonifacio executions is seemingly consid-

ered by historians as marking the end of the “first” phase of the
Revolution, and conversely, as marking the beginning of the “sec-
ond” (and allegedly more “progressive”) phase which culminated
in the establishment of the alleged “proper” entity, the Malolos
Republic of 1898.68 The insidious implication is that a continuity
exists after all, insofar as the execution of the Supremo paved
the way for the “retrogressive” and “improper” ideas of the first
phase to be finally superseded by the “progressive” and “proper”
ideas of the “second” phase. But while the attributes of this sec-
ond phase can in themselves, textually or otherwise, be system-
atically questioned as to their true “progressiveness” and “pro-
priety,”69 the fact remains that historians have been led to these
views inasmuch as the aftermath of the mock trials and assassi-
nations of the Bonifacio brothers were seemingly not marked by
any great dissension in the Katipunan rank-and-file.70 And so, in
such seeming absence of widespread indignation, the plausibil-
ity of ilustrado and principalia “parentage” of the Revolution, and,
much more, the justifiable execution of the Supremo, is derived
even further: that insofar as there was no “discontinuity” that arose
after the elimination of the Supremo, then it is but logical to as-
sume that the principalias and the ilustrados must really have
had (if not, ought to have had) a direct relationship with the
Katipunan, a relationship which can therefore be likened to the
parents, natural or otherwise, of a small boy finally claiming him
from an inept babysitter.
But inasmuch as these claimants, from all indications, appear
not as parents but as kidnappers, the question has to be posed:
does this seeming absence of great and widespread indignation
consist sufficient proof of ilustrado parentage being operational
(if not necessitated) in this situation, insofar as the “first” phase
of the Revolution indeed simply had to give way to the “second”
phase? As indicated earlier, the explanation which could help
disentangle the knot would stem rather from this “great thirst”
among the Tagalogs. Given the presence of at least 29,700 fresh
Katipunan recruits, the authority of the Supremo must have been
not that firmly established, much more known to and recognized
58
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
by all these new members. After all, the Katipunan was a secret
society and the essay Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog was
written under a nom de plume.71 And so, if at all, the news re-
garding the Tejeros Convention and the consequent Aguinaldo
proclamations practically became the next official contacts by
these fresh recruits to that secret society which had initiated them
into the Revolution, but which was now dissolved, the leadership
of which having been already captured by the Cavite principalia.72
In short, these new Katipuneros simply had no way of voicing
out their widespread indignation even as the malicious lies and
unjust accusations against the Supremo could only have be-
clouded all the more his authority and leadership of the Tagalog
revolt. And beclouded as such, there could not have possibly
been an immediate great dissension or “discontinuity” on the part
of the multitude of fresh Tagalog footsoldiers and officers of the
Katipunan.73
And so, if anything, all these would only shed light on the
real significance of what were discussed earlier as Bonifacio’s
July nights. Could it then be that what could explain the curious
meeting was the intention on the part of the Supremo to make
known his leadership and authority, knowing fully well that the
Revolution could break out at any moment? The implications of
this question should be interesting, for it might be remembered
that the fatal flaw the Supremo brought with him to Cavite con-
sisted of a terribly diminished reputation by virtue of the military
losses he had incurred in the Manila area.74 And, in this regard, it
boggles the mind how things could have turned out differently
had Father Gil just for once obliged the cold dagger and revolver
of the Supremo, insofar as Bonifacio would by then have been
equipped with a greater and firmer reputation among the rank-
and-file as the unquestioned great leader of the Revolution since
he was the one who actively started it all by assassinating the
hated Spanish friar.
And if anything, this act of assassinating a Spanish friar could
very well have provided the Supremo that greater and firmer
reputation among the multitudes as indeed their “king.” This is
due to the fact that throughout the earlier centuries, the host
59
of “kings” and “prophets of the devil” that surfaced to contest

Spanish dominion had viewed the same act as some sort of a
solemn duty which must be carried out before any revolt could
actually take place. The Spanish account of the Sumuroy Rebel-
lion of 1649 should be instructive in this wise:
Immediately, the demon offered them, for its execution, the

evilly-inclined mind of a vile Indian named Sumuroy...This
man offered to kill the father...A Tuesday then, the first day
of June in the year 1649, the traitor Sumuroy selected for
his sacrilegious parricide, and as a thief in the house, who
knew its avenues of entrance and egress very well, he took
his stand within, awaiting the father at the top of the stair-
way, when he should ascend it after supper. While the fa-
ther halted on the stairs to say a prayer for the souls in
Purgatory---for which it happened, the bells were ringing---
Sumuroy hurled a javelin at him from above, which pierced
his breast and immediately brought him to the ground; nor
did he breathe again, spending his last energy in pronounc-
ing the sweet names of Jesus and Mary...For two days, the
fathers remained at home in suspense, without understand-
ing the cause of this evil deed, or knowing who was its au-
thor, and the rebels themselves delayed to commit sacri-
leges by breaking with shame and declaring themselves
rebels. Finally on the day of the Corpus Christi about noon,
the murderer came in sight, leading the multitudes, and
openly declared that it was he who had slain the father,
loudly defying the whole world.75
The rebellious conflagration prompted by this single action

of a “vile Indian” named Sumuroy—all in rapid and spontaneous
succession: Camarines, Sorsogon, Masbate, Samar, Cebu, Iligan,
Camiguin, Zamboanga and the entire coast of northern Mindanao
—should finally prove the point regarding what the Supremo’s
July nights, the Katipunan, and the 1896 Revolution were all
about. It was the Tagalog provinces’ tum to do what the Bicol,
Visayan and Mindanaoan regions did in 1649. Similarly, it was
60
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
the Katipunan’s turn to resurrect and revel at these ancient lega-

cies and rites. And finally, however unsuccessful he might have
been in the end, it was most likely Bonifacio’s resolve, as the
“King of the Tagalogs,” to appear as another Sumuroy: coming in
everybody’s sight, openly announcing that it was he who had
slain the hated friar, loudly defying the whole world, and rightfully
leading the multitudes on the road to their salvation.
NOTES
E
1
Teodoro Agoncillo, The Revolt of the Masses (Quezon City: University
of the Philippines, 1956) p.128-129.
2
Agoncillo, ibid., p.121.
3
4
5
The third member of the Chamber, Emilio Jacinto, was not able to join
the stakeout as he was reportedly sick at that time. This account was based
on Dr.Valenzuela’s confession.
6
Father Gil, of course, was the individual chiefly responsible for the dis-
covery of the Katipunan! Supposedly, the chief reason why Fr. Gil did not
promenade during those nights was because of the panicky rumors then al-
ready circulating about a secret society of patriotic indios.
7
The first task was assigned to Bienvenido Nijaga, a Katipunan member
who was a lieutenant of the carabineers.
8
Perhaps the greatest indication of this is the fact that until now, a real
comprehensive and exhaustive biography of the Supremo is still a task yet to
be written.
9
This is necessarily linked with the above, inasmuch as the usual custom
when dealing with the Supremo is to sandwich him always between a Rizal
and an Aguinaldo as if without these two, Bonifacio would never have amounted
to something in Philippine history.
10
Renato Constantino, The Philippines: A Past Revisited (Quezon City,
1975) p.170.
11
Generally, it may be said that this is what Reynaldo C. Ileto’s major
contribution to Philippine revolutionary historiography is all about. Refer to his
trailblazing Pasyon and Revolution (Quezon City: Ateneo University Press,
1979). For an excellent elucidation of his method vis-a-vis conventional histo-
riography, refer to his highly affective demolition of Milagros Guerrero’s cri-
tique in Philippine Studies, Vol.30, lst quarter 1982, p.92-119.
12
For one of the best example of John N. Schumacher’s historical
revisionism, refer to his book (which is a collection of his essays) entitled The
61
Making of a Nation: Essays on Nineteenth Century Philippine National-

ism (Quezon City, Ateneo University Press, 1991)
13
Schumacher, ibid., p.199.
14
This must be viewed especially with what Schumacher earlier had to say
about the Supremo: that the Supremo “can be considered ilustrado, even if a
self-made one, inspite of his lack of higher formal education.” Needless to
say, this view is utterly preposterous, especially in the light of a Daniel Tirona
insulting the Supremo at the Tejeros Convention specifically on the Supremo’s
non-ilustrado status.
15
Refer to his “Perspectives on the Revolution” in The Making, pp.178-
209.
16
17
18
19
20
While writing this essay, the author had the misfortune to have missed
by a few weeks the printing in book form of General Santiago V. Alvarez’s
remarkably enlightening memoirs entitled The Katipunan and the Revolu-
tion (Quezon City: Ateneo Press, 1992).
21
The narration according to this schema can be said to comprise the
usual practice among textbook historians.
22
Besides an Agoncillo, a Constantino and a Schumacher, refer also to
Jonathan Fast and Jim Richardson’s The Roots of Dependency: Political
and Economic Revolution in 19th Century Philippines (Quezon City: Foun-
dation for Nationalist Studies, 1979).
23
Refer to how Schumacher even made use of Fast and Richardson’s
conclusions in The Making, pp.181-184.
24
Fast and Richardson, op.cit., p.83.
25
Fast and Richardson, ibid., p.74.
26
Ileto, Pasyon, p.114.
27
Agoncillo, Revolt, p.48-49.
28
Bonifacio, for instance, was a member of said lodge. See Agoncillo,
Revolt, p.48.
29
Agoncillo, Revolt, p.50.
30
31
For instance, T.M. Kalaw’s Philippine Masonry, trans. Fredric Stevens
and Antonio Amechazurra (Manila, 1956).
32
Ileto, Pasyon, pp.135-136.
33
Aside of course from the issue of being able to secure copies of these
ilustrado documents in the first place inasmuch as, in the main, these propa-
ganda materials circulated only among ilustrados themselves.
34
The incriminating documents that sealed the fates of some of these
people were forged by the Supremo and his associates. The Supremo wrongly
assumed that by irrevocably incriminating these rich men to the Revolution,
they would support it.
35
Blair and Robertson, History of the Philippine Islands, Vol.2, p.199.
36
Blair and Robertson, ibid., Vol.2, p.201.
37
See the facsimile of the original Katipunan questionnaire which men-
62
KKKANB or KKKANIP?
tions “Katagalugan” and not “Filipinas” in Agoncillo, Revolt, p.56.

38
Fast and Richardson, Roots, p.80.
39
Ileto, Pasyon, P.97.
40
Schumacher, The Making, p.114.
41
Constantino, Revisited, p.169.
42
Cited in lleto, Pasyon, p.102-103.
43
Schumacher, The Making, p.114.
44
45
Indeed what a tall fiction after all was this supposed of lineage between
the ilustrado Propagandistas and the Supremo! The closest account in the
Annotations had something to do with Legazpi’s exploits as Adelantado. But
even then, there was no mention, detailed or otherwise, of the pacto de sangre
rites. Not even in the last chapter on the customs of the Tagalogs was there
any mention of this rite. Indeed, Schumacher’s sloppy scholarship is best
demonstrated in this when he even wrote that ‘(t)he content of Bonifacio’s
manifesto in its picture of the past and the present has scarcely a phrase that
cannot be found in Spanish in Rizal’s writings.” See, Making, p.188.
46
Ileto, Pasyon, pp.103-113.
47
Cited by Schumacher, The Making, p.105.
48
Agoncillo, Revolt, p.96.
49
David Sturtevant, “Appendix D,’ Popular Uprising in the Philippines
(New York: Cornell University Press, 1976), pp.286-299.
50
Sturtevant, Popular, p.298.
51
Sturtevant, ibid., p.299.
52
Sturtevant, ibid.
53
Sturtevant, ibid.
54
Rizal of course had wrongly assumed this fact judging from the following
lines he wrote on his Preface to his Annotations of Morga: “Born and reared in
the ignorance of our Yesterday...If the book succeeds to awaken your con-
sciousness of the past, already effaced from your memory...”
55
Ileto, Pasyon, P.136.
56
Blair and Robertson, Vol.38, p.98-99.
57
58
Ileto, ibid., p.33
59
Blair and Robertson, Vol.38, p.87-88.
60
Blair and Robertson, Vol.38, p.92.
61
Theodore Friend, Between Two Empires (New Haven, Connecticut,
1965), p.36
62
Blair and Robertson, Vol.32, pp.119-120.
63
See the discussion by John Leddy Phelan in his The Hispanization of
the Philippines (Quezon City: Filipiniana Reprint Series, 1985), pp.146-147.
64
Patricia Melendrez-Cruz, “Ang Maikling Kwento sa Panahon ng
Amerikano Hanggang sa Komonwelt,” Lagda (Quezon City: University of the
Philippines, 1992), p.99.
65
Of course, this silence on the part of Tagalog society is posited not in an
absolute sense, inasmuch as the agrarian disturbances of 1745-46 may be
cited. But in a relative sense and compared to the situation of the other ethnic
communities, Phelan would even state that given the density of exploitation
63
in the lowland provinces of Luzon, there was surprisingly a paucity of revolts.

See Phelan, p.147.
66
Ileto,“Rizal and the Underside of Philippine History,’ Himalay (Manila:
Cultural Center of the Philippines, 1992) p.486.
67
Jose Rizal, The Reign of Greed (translated by Charles Derbyshire, 1974),
p.33-34.
68
See for instance, Carlos Quirino’s The Trial of Andres Bonifacio
(Manila: Ateneo University Press, 1963).
69
Regarding the tenousness for instance of the allegations that Bonifacio
had monarchical ambitions, Agoncillo himself noted that in one heated dis-
cussion, the Supremo said that all Katipuneros, from the Supreme Head to
the lowest member, recognized the principles of Unity, Fraternity and Equal-
ity. And that therefore, he said further, it can be seen ‘that the Government of
the Association of the Sons of the People is republican in form.’ See Agoncillo,
Revolt, p.210.
70
In general, the converse of this proposition can be seen in accounts that
depict the dilemma of Bonifacio as simply the dilemma of a single individual
who lost in a power struggle.
71
Bonifacio’s nom de plume was Agap-ito Bagumbayan. See Agoncillo,
Revolt, p.333.
72
It may be noted that Aguinaldo’s first official proclamation as President
was handed down to the Batangas revolutionists as early as April 24, 1897 or
two weeks before the execution of the Supremo in May 10, 1897.
73
General Apoy’s narration (SeeThe Katipunan and the Revolution,
pp.118) of the deleterious effect of the Bonifado executions on the entire revo-
lutionary movement is particularly revealing:
The news about the execution spread quickly...After the death of

the Supremo, many patriots formerly serving the Revolution in the
Province of Cavite, Manila, Rizal and Laguna lost heart and with-
drew from the struggle. They no longer joined or got involved in any
undertaking having to do with the Revolution. Keeping a distance,
they contented themselves with a wait-and-see attitude. This alien-
ation on the part of many revolutionaries led to a further deteriora-
tion of the movement.
74
In retrospect, the allegations that the Supremo was a poor military
tactician may possibly be another tall fiction after all. According to Zeus
Salazar’s book Ang Pagsalakay ni Bonifacio sa Maynila (Quezon City:
Miranda Press, 1994), the military failures that was Manila in 1896 might have
been the result more of insubordination on the part of Cavite rebels rather
than the Supremo’s poor military thinking.
75
Blair and Robertson, Vol.38, pp.102-104.
64
65
ACTING AS SOME sort of a “cultural proletariat” of Philippine

society in 1896, the Tagalog contemplating his own emancipa-
tion under the aegis of the Katipunan laid out, even for that brief
while, the theoretical basis out of which the emancipation of his
other ethnic kins all over the archipelago would thereby proceed
and be derived. And this theoretical basis was none other but
that most important concept of a “nation.”
Contrary to what Constantino had surmised as Bonifacio’s
“inchoate declarations” leading henceforth to the Katipunan’s
“inchoate” or “primitive” ideology,1 the Supremo in his essay Ang
Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog and in other declarations had
made perfectly and coherently clear what the Katipunan’s “ideol-
ogy” consisted of, revolving as it was on this central notion of a
resurgent “Katagalugan” at a time when its latter-day equivalent,
“Filipinas,” was, at least, still a Spanish, or at best already an
ilustrado, notion.2 Hence, far from this “ideology” allegedly being
an “articulation of a people just discovering themselves,” which
would still have necessitated ilustrados giving it an “explicit form,”3
it was nothing less than that most dramatic assertion by Tagalog
society being the most abject victim of Spanish colonialism that it
had, finally, arrived at a rediscovery of its former self. And inso-
far as the real proletariat was said by Marx to be a class with
“radical chains” that cannot emancipate itself without emanci-
pating itself from all the other spheres of German society, thereby
in the process also emancipating them,4 this rediscovery on the
part of Tagalog society was not unlike the shouts of joy by the
amnesiac at his memory’s comeback, and which were heard
clearly enough by the somnambulist and the insomniac. And, as
it so happened, when Tagalog society finally announced the dis-
solution of the Spanish colonial order of things, not only did it
reveal the greatest secret of its own existence, that, indeed, it
was the de facto dissolution of the traditional, pre-colonial order
of things; it also made manifest that with the strongest link in the
Spanish colonial chain finally breaking free, Spanish colonialism
simply had to reckon with its own end. In short, without meaning
to take away anything from the Visayans, the Mindanaoans, the
llocanos, the Cordillerans and especially the Moros, along with
66
Folk Catholicism or Catholic Folkism?
the rest of the other ethnic communities who, from time to time,
valiantly rose up in arms and resisted partial or full integration
into the colonial domain, it was as if the centuries had to wait tor
the Tagalog to be dispossessed to such an extent for him to,
finally, rise up and toll the death knell of Spanish colonialism.
And yet, unlike the emancipation of Germany, which Marx saw
as proceeding from the “heart” of the proletariat being guided by
the “head” of philosophy,5 in the absence of the ilustrado’s direct
and positive cosmopolitanizing influence, the emancipation of Ta-
galog society in 1896 proceeded with a heart and mind wholly
united and sufficient unto themselves, as they were wholly tradi-
tional. And it is in this light therefore that this paper arrives at
what can be the real significance of the Tejeros convention.
Contrary to what historians have tenuously conceived hereto-
fore, the convention at Tejeros was not primarily a site of struggle
between “progress” and “retrogress,” that is, between the repub-
lican/democratic/national ideas, and the supposed monarchical/
dictatorial/parochial leanings of the Supremo which were the
“residues of hierarchism which was (in turn) a legacy of Spain.”6
Rather, it simply was nothing more than what it actually was:
a ruthless drive for power by the Cavite principalia, a drive for
power whose nakedness and blatantness could not possibly be
clothed with any decent justificatory motif idea. And if at all, the
main reason behind why exhortations such as the one made by
Aguinaldo in July 1898 to the disgruntled rank-and-file of the
Revolution7— to consider the “Filipino nation” as having already
replaced the Katipunan brotherhood and thus to unite under it—
proved largely ineffective in boosting the sagging troop morale
was that such a proclamation might have appeared before the
Tagalogs as, at best, nothing but a cruel superfluity because the
Katipunan, with its notion of the “Katagalugan” all along meant
for them precisely that unity, and at worst, a brazen attempt at
deception in the face of the shameless opportunism displayed by
the ilustrados and the principalias Aguinaldo eagerly appointed
in his Malolos govemment.8
It is in this regard therefore that the Salud Algabre interview
should again prove instructive as she might afford the reader a
67
glimpse of what could have been the thoughts of the ordinary

Tagalog footsoldier at that time. When asked by her interviewer
whether or not her Katipunero father and grandfather fought the
Americans, her curt and precise, but rather off-tangent, reply
was that “they did not fight in 1898-1899.”9 Part of the reason
why Algabre answered as such might be explained by the fact
that before this particular question, she and her interviewer talked
about Juan Cailles, the revolutionary General under whom her
kin fought during the “War of the Katipunan” but who later on
became the govemor of Laguna under the American govemment.
And that furthermore, “the same Cailles” as Algabre would say
when further asked whether he was the incumbent governor
during the 1935 uprising. Apparently therefore, Algabre was,
in her off-tangent reply simply drawing the distance between
the memory of what her kin honorably did and what their
commander, to her mind, dishonorably did.
But as such, this off-tangent yet too precise reply is not
yet exhausted of its full significance. This is because more than
anything, notwithstanding Algabre’s non-elaboration of the
issue further, it should be noted that actual Filipino-American
hostilities did not begin until February 4,1899!10 And thus, it
might be asked what could explain the significance exerted on
her, and, more important, on her father and grandfather, of that
year 1898? If at all, the significance of such a reply cannot stray
far from this: that inspite of the absence of their great and imme-
diate dissension in the aftermath of the Tejeros Convention and
the executions at Mount Buntis, the Supremo’s Tagalog legion-
naires, drawn as they were into Revolution by this essay Ang
Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog, must already have at this time
finally realized that something was gravely amiss with the Revolu-
tion they started and which, among other things like the Pact of
Biak-na-bato and the pompous Malolos Congress, was now
addressing them as “Filipinos.” Such a realization that the Revo-
lution, given this sudden turn of events, was fast becoming un-
recognizable, or worse, was already in the hands of persons who
would fall under the category of those who were tila mga Kastila11
could only have exerted among the Tagalogs tremendous confu-
68
sion and bitterness, and a confusion and bitterness which, in

turn, generally were manifested as that unwillingness or a sud-
den vacillating resolve on the part of the ordinary Tagalog foot-
soldier to fight on any further. And if it’s any indication, the blitz-
krieg-like rapid siege of the Tagalog provinces by American
troops,12 and conversely, Aguinaldo himself ultimately finding a
refuge in the hinter lands of the North, could perhaps only attest
to the depth of this confusion and bitterness on the part of the
Tagalogs who, in the absence of the Katipunan organization
whose language and ideas fired him to activity in the first place,
naturally displayed an unwillingness to put up a fierce and in-
spired resistance.
And while this paper recognizes the fact that inasmuch as
these extrapolations on a Salud Algabre, however much the
influence her Katipunero father and grandfather had on her,
may be considered in the end by other scholars as nonetheless
mere extrapolations on a Salud Algabre, it is believed that no
other route can be taken to prove this point regarding this
view of “Katagalugan” as having consisted the Katipunan’s
concept of a nation. This is based on the fact that even on the
realm of textual evidence itself13, scholars—for some reason or
another—are rather not too keen nor predisposed to grant
Bonifacio and the Katipunan the intellectual capacity to think in
terms of what Benedict Anderson has called as the “imagined
community.”14
Among other things, consider, for instance, that portion in
Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog where Bonifacio appropri-
ated King Sikatuna and the blood compact he performed together
with Legazpi as a “Tagalog” and a “Tagalog custom,” respec-
tively. Indeed, if such appropriations cannot in any way be right-
fully considered as clear evidence, if not strong indications, of
this capacity on the part of Bonifacio to think in “national” terms,
then perhaps absolutely no other textual evidence will ever suf-
fice for the Supremo! But then again, fortunately, there are other
factual indications that may further reinforce this paper’s point
that the Katagalugan concept of nationhood is not only a textual
reality but was an operative and efficacious fact as well.
69
Among the numerous dramatic and interesting spin-offs of

the 1896 revolt of the Tagalogs, the case of Negros should prove
to be the most illuminating for it was here that whatever theoreti-
cal ambiguities which might have obtained in Luzon regarding
this issue of nationalism were rendered in sharp and conclusive
focus. It might be remembered that the Negrense ilustrado and
principalia, fearful that the series of events in Luzon would ulti-
mately upset their social and economic positions in the island,
acted out a comedy of sorts: one day they were defiantly pro-
claiming a Republic of Negros existing side by side with the
Malolos Republic only to be seen jubilantly hoisting the Ameri-
can flag in the next few days.15 Apparently, inspite of Aguinaldo’s
over-friendly and over-tolerant attitude towards these men, the
reason behind this comedy was nothing less than their grave
fear of the Tagalogs. And this fear must have been so great that
even before the Filipino-American War actually started, in ex-
change for their acknowledgment of the latter’s sovereignty, they
were already demanding from the Americans protection against
the Tagalogs.16 All these happened despite the fact that, given
Aguinaldo’s over-friendliness with these men, the island was in
no immediate or medium-term danger of being occupied by the
Luzon forces!17
But, if anything, these Negrense ilustrado and principalia would
never have to still worry about such an expeditionary Tagalog
force coming from Luzon to invade their island. For in the
person of Papa Isio and his formidable army of babaylanes, the
ilustrados and principalia were confronted in their own backyard
by rebellious “Tagalogs” or, at least, rebellious Negrenses who
throughout their careers maintained their recognition of the sov-
ereignty of the Malolos government which they perceived, more
erroneously than correctly, as the crowning glory of the 1896
Tagalog revolt.18 And, in this regard, the question that arises, in
view of the rather unceremonious treatment Papa Isio got in
return from Aguinaldo, should further prove instructive for this
paper: that left as such in the cold by the ilustrados and principalia
of the Malolos Republic and the Negros Republic which, though
having contrasting versions of what their respective “nation”
70
concept should encompass, would nonetheless prefer dealing

with each other, what could then explain Papa Isio’s continued,
albeit unreciprocated, allegiance to the former? This question
becomes even more acute inasmuch as the rebellious forces
commanded by Papa Isio were not, as alleged by their enemies
and detractors, mere “robbers and bandits.” As Fast and Rich-
ardson would themselves state, Papa Isio’s forces was an army
where a code of military discipline was enforced.19
Evidence at hand would suggest that Papa Isio did all these
things not according to that nation-idea “Filipinas” propounded
by Aguinaldo and the Malolos government but rather according
to that nation-idea “Katagalugan” propounded earlier by the
Supremo and the Katipunan. The indications of this proposition
are striking, to say the least. Reportedly, Papa Isio, throughout
his militant career stamped his official documents with the
word “Katipunan” across the face.20 Conversely, bearing so much
resemblance to the Katipunan pronouncements regarding its
solemmn respect for the ating mga tunay na mga kababayan,
Papa Isio reportedly wished “any but pure blooded Filipinos,”21
indios hence, to live on Negros Island. Add the further fact that
Papa Isio himself was a babaylan or a native priest, it would not
be unacceptable to presume that, just like the Katipunan “men of
anting-anting,” the sacadas Isio attracted to his fold must have
also fought with the same courage, boldness and utter disregard
for their own physical safety.22 And though it may be said that,
having lived his life before 1896 in the mountains of Negros as a
fugitive, Papa Isio never learned of his language and ideas
directly from the Ang Dapat Mabatid ng mga Tagalog, much less
the Kataastaasan Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga Anak
ng Bayan; it might nonetheless be said that the reason why both
he and the Supremo and consequently their respective follow-
ers, were able to display such striking similarities lay in the fact
that they were all drawing from the same source! And a source,
the least of which could be said was one that definitely did not
flow nor have to proceed from any ilustrado nor principalia well-
spring; and therefore at most, that non-ilustrado, non-principalia
source that will make the connections between a Bonifacio and a
71
Papa Isio, and between these two men and a Sumuroy and a
Bancao of earlier centuries not only perfectly comprehensible
but nothing less than the only way towards any real historical
comprehension.
But then again, this paper simply has brought into focus this
supposed larger continuity that was referred to earlier. And in the
elucidation and demonstration of what this continuity precisely
consists of, it will prove illuminating to refer back to Ileto first.
It is undeniable that among existing historiographies of the
Revolution, Ileto’s Pasyon and Revolution represents by far the
most advanced and penetrating account, delving on how the
masses could have perceived 1896 and the succeeding events it
set in motion. And insofar as other historiographies have unabash-
edly canonized the ilustrado and the principalia’s role in the Revo-
lution, by virtue of this perspective alone, Ileto’s book, just like
Agoncillo’s The Revolt of the Masses earlier, definitely merits
the status of a classic ascribed to it. But inasmuch as these books
have promised much more than they can actually handle—that
while indeed giving fresh and thought-provoking accounts of the
Katipunan, they ultimately yield to the same, albeit more tem-
pered, canonization of the ilustrado and principalia — it must be
precisely pointed out where they have gone wrong, if only to sal-
vage the important points that they have already raised correctly
or have disproved sufficiently. In Ileto’s case, this need is more
acute in the sense that while appearing to have been fixated on
the historical period which he has initially and prudently set upon
himself —i.e. refer to the subtitle of Pasyon and Revolution which
states “Popular Movements in the Philippines, 1840-1910”—he
nonetheless derives so much from this period to the point that in
his other writings, it seems as though he views everything prior
or beyond this period or his discussions of it, as already prehis-
tory! For example, this paper has elucidated earlier on the origin
of the anting-anting as proceeding directly more from Bancao
than from, as Ileto would have it, the unwitting intention of the
Spanish friars. And if only to dramatize further what this paper
means when it says that this hitherto creeping blindness of Ileto
is becoming more acute, the reader is referred to one of his later
72
essays where he makes the following statement regarding the

anting-anting:
Churches were also the places where God’s kapangyarihan

was concentrated; whose efficacy was tapped during church
rituals and through its traces in holy water, statues of saints,
other rituals objects, and even candle-drippings. These po-
tential sources of power were controlled by the Spanish
priests. Stories abound of Spanish missionaries and curates
who worked miracles, whose blessings were avidly sought
for their potency, who were regarded as second Christs and
revered even after death. The Spanish priests, it was widely
thought, knew the meaning of the Latin inscriptions on amu-
lets and therefore had access to kapangyarihan.23
In proving this otherwise highly debatable assertion, Ileto,

in his footnotes, thence noted the incredible stories regarding
this Spanish friar, Fr. Pio Zuzuarregui, and the supernatural re-
gard by which many among the llocano masses still view their
parish priests. The greatest problem, however, with such an as-
sertion by Ileto lies not so much in the fact that it can very well be
the revisionist Father Schumacher speaking in this instance but
more on the question whether such assertion (and the “proofs” of
such) denote a general, or exceptional, truth. For indeed, it may
be said that given all the proper and necessary historical reckon-
ings, such judgment from Ileto regarding the access of the friars
on the kapangyarihan being a “widely thought” proposition among
the people may prove to be not so wide a thought after all, or
simply a thought as wide as the potbellies of these friars them-
selves, insofar as during the 1896 Revolution, these friars have
been subjects of the most brutal tortures and instant deaths cour-
tesy of the avenging common people.24 And among other in-
stances which may be of greater importance, insofar also that
these tortures and deaths heaped on Spanish friars occurred
mostly in the Tagalog and llocano region,21 it is truly a wonder
how it has escaped a historian like Ileto that the “proofs” he pre-
sented are indicative more if the exceptions to the rule than the
general rule itself!
73
And yet there are other instances of an Ileto grossly failing

in his historical judgment. It might be noted that in his Pasyon
and Revolution, he had made use of that interview with the
Generalla, Salud Algabre, in driving home a particular point.26
And yet, far from appreciating, much less grasping, the utmost
significance of her eloquent remarks, in that later essay cited
above, he would even disregard all these tales altogether as he
would rather canonize the ilustrados in a fawning manner like
this one below:
Perhaps it was the specific condition of being ilustrado that

led to this group’s anxiety over a lost tradition and the at-
tempt to recover it through historical writing. This writing, as
pointed out earlier, privileged the status of its practitio-
ners through its underlying presuppositions of emergence
and enlightenment, and Rizal is seen at the forefront of this
movement.27 (emphasis supplied)
Apparently, the all-important context—the one he mentions

as already “pointed out earlier”—of this canonization of the
ilustrado is this:
The Western education of prominent scions of (the princi-

palia) class forged an advanced nucleus or core around
which a modern nation could form. The roots of this pro-
gressive, nationalist class are inextricably bound up with
the initial ordering of Philippine society in the aftermath of
the Conquest.28 (emphasis supplied)
And insofar as it will only be redundant to restate at this point

all the arguments arrived heretofore by this paper that will, in
turn disprove these assertions by Ileto with regard to this alleged
“privileging of the ilustrados” by virtue of their historical writings,
and therefore the pernicious implication pointing out, among
other things, that the Supremo and the Katipunan indeed ought
to yield to the “progressive” and “largely nationalist” ideas of this
class, this paper will have to suffice itself with stating that here
are direct statements which shall consist as the best proofs on
74
why it has been earlier observed that Ileto, though disdainful of

the errors of the historiographers before him, actually shared with
them quite a few fundamental erroneous views in common. And,
as such, Ileto indeed has no choice but to follow Richardson’s
trenchant advice that a sequel to his book which shall now have
to be entitled Pasyon and Bourgeois Revolution is really in order.
The critical questions that arise at this point are the following:
what has caused an otherwise trailblazing work by Ileto to turn
back and ultimately reaffirm these not-so-evident and demon-
strably false “truisms”? What caused him not to see the suffi-
ciently clear connection between a Don Pedro Ladia claiming to
be the King of the Tagalogs and a Bonifacio who acted like one,
or between the “evilly-inclined Indians” who, in 1622, went to the
hills and built their diwata a temple and the “men of anting-
anting” who, in 1896, sacked churches and tortured or killed
friars, or still, between the babaylan in a Papa Isio, the son of a
babaylan in a Sumuroy and this preoccupation with “sacred
ideals” and “moral transformation” in a Bonifacio, so much so
that in between these connections he would have to foist respec-
tively a Bernardo Carpio, a Father Zuzuarregui and a host of
early Spanish missionaries? Likewise, what caused Ileto not to
see in a Salud Algabre a person in possession of a long memory
(which otherwise, as she would insist, be rightfully called as ‘his-
tory29) and who as such never needed ilustrados reminding her
of what her former legacies consisted of.
In all appearances, the answers to all these lies in this
presumably all-too-self-evident “truth” deeply held not only by
a historian like Ileto but by the rest also: that there indeed was a
full-fledged and thorough conversion on the part of the indios
to the Roman Catholicism of the Spanish friars.30 And thus with
this “fall” of the indio established as a fundamental presumption,
lleto and the rest can do nothing but concede, grudgingly or oth-
erwise, to the eventually emergent principalia and ilustrado class
this role of the “messiah” of the indios in general. That oft-re-
peated periodization, such as “The Rise of Nationalism,” usually
appended to mark the emergence of this principalia class derives
so much from this fundamental presumption.
75
And while periodizations such as this one has not exactly

been held as an inviolable nor an unquestionable truth among
scholars, as Ileto for instance has already destroyed that notion
of a passive indio receiving rather idiotically the ideas and devel-
opments immanent in such a “period,” the fundamental presump-
tion of conversion nonetheless remains inviolable and un-
questioned. So much so that inspite of the great explanative and
analytical potentials of what Ileto’s theoretical and historical en-
deavors have started, all that he can come up with is this less
effete, but nonetheless still effete, picture of the indio; while not a
“passive recipient” and thus an active recipient, is nonetheless
still a recipient; and while not reacting “blindly, in the gut, to mount-
ing irritants impinging upon him” is nonetheless reacting half-
blindly to these irritants! And thus, Ileto can only see “discon-
tinuities,” “interruptions,” “lost origins,” “naivete,” and “ignorance”
pervading the state of affairs of the indio before the ilustrados
came and attempted to “reconstitute the unity” of Philippine
history.
Yet was there really a conversion?
From all indications, there indeed was. And yet the generality
inherent in this question does not make it the real question, as
the more specific, and thus appropriate, one would be: was there
really a full-fledged, thorough, and substantive conversion? One
that would honestly and completely account for the indio’s “lost
origins,” the “discontinuities” in his character, and thus ultimately,
the“privileged status” of ilustrado historiography of the indio’s
pre-colonial past?
Fortunately, besides a Salud Algabre whose replies have only
afforded the reader what otherwise would be an a posteriori
approach on this matter, developments in recent colonial period
historiography will afford the reader an approach in transit. And
in this regard, what has been elaborated rather too-meticulously
by Vicente Rafael in his otherwise innovative book Contracting
Colonialism,31 takes on primary importance in the discussion.
Studying the nature and the processes of missionary translations
of Christian doctrines into the vernacular given the nature
of Tagalog society under early Spanish rule, Rafael has convinc-
76
ingly demonstrated the dismal failures of these missionary

proselytizations and what, more importantly, may account for these
dramatic failures.
Apparently, the main reason why conversion largely became
a failure among the Tagalogs had something to do with the na-
ture of the Tagalog language itself as manifested in its ancient
syllabary whose inordinate and imprecise character had proven
to be the greatest stumbling block which Spanish missionaries
had to surmount but failed to, eventually; and the problems brought
about, in turn, by the inherent inadequacies presented by what
has been used as an alternative system by these missionaries—
the romanized phonetic script.
According to Rafael, who cited early sources, the Spanish
missionaries found out that inasmuch as the ancient Tagalog script
was still in the process of transition from hieroglyphics to the
perfection of phonetic writing, the meaning that the missionaries
wanted to be imparted tended to get lost each time, and that if
ever imparted successfully, the problem was that it was under-
stood by the natives rather imperfectly. Apparently, the most prob-
lematical nature of the script was that by disallowing any direct
and unequivocal link “between signature and the name and
between name and person”, it ultimately had the tendency to “sus-
pend sense in favor of sensation.” 31
And given therefore this inherent inordinateness of the Taga-
log language, that recourse by the missionaries to the romanized
phonetic script to convey the Christian doctrines they wanted
imparted to the indio did not resolve anything at all. Especially
since, according to Rafael after a thorough discussion, that
renowned first ever book in the country written by Tomas Pinpin,
the Doctrina Christiana, apparently could not have been origi-
nally intended by its author to teach the natives important les-
sons on Castillian grammar, much less teach them the rigors of
Christian theology, but, rather, simply to expose and familiarize
them to the hazards of the Castillian language so that ultimately,
they could “immunize themselves against those real shocks that
might come any moment” from the Spanish religious and secular
authorities.33
77
Henceforth, Rafael discussed what were the “fruits” of all these

religious translations and proselytizations as they were ultimately
“harvested” in the confines of the priest’s confessionals. He right-
fully noted that the following account by the Spanish missionary
Murillo in the eighteenth century could only attest to the fact that
what Christian conversion had in breadth among the Tagalogs, it
lacked sorely in depth:
No one can save him who has had this experience can state
the labors it costs to confess them; and even when the sin
is understood in general, to seek for a specific account of
circumstances is to enter into a labyrinth without a clue.
For they do not understand our orderly mode of speech,
and therefore when they are questioned they say ‘yes’ or
‘no’ as it occurs to them, without rightly understanding what
is asked of them---so that in a short time they will utter twenty
contradictions.34
But, apparently, this picture of the indio bungling passively

and rather hilariously every step of the way in the confessional
did not yet constitute that conclusive picture of what might well
be the indications of his substantive non-conversion. As Blancas,
another Spanish missionary, provided in his report that was cited
by Rafael, here is a totally different picture of what the indio
actively did inside the confessional:
And others seriously go astray when they announce to the

priest the sins of their wives, or their sons-in-law, or their
mothers-in-law, while their own sins rarely cross their lips;
the only reason they go to the priest is to denounce to him
all the people they dislike.35
But then, again, this is not yet as exhaustive as can possibly

be. As Rafael would cite Blancas further, the confessional box
also became the site of the indio’s proud protestations of his in-
nocence, or more appropriately, his resistance to what Christian
theology has virtually rendered him:
78
One other great error that others commit in their confession

is that they speak only of their great deeds, while never
speaking about their sins...The only reason they go (to con-
fession) is to honor their own goodness.36
Faced therefore with these reports, as consisting but a few

examples of missionary complaints and exasperations, Rafael
would conclude that what emerged on the part of the Tagalog
was, therefore, a “confession without sin,” stemming as it did from
a conversion that by virtue of a translation and proselytization
that allowed the indio the continous bifurcation and elision of
meanings was “in a state of distraction.” And that as such, Rafael’s
somewhat radical observation was:
The result was a colonial order that seemed to be premised

on a mutual misreading of each other’s intentions rather
that on the unambiguous imposition of the ruler’s will over
the ruled.37
And yet insofar as Rafael, somewhere in the course of his

subsequent discussions, would suffer a serious lapse in judg-
ment by positing that, despite all these successful instances of
resistance and elision by the Tagalogs of Catholicism’s totalizing
influence, there was ultimately the acceptance on their part of
the Catholic notions of “paradise” and “hell,”38 this paper neces-
sarily has to distance itself at this point from his discussions. And
insofar that likewise, just like Ileto, Rafael will come up with an
ultimate, albeit an oblique, canonization of the principalia as
having been responsible for this ultimate acceptance and con-
version on the part of the indio, it has to be pointed out to Rafael
where exactly he had gone wrong and how.
Apparently, Rafael was led to laying this great stress and
importance on the role of the principalia by virtue of their leading
roles in the religious confraternities—which the Spanish friars
allowed to be established for the purpose of supplementing their
activities, particularly in the ministrations of the last sacraments
and rites on the dying. Accordingly, it was through these minis-
79
trations that the alleged Christian “reinvention of death” on the

part of the indios transpired, insofar as these confraternities were
designed to counter the influence of the native babaylanes over
the sick and dying. And in this regard, Rafael henceforth dis-
cussed in great detail the works of the principalia, Don Gaspar
Aquino de Belen, which included not only the less popular ver-
sion of the Pasyon but also this translation of a 1613 Spanish
manual of prayers for the dying.39 And despite the fact that the
lesser popularity of De Belen’s version of the pasyon, compared
to what had been known as the Pasyon Pilapil, should have served
as enough warning for Rafael to tread on prudently in his discus-
sions,40 he would even boldly say that De Belen’s creation of a
“translation of death” and, consequently, a “new grammar and
vocabulary of desire” ultimately set the “ideological basis for a
wish that was to emerge among another group of indios a cen-
tury and half later, who in their turn sought to translate a history
of colonial rule into an idiom of patriotism and national duty.”41
Inasmuch as Rafael here is pertaining to the ilustrados, this
paper’s disagreement with him lies not merely in his tacit echo-
ing of an Ileto who has posited earlier the alleged “privileging of
status” of the principalia and the ilustrado, a presumption already
disproved sufficiently by this paper, but also on the fact that in
his discussions of these religious confraternities where the
notion of death was supposedly “reinvented” among the indios,
Rafael completely avoided any reference at all to this most
celebrated confraternity that sprouted among the Tagalogs: the
Cofradia de San Jose of Hermano Pule.
Ileto of course has already shed light on the nature of the
Cofradia and the character and discourse of its “king,” Apolinario
dela Cruz. But inasmuch as Ileto can only view the “kingship”
of Hermano Pule and the dalit of the Cofradia in terms of the pasyon,
and therefore ultimately in terms of conversion, the Cofradia’s real
nature has to be evaluated once more, especially since Ileto him-
self, in his book Pasyon and Revolution, has noted that:
(t)he cofradia neophytes prostrated themselves on the dusty

pavement of the church askingfor divine light, supernatural
80
grace, in order that at that precise moment they may be

strengthened in their new state of being. They whispered
ancient prayers.41 (emphasis supplied)
If at all, the significance of this situation is what is missed by

a Rafael who, after convincingly detailing the early resistance
among the Tagalogs, assumed without much convincing proof
their subsequent “submission.” Yet a Rafael following what an
Ileto has trailblazed earlier could not really be expected to draw
the significance of such situation, insofar as even Ileto himself
was not able to. And yet inasmuch as it might be said that the
Cofradia de San Jose and its rebellion in 1841 could not be taken
as a categorical representation of the general nature of these
confraternities, attention should now be given to this similar event
which transpired some fifty years later: indeed, what else but
the Katipunan?! The Katipunan whose rituals enshrined the
ancient rite of the blood compact, and whose discourse adhered
to the Tagalogs’ pre-colonial, and, therefore, ancient, past. And
that furthermore, the Katipunan Schumacher himself would
grant lineage from the Cofradia de San Jose!43
If anything, a consideration once more of Schumacher should
prove instructive at this point. In a recent forum, Schumacher
elaborated to an otherwise shocked audience his point that the
Supremo, Andres Bonifacio, might not have been the atheist he
had conventionally been portrayed to be.44 This was because,
according to him, the Supremo’s circular Katungkulang Gagawin
ng mga Anak ng Bayan began with the precept “Sumasam-
palataya sa Maykapal ng taimtim sa puso,” and ended with an
explanation of the purposes of the Katipunan as being “kaloob
ng Maykapal.” The implication by Schumacher, of course, was
that the Supremo, after all, while being some sort of a rebellious
Catholic was nonetheless still a Roman Catholic. Apparently, the
shock, which he made his audience bear, concerned this presump-
tion on their part that the Supremo, influenced as he was by
Masonry, was an atheist, or at least, virulently anti-Catholic. But
a correct consideration of these “proofs” Schumacher brought to
fore may rightfully include him as well among his shocked, or
81
rather consternated, audience, as there is absolutely no reason

for him to derive Roman Catholicism from the word “Maykapal”
used by the Supremo since this apellation belongs rightfully to
the Tagalogs’ pre-colonial chief deity, Bathala Maykapal.45
Thus if anything, this absence of a consideration of what is
signified by the Cofradia de San Jose, and more important, by
the Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga Anak
ng Bayan in this issue of Tagalog conversion, is what is fatally
lacking in a Vicente Rafael who, in tum, would rather end his
discussions with drawing out the significance of the sermon scene
by Father Damaso in Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere,46 as if Spanish
colonialism indeed was put to an end without the bored and non-
comprehending masses of parishioners ever leaving the church!
But then, again, if anything, these pathetic and absurd turns in
what otherwise were initially potent discussions on the part of
Rafael, and moreover of Ileto, could only signify the limits of
what heretofore has been the “wave” in historical analysis, i.e.
post-structuralist/linguistic analysis.
Another consideration of Ileto would again be illuminating
in this regard. In that later essay cited above, seemingly both-
ered correctly by the fact that the pasyon might not at all be that
bottomline category animating the masses, he nonetheless had
this to say:
One fact that renders the notion of a ‘Fall’ problematic, how-

ever, was the survival of the indigenous languages. For ex-
ample, the whole crop of foreign story lines in Tagalog lit-
erature, which on the one hand suggest a certain loss of
authenticity, upon close examination turn out to be masks
that conceal age-old preoccupations. We shall see later on
that the failure of such terms as ‘soul’ and ‘self’ to encom-
pass the meanings of loob (lit.‘inside’) releases the Taga-
log Passion of Christ (Pasyon) from the control of the Church.
The translation of alien story lines and concepts into Taga-
log not only resulted in their domestication, their assimila-
tion into things already known, but gave rise to various plays
of meaning.47
82
The limit stated earlier should therefore be apparent by now.

To use an analogy, given an ocean of possibilities entailed by a
recognition of this survival of the indigenous languages, all that
an Ileto who is otherwise bent on maintaining his pasyon and
conversion thesis can come up with and show his audience is
this handful of “things already known” and “various plays of mean-
ings.” But is this handful really all there is to be derived in this
fact of the indigenous languages’ survival?
Proceeding from the elementary fact that languages do
not merely entail certain nuances in the meanings of concepts
such as hiya and loob, but carry within their wombs the entire
philosophy, the Weltanschauung, the epics, the history of peoples,
this paper advances its most important proposition: it is here in
the fact that the indigenous languages have survived three cen-
turies of Spanish colonialism that one finds the greatest indica-
tion and proof of the fundamental continuity referred to earlier,
the continuity that should dispel the indio’s “lost origins” and the
continuity that, in turn, ought to enshrine the integrity of his own
ideas and indeed, his own self. And in the elucidation therefore
of this continuity, the reader is initially referred to this brilliant yet
almnost forgotten essay by Isagani Cruz, Jr. entitled ‘Si Lam-
ang, si Fernando Poe Jr. at si Ninoy Aquino: Ilang Kuru-kuro sa
Epikong Pilipino.48
This essay by Cruz is noteworthy because by analyzing the
various epics in the country and, from there, deriving a morphol-
ogy of functions (or as he called them anda), he allowed his read-
ers a glimpse of what could well be considered as the main
attributes of that worldview which animated the primal, pre-
colonial minds of the indios. Among the numerous epics he
considered were the more well-known Biag ni Lam-ang of the
llocanos, the Handiong or Ibalon of the Bicolanos and the Hudhud
of the Ifugaos. And while Cruz himself noted the fact that since
there are far more numerous epics still unknown to general schol-
arship, the desiderata he was able to study were not that
exhaustive, he was nonetheless able to come up with a number
of commonalities in these epics which should be indicative of the
general development in the storylines of Philippine epics as a
whole. Classified as they are into stages, they are as follows:49
83
1. Aalis ang bayani sa kanyang bayan;

2. Makatatanggap ang bayani ng isang mahiwagang
bagay;
3. Dadalhin o pupunta ang bayani sa isang hinahanap,
na karaniwan ay isang mahal sa buhay;
4. Magsisimula ang bayani ng isang labanan;
5. Makikipaglaban ang bayani nang matagalan;
6. Pipigilin ng isang diwata ang labanan;
7. Ibubunyag ng diwata na magkamag-anak pala ang
bayani at ang kanyang kaaway;
8. Mamamatay ang bayani;
9. Mabubuhay muli ang bayani,
10. Babalik ang bayani sa kanyang bayan;
11. Magpapakasal ang bayani.
Having derived these archetypal stages, he then went on to

demonstrate his main proposition that these stages of the epical
thinking on the part of Filipinos are what can finally explain,
inasmuch as they may be what are behind, certain phenomena
in contemporary Philippine society. In other words therefore,
the all-important implication by Cruz which is accepted wholly
by this paper, is the idea that after three centuries of Spanish
colonialism and after less than a century of American influence,
the worldview of the indio, unassimilated completely or at least,
significantly as he was in either of the cultures of these coloniz-
ers, has not changed and has basically remained the same.
For instance, as the title of his essay would itself suggest,
Cruz saw on the level of mass perception an organic connection
between a movie box-office phenomenon in a Fernando Poe Jr.
and a political box-office phenomenon in a Ninoy Aquino after
his assassination in 1983, insofar as a Femando Poe Jr. and a
Ninoy Aquino, not unlike a Lam-Ang or a Bantugan of centuries
ago, were similarly perceived by the ordinary indios as their epical
heroes. In the case of Ninoy Aquino, Cruz would aver that, aside
from the fact that his adventurous and colorful life fitted in
more ways than one the pattern of these stages, his epical con-
sideration would even find its greatest attraction given the dra-
84
matic manner of his celebrated death. And if the widespread popu-

larity of the slogans which have proliferated after Ninoy’s death
had any significance at all, Cruz would further aver that it could
have logically signified only one thing on the part of the mass
perceivers: that inasmuch as the integration of Ninoy in the pro-
cess of resurrection as referred to in stage nine above had al-
ready been fulfilled, he had become, indeed, the classical epical
hero. And that apparently, all these should not at all be surprising,
inasmuch as among the most common denominators in the Phil-
ippine epics, foremost is the widespread prevalence of this “resur-
rection myth” or that theme where epical hero is supposed to
have died but is nonetheless later on brought back to life by magic
or by other supernatural forces. Hence, in Ninoy Aquino’s case,
it would be:
Sa madaling salita, dahil hindi mabubuhay muli si Aquino

sa anyong pisikal, tayong mga sumusunod sa kwento niya’y
maghahanap ng ibang uri ng pagkabuhay. Tingnan na
lamang ninyo ang mga pin na ngayo’y kumakalat sa mga
lansangan ng bayan natin. “Ninoy Lives On.” “Ninoy for-
ever.” “Happy Birthday Ninoy.” “I Love Ninoy Forever.” “Ninoy
Aquino Lives.” “I LoveNinoy.” “WeLove Ninoy.” “Ninoy Hindi
ka Nag-iisa.” “Ninoy Forever, Marcos Never.” “Ninoy May
Kasama Ka,” Ninoy Superstar Mahal Ka Namin.” “Ituloy ang
Laban ni Ninoy.’ “Ninoy is my Hero.” Sino ang magsasabing
hindi nabuhay muli sa Ninoy Aquino? Sa imahinasyon ng
mga taong-bayan, buhay muli si Ninoy, katulad ng mga
bayani ng mga epiko na namatay sa pakikipaglaban at
binuhay muli ng kanyang mga kaibigan. Ito ang ikasiyam na
anda, at dahil dito’y nabuo ang tala ng mga anda.50
And yet given the benefit of hindsight, one can say, not quite.
For as events would later on show, other than these slogans,
there was to be a greater fulfillment of the “resurrection stage”
which still awaited an epical hero such as Ninoy Aquino, one that
was to manifest itself more dramatically in the series of events
that ultimately reached their climax in February 1986, and one
85
that has accounted and still accounts for the popularity of, who
else but, a Cory Aquino! And inasmuch as Cruz made an error in
judgment in this regard (at one point deeming Cory as not the
sweetheart referred to by the marriage in stage eleven51) and
likewise inasmuch as the probable reason why this article was
largely ignored by writers and scholars was due to this error of
judgment, it needs to be pointed out that this mistake on Cruz’s
part is perfectly understandable and within bounds. The essay,
as published in the early months of 1985 and, hence, most prob-
ably written earlier, could not have possibly apprehended fully
what twists and turns the popular perception would precisely take
in the succeeding months, starting as they did on Marcos’ chal-
lenge for a “snap” elections around November the same year,
and Cory Aquino against all odds ultimately emerging as the
opposition’s sole candidate and the major leitmotif of the EDSA
Revolution in the following year!
Hence if anything, while it may rightfully be said that it is here
in the nooks and crannies of the primal mind that one ultimately
finds sufficient explanations for contemporary mysteries, such
as the twin popularity of a Ninoy and a Cory Aquino, and this fact
therefore inviting a lengthier and more detailed discussion on
the part of this paper, it will hesitate to do so, inasmuch as these
same nooks and crannies of the primal mind must first be made
to unravel finally this ultimate mystery in Philippine history which
lies at the core of the controversies this paper have so far touched
on: indeed, what else but the popularity of Christianity?!
There can be no doubt that the conversion thesis held on to
by most scholars ultimately is derived from this indubitable fact
that Christianity, inspite of all its handicaps and inadequacies,
was nonetheless able to spread with much facility and ease among
the natives which were scattered in various communities on the
islands. As missionary figures for example show, during the pe-
riod of 1583 to 1622 when the proselytization zeal among the
various Spanish missionary orders was at its height, there was
reported this astounding total number of 1,378,400 baptisms
undertaken on the native population!52 Broken up more dramati-
cally, the figures would represent among the Dominican, the
86
Franciscan, the Jesuit and the Augustinian missionaries a yearly

harvest of approximately 35,344 new indio converts for a con-
tinuous period of thirty nine years! And yet inasmuch as it has
been universally recognized that, on the part of these missionary
orders themselves, they were greatly handicapped by obviating
circumstances such as the general paucity of missionaries who
would nonetheless be more interested in the conversion of China
and Japan, and also by their gross linguistic ignorance,53 short of
believing that a miracle indeed took place, it should really be
asked what were the factors operative at that time which might
account for this apparent popularity of the Christian gospel among
the otherwise bewildered indio population.
Of course, it might pointed out that the numbers as indicated
might just be another exaggeration on the part of those overzeal-
ous missionaries. But granting that the numbers are, indeed, pre-
cise, scholars with a healthy dose of skepticism like Phelan have
nonetheless pointed out that what most probably happened was
that many among these natives were only “swept along in the
baptismal current.”54 And reckoned with other consideration, such
as that tactic of the missionaries of conversing first the native
chiefs having tapped correctly the nature of the indio’s pre-colo-
nial society, this paper therefore could do nothing but agree with
this explanation. And yet inasmuch as this being “swept along” is
almost always taken as a sign of that “passivity” on the part of the
indio which, in turn, is made to account for the alleged fact that
he ultimately traded his birthright for the Christian missionary’s
bowl of foreign alphabet soup, a second and a deeper look has
to be cast again on this aspect of the indio’s baptism.
As the images provided by another Spanish missionary re-
port would reveal, there might not have been a great bewilder-
ment on the part of the indio as there might, in turn, have been at
least an active discernment on his part in face of all these Chris-
tian proselytization:
They are a people easily conversed to the faith, and in the

short time while those religious have been in the islands,
they have gathered many fruits, and have baptized many
87
people, men, women and children, who have all been bap-
tized without any chief or native Indian of this land denying
our faith. Quite the contrary, if they are questioned in re-
gard to it, they say it is very sacred and very good.55
(emphasis supplied.)
And while one certainly could not deny that this response on
the part of the indio might have been colored by self-serving
motives on the part of the rapporteur, the fact that the same re-
port contained the following entry regarding how the indio in the
face of a prior influence of Islam have cleverly appropriated the
Islamic practice of not eating pork to suit ultimately his own needs
or desires only signifies that this active discernment might really
have been an operative fact after all. If anything therefore, what
the following image would reveal is that the indio was not the
tabula rasa recipient that historians have always painted him to
be:
In the villages nearest the sea some do not eat pork, the
reason for their not eating it, being that, in trading with the
Moros of Burney, the latter have preached to them some
part of the nefarious doctrine of Mahoma, charging them
not to eat pork. In this they act most childishly, and when by
chance any of them are asked why they do not eat it, they
say they do not know the commandment or anything about
Mahoma, not even his name; nor do they know what his law
is, nor whence it came. It is true that some of those who
have been in Burney understand some of it, and are able to
read a few words of the Alcoran; but these are very few,
and believe that he who has not been in Burney may
eat pork, as I have heard many of them say.56(emphasis
supplied)
This image of the clever indio appropriating only that suited

his purpose hence would recur invariably throughout the period
under question. Rafael of course has portrayed some of the as-
pects of this cleverness, given his citation of how the natives
responded in various ways to the priest inside the confessional
88
box. But what Phelan had to say further given this intelligence
and active discernment of the indio should be most instructive.
After a discussion of all the handicaps that the early missionar-
ies had to surmount in the otherwise revealing chapter he called
“The Imposition of Christianity,” he was led to conclude, more out
of sheer bravado than of proofs, that there indeed was a
Christianization inasmuch as:
(g)iven the disadvantages under which the Spanish clergy

had to operate, their efforts would have proven abortive if
the Filipinos had not voluntarily responded to some features
of Christianity. As it happened, the Filipinos endowed cer-
tain aspects of the new religion with a ceremonial and emo-
tional content, a special Filipino flavor which made Catholi-
cism in the archipelago in some respects a unique expres-
sion of that universal religion. In this process of ‘Philippinizing’
Catholicism the major role belonged to the Filipinos. They
showed themselves remarkedly selective in stressing
and deemphasizing certain features of Spanish Catholi-
cism.57 (emphasis supplied)
If at all, the utmost significance of this curious observation

has to be fully drawn out. For indeed, what does one have here:
a Christianization brought about more by the voluntary response
of the native population and less by the efforts of the missionar-
ies who, not coincidentally have presented Christianity to the in-
fidels “not as a more perfect expression of their pagan beliefs but
as something entirely new,” and that furthermore, as such, have
dismissed as a “diabolical conspiracy”58 any resemblance be-
tween the pagan beliefs and the Christian ones? An absolutely
curious kind of “Christianization” indeed! But absolutely “curioser”
still is a Phelan, who, after making this trenchant observation,
would posit that these active mixture on the part of the indio could
nonetheless be aptly called as “popular or folk Catholicism,”59
allegedly a syncretism brought about by the native’s “lack of a
solid grasp of Catholic doctrine” and which caused native Chris-
tianity ‘to degenerate into outward ritual formalism.”60 And while
89
Phelan can already be interrogated at this point as to how can

the “plant” of Christianity still “wither” and “degenerate” if its seed
had been planted on a “swamp” in the first place, more instruc-
tive is his later observation below. For inasmuch as it may be
said that such a syncretism is something to be really expected in
the initial stages of any Christian proselytization, a Phelan griev-
ing over the fact that the Spanish friars throughout the centuries
of colonial rule have done nothing to arrest this “degeneration”can
only signify that the grounds on which Christianity was supposed
to rest its foundation, much less flower, have never really “solidi-
fied.”
In deliberately stunting the growth of a Filipino clergy, they

allowed their Spanish ethnocentrism to override the univer-
sal spirit of their creed. The consequences for the character
of Philippine Christianity were momentous. A well-trained
Filipino clergy could have done a great deal to root out
superstitions, to promote a firmer grasp of the doctrine, and
to administer the sacraments with much greater frequency.
As it was, there were virtually two religions. One was
the Catholicism of the Spanish clergy and the Spanish colo-
nists, and the other was the folk Catholicism of the Filipinos,
a cleavage which was sharply delineated along racial and
linguistic lines.61 (emphasis supplied)
As it were, one, therefore, finds in this observation the rightful

context of what has been discussed about the true nature of the
Katipunan. And inasmuch as it may still be posited that this
“degeneration” has already been fully arrested, what with the
consequences of the 1896 events ultimately effecting hence
Phelan’s prescription of the Filipinization of the clergy, the reader
is referred to this yet another trenchant essay by the Jesuit scholar,
Jaime Bulatao. Published in 1967 and using examples current at
that time, it will be seen that Bulatao’s theory of “split-level Chris-
tianity” is nothing but an echo of what Phelan has observed to
have animated the “Christianity” of the people in the earlier cen-
turies. According to Bulatao:
90
Split-level Christianity may be described as the coexistence

within the same person of two or more thought-and-behav-
ior systems which are inconsistent with each other. The im-
age is of two apartments at different levels, each of which
contains a family, the one rarely talking to the other. So is it
with the split-leveled person: at one level he professes alle-
giance to ideas, attitudes and ways of behaving which are
mainly borrowed from Christian West, at another level he
holds convictions which are more properly his “own ways of
living and believing which were handed down from his ances-
tors, which do not always find their way into an explicit philo-
sophical system, but nevertheless now and then flow into
action.” 62
And insofar as 1967 is not too far off from February 1986
when this level can be said to have once more “flowed into
action,” what with the all-too-conspicuous presence of statues of
the Virgin Mary, rosaries and even nuns and priests themselves
at the EDSA, this paper has, therefore, simply come around full
circle to the tremendous significance of Isagani Cruz’s epical
discussion. And the tremendous significance is this: considering
to the fullest this persistence of the epical thinking on the part of
the Filipinos, the inherent tenuousness of the otherwise trenchant
concepts like “folk Catholicism” and “split-level Christianity” might
just be finally resolved in favor of this more accurate and demon-
strably more efficacious concept: catholic Folkism!
Needless to say, the difference between these concepts is
not merely semantical. Whereas the concept “folk Catholicism”
is used by Phelan and other scholars to denote a “Catholic” sub-
stance expressed preponderantly in various paganistic ways,
hence signifying that there indeed was a conversion that may
account for a consequent “lost origins” on the part of the indio,
the concept “catholic Folkism” as hereby presented is meant to
denote an essentially “traditional” or “folk” substance expressed
prepon-derantly in various Catholic ways, and thus ultimately
affirming the integrity of the indio’s ideas as dramatically mani-
fested, for instance, by the Katipunan. And if anything, it is this
91
concept of catholic Folkism which may well resolve this another

sharp and insightful line of argument by Rafael which he unfortu-
nately bungled consequently into a ridiculous knot. Criticizing
the earlier accounts by scholars like Phelan and Horacio de la
Costa, he had this to say:
Though differing in approach and emphasis, De la Costa

and Phelan have two things in common. First, both take the
structure of Christianity for granted as an unproblematic
given of colonial rule. And once taken for granted, it is seen
ultimately to have exercised a mitigating effect on Spanish
imperialism and a civilizing influence on native culture. What
is wanting is a critique of colonialism that would also ac-
count for the curious place of Christianity in early colonial
society. As we shall see, Christianity set the rules of colonial
enterprise while maintaining a position above those rules. It
also sought to define the boundaries of native culture while
at the same time claiming an attachment to an origin out-
side of those boundaries.63
If at all, this view by Rafael about Christianity “defining the

boundaries” of native personality while being “outside of this per-
sonality and all the while making his readers “see” only his tenu-
ous extrapolations on an Aquino de Belen, is absolutely the
“curiosest” thing of all! And yet inasmuch as Rafael, too, signifi-
cantly used in his discussions Ileto’s seminal Pasyon Theory,
this curiosity might as well be thrown at Ileto who, in his later
essay cited earlier, had this to say:
The reappearance, the persistence over time, of figures

bearing the mark of Christianity could interpreted as a sign
of the total Filipino subjugation by Spain. It could signify
the break, the loss and the enslavement resulting from the
Conquest.64 (emphasis supplied)
The scholarly myopia of Ileto is all-too-evident in this

statement. For if anything, inasmuch as lleto drew so many
important concepts and implications from a Rizal annotating a
92
Morga, he forgot to consider the works of a Pedro A. Paterno

which were even approvingly cited by Rizal in his annotations.65
It may be recalled that Paterno studying pre-colonial Tagalog
society in his El cristianismo en la antigua civilisation tagalog
postulated what was then a rather startling observation that
the indios before the arrival of the Spanish missionaries were
already de facto Christians, inasmuch as their Bathala worship
already had a body of teachings that contained elements which
were synonymous with major Christian doctrines.66 And while
contemporarily an effectively startled Schumacher would only
patronizingly attribute such an observation by Paterno to his
“fantastic ingenuity,” an assessment that unfortunately holds
water inasmuch as Paterno not only was impelled by what could
be called as unscholarly motives but also arrived at all these by
virtue of his rather eclectic anthropological reasoning, in the light
of the epical thinking which Cruz had brought to light, such an
observation might have been, after all, an accurate hypotheses.
Cruz has of course emphasized that one of the most striking
resemblance among Philippine epics concerns the “resurrection
myth.” And so if anything, when the native interviewed by the
missionary rapporteur cited earlier replied that what the Chris-
tian missionaries were preaching about was “very sacred and
very good,” one can only surmise that these natives must have
been referring to that central teaching of the Christian gospel:
the resurrection of Jesus Christ!
It is in this light, therefore, that this paper arrives at its main
explanation for the appeal and the popularity of Christianity,
or more appropriately the Christian Gospel, which since the early
centuries have manifested themselves only in terms of geographi-
cal breadth and not in doctrinal depth: that the natives must have
been recognizing all along in the life, death and resurrection tales
of Jesus Christ the life, death and resurrection of their own
respective epical heroes.67 And given such recognition of Jesus
Christ as nothing more than another epical hero in the tradition
of a Lam-ang, a Bantugan or a Suleyman, the observation of
Ileto retarding the “reappearance” and “persistence” of Christ-
like figures in Philippine history becomes, therefore, perfectly
93
understandable, not in terms of the indio’s subjugation but

his successful, albeit generally passive, resistance against the
acculturation trap of colonialism. And so, again, if anything, what
Ileto observed as the anxiety and passion among the ilustrados
to recover through historical writings a certain “lost origin” is
likewise perfectly understandable inasmuch as no other group
of people in Philippine society then and now had been as
thoroughly acculturated into the orbit of colonialism than their
group. Hence, if the crucial difference between the “Filipinas’ and
the “Katagalugan” nation-concepts could again be rendered in
this light, it might be said that the reason behind why the histori-
cal manuscripts and other pieces of paper which these ilustrados
pompously waved in their hands had remained without effect
on the indios was that among these pobres y ignorantes, a Tower
of Babel standing mightily still remained in their tongues.
But returning to the discussion, it may just well be that it
is in this appropriation by the indio of Jesus Christ as simply
another epical hero that one finally arrives at this long-overdue
reckoning on the historical importance of these twin phenomena
in Philippine society: the Aglipayan Church and the Iglesia ni
Cristo. And that inasmuch as it may be noted that certain schol-
ars have virtually considered these phenomena as some sort of
aberrations or deviations in Philippine history, this paper will posit,
hence, the contrary, and state that it is rather in the investigation
of the histories of these twin churches that one will find that all-
important continuity which can only indicate a “truer” Philippine
history.68 And in such an investigation, it will be instructive to
refer back to Bulatao first who, in operationalizing his “Split-level
Christianity” theory, has stated the following:
Thus there appears the upper of the split-level in the mind

of the student, a level of concepts and words, interesting
enough as bits of erudition but lacking the explosive power,
the driving force of the “archetypes” of one’ s own culture.
Thus does it become possible to hold certain truths in the
abstract, to look upon oneself as a Catholic rather as an
Aglipayan or an Iglesia ni Kristo and at the same time si-
94
multaneously to be thinking and doing things objectively

inconsistent with the abstract principles, and in the con-
crete behaving very much the same as the Aglipayan or
the Iglesias!69
In view of the previous discussion on catholic Folkism, it be-

comes apparent that one can therefore easily turn his observa-
tion around and ask this guiding question: what is it, therefore,
that exist as “certain truths in the abstract” among the catholic
Folkists which the Aglipayan and the Iglesia actively manifest as
“concrete behavior”? The initial answer of course lies in this ap-
propriation of Jesus Christ by the indio as but another one of
these epical heroes. The real substantial answer, however, lies
in the fact that despite their numerous doctrinal and ritualistic
differences, the Christologies of both these churches were, at
one time, strikingly the same, insofar as their views of Christ are
what may be considered from the point of view of orthodox or
historical Christianity as no less than “heretical.”
On the part of the Aglipayan Church, at least, before it
finally ended its theological wanderings by entering into a full
communion with the Episcopalian Church in the 1940s, its
“heretical” Christology consisted of the main view that Christ,
among other things, cannot be considered as sharing equal sta-
tus with “God the Father.”70 And that, apparently, this notion was
not merely an isolated doctrine which existed in the manner that
defined earlier Christian heretical movements. As it was, this
denial was but part of a larger, or systematic, denial of Christian-
ity as a whole. In fact, for while it might be noted that though the
Aglipayan Church was known in its early years of existence as
the Philippine Catholic Church,71 a reputation helped no doubt
to a large extent by the further fact that its founding clergy
consisted of renegade Catholic priests, it should be noted
that it expressed itself doctrinally in what might be called as a
wholly uncharacteristic Catholic, nay, even Christian, manner.
Or in the words of priests Achutegui and Bernad, who studied
rather comprehensively Aglipayan documents:
95
Aglipayan doctrine does nothing to build. It contributes noth-

ing positive. It is essentially destructive. It consists in a tis-
sue of denials: denial of the Trinity, of the divinity of Our
Lord, of the reality of redemption, the reality of grace, the
reality of original sin, the divine inspiration of the Bible, the
historicity of the Gospels, the nature and the character of
the Church.The only thing not denied by Aglipayan the-
ology is the unicity of God.72 (emphasis supplied)
And if one may add, on the level of practices, also the Catho-
lic rituals, the continued observation of which made the Aglipayan
C’hurch at one time appear curiously in the eyes of its prospec-
tive Episcopalian partners as, according to William Henry Scott
in a 1960 essay, probably the “only church in history to be simul-
taneously suspected of being non-Catholic and too-Catholic.” 73
But if anything, the discussion of Phelan regarding how “folk
Catholicism” veered toward mere “outward ritual formalism”
on the part of the natives only takes primary significance in this
regard.
And yet inasmuch as on the level of theology, this denial of
Christ’s divinity and the concommitant doctrine of the “unicity of
God” as invariably expressed as either pantheism or naturalism
is ultimately attributed by scholars and Church historians on the
overbearing influence of a single individual in the person of the
prodigious but imprudent Isabelo Delos Reyes Sr.,74 or better yet,
on external influences such as the Unitarianist doctrines of the
Intemational Association for Liberal Christianity and Religious
Freedom to whom even Aglipay himself associated,75 rather than
on the things that this concept of catholic Folkism can only sig-
nify, it has to be pointed out where an appropriate analysis of
Aglipayan theology ought to proceed. And if anything, inasmuch
as it had been correctly observed by Scott that the millions of
Filipinos who followed Aglipayanism could not have followed the
flights of the minds of its Spanish-acculturated leaders like Aglipay
and Delos Reyes,76 Aglipayan documents in the vernacular would
have to be the starting point of any analysis. In this regard, it will
be instructive to refer the reader to this 1935 pamphlet entitled
96
Mga Banal na Katuruan nang Iglesia Filipina Independiente and

written by a certain Rev. Gavino Belen de Lara.77 If at all, just like
a Salud Algabre whose “long memory” obviated the need for any
external or foreign influence, the theologizing below can only at-
test to the fact that Aglipayanism as a religious phenomenon
derived less from Unitarianism and Delos Reyes’s amateurish
theologizing and more from that source which molded the
Katipunan’s ethos, and the braggadocio of the indio in the con-
fessional box of earlier centuries. Starting by explaining the
Aglipayan’s modification of the Angelus’ meaning, the pamphlet
had this to say:
Ipinaliliwanag namin na ang kahulugan ng Oracion sa

pag-aagaw-dilim ay walang iba kundi ang pagpapasalamat
ng mga pagano ng unang panahon sa pagkakalingkod ng
araw na sumisikat mula sa pamamanaag hanggang sa
paglubog. Ang mga pagano ay walang sinasamba kundi
ang Araw sa pagkahulugang ibig nila ang kaliwanagan kaysa
kadiliman, kaya’t sa Araw ipinakikilala ang pagsamba. Tayo
naman ngayon ay hindi makaiiwas sa tungkuling ito na
magpasalamat kay Bathala hindi dahil sa liwanag na
ipinagkaloob ng Araw kundi sa panahong ipinagamit sa atin
na nangangahulugang biyaya ng Dios.78
Again, if only to disabuse any reader from alleging that this

simultaneous usage of “Bathala” and “Dios” can only signify
at least, an essentially confused theology, or at most, a syncre-
tism tilted in favor of a Roman Catholic substance, the same pam-
phlet ends with a question-and-answer part which has the follow-
ing as the last entry:79
Tanong: Paano maaaring magkaroon ng kapayapaan

sa ibabaw ng lupa?
Sagot: Awitin mo itong sumusunod:

Ang langgam na pula’t ang langgam na itim,
Paghaluin mo may maghihiwalay din;
97
Ang pula’y sa pula’t ang itim ay sa itim;

Ang Roma’y sa Roma’t ang atin ay atin.
And once more, if only as a final riposte to an Ileto who

discussed the “textualization” by the masses of a Rizal in the
light of the Latin Ego sum formulation80 which, in turn, Ileto as-
cribed to the condition of the indio having competely “lost” his
“origins” because he was overwhelmed by Catholicism centuries
earlier, the oraciones in the pamphlet made it sufficiently clear
who figured most prominently, albeit oftentimes inconspicuously,
in all these creative endeavors:
Banal ang pangalan mo, Oh Hesus na Anak ng Tao, ng

tunay na Tao, na ang kahulugan ay Teo, Deo, Dios o Bathala
na tunay na Badha ng alala at pag-iisip o ng Diwang Banal
o Espiritu Santo at ang matamis na kahulugan ng iyong banal
na pangalan, Oh Hesus ay Ye-sus, Yo soy, Ego sum o Ako
nga na siyang tunay na tawag sa Iyo oh Kristo.” 81
And so, inasmuch as it might said that the Katipuneros were

“men of anting-anting” who uttered individual oraciones to stimu-
late the kapangyarihan resident in their amulets, a consideration
of Aglipayanism in the light of the above as nothing less than the
institutionalization of the kapangyarihan behind the oracion would
only firmly establish all the more the continuity referred to earlier.
Hence, far from being a historical curiosity or an aberration,
Aglipayanism as a phenomenon represented nothing but the logi-
cal development of the indio’s own history in the past centuries.
Unfortunately for analytical purposes, what apparently hides
this fact is the tendency among scholars to attribute the panthe-
istic or naturalistic Aglipayan doctrine sorely to Delos Reyes and
Aglipay who both had their own flirtations with foreign ideas; little
have they bothered to focus their sight on this pantheistic and
naturalistic pre-colonial religion of the indio: Bathalismo.81
In the case of the Iglesia ni Cristo, while it may not be said
that its official doctrines reflect this preponderance of pantheistic
or naturalistic elements, there nonetheless are indications suffi-
98
ciently clear to ascribe it another direct and integral continuity to

the indio’s history. At the very least, its Christology is so similar to
that of the Aglipayan: that Christ cannot, in any way, be consid-
ered as sharing equal status with “God the Father.” Or in the
words of Tuggy, a Baptist scholar who studied extensively the
Iglesia ni Cristo:
It strongly affirms the unity of God, so strongly in fact, that

no room is left for the doctrine of the Trinity. John 17:3, “that
they may know thee, the only true God...” and Corinthians
8:6, “But to us, there is one God, the Father...” are both
quoted to undergird their contention that the one God spo-
ken of in Scripture is the Father, not the Son, nor the Holy
Spirit. The section in Isang Pagbubunyag on the unity of
God ends with the following statements, “He who believes,
recognizes, and teaches that Christ and the Holy Spirit are
Gods (mga Dios) also like the Father, do not have eternal
life and will not be saved’ (Iglesia ni Cristo, 1964:6). No
verse is quoted to support this contention.” 83 (Original
emphasis)
Impelled as he was with the ultimate objective of enabling

Protestant proselytizers to deal squarely with their Iglesia coun-
terpart, Tuggy’s final emphasis in the quotation above should be
instructive. For, in all appearances, Tuggy here is pointing out to
his Protestant brethrens the doctrinal “weakness” of the Iglesia,
especially insofar as in opposition to the Roman Catholic Church,
it claims to be completely scriptural or biblical. And insofar like-
wise, that the context of this view by Tuggy is the erroneous be-
lief that “if Aglipayanism is the indigenization of Catholicism, the
Iglesia ni Cristo is the indigenization of Protestantism,”84 it has to
be pointed out to him that if at all, this scriptural silence on the
part of the Iglesia cannot, in any way, be considered as its “weak-
ness.” This is because more than the Scriptures, the Iglesia de-
rives its greater proselytizing strength elsewhere: most likely in
the purer folkist aspect of what may otherwise be the catholic
Folkist mind of the twentieth century indio.
99
In this regard, instructive is the story about how Aglipayanism,

though strongly nationalistic in character and unitarian in doc-
trine, failed to attract the interest of the Sugo, Felix Manalo. This
is so because given the continued Aglipayan observance of
Catholic rituals, it seemed to him that Aglipayanism was essen-
tially no different from its mother, Roman Catholicism.85 Further-
more, instructive also was where the restless Sugo began his
spiritual odyssey: in the Colorum sects around Mount Banahaw
which traced their lineage from the Katipunan of Sebastian del
Caneo and further back, the Cofradia de San Jose of Hermano
Pule.86 And if only to stress further the significance of the Iglesia
in the light of this continuity of the indio’s history as against the
conventional signification of overbearing Protestant influences,
just like the religious expressions of the Katipunan, it has been
observed that the Iglesia ni Cristo’s religious expressions are, in
substance, actively and wholly indigenous:
Tagalog, or some other local languages or dialect is em-

ployed in all the preaching and teaching services, thus reach-
ing the innermost core of the common man’s heart. The
songs rendered by the local choirs are in the vernacular.
The official publication, the Pasugo, contains articles mostly
written in Tagalog, and occasionally an article or two in an-
other Filipino language or dialect. In order to reach those
unfamiliar with Tagalog, an English section has been added
in most editions. The writings of Dr. Jose Rizal, the national
hero, are frequently referred to or quoted. The portions
quoted, however, usually if not always are polemics
against the Roman Catholic friars and the practices of
the Church of Rome.87 (emphasis supplied)
And so, inasmuch as it might be said that the ethos of revolt

by Tagalog society under the Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang
Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan was stopped dead on its tracks
by the principalia’s elimination of the Supremo and all that he
signified, it might also be said that this ethos, far from forever
accompanying the Supremo in his unmarked grave, escaped and
100
assumed new forms by giving birth to a host of new prophets and

kings who took it upon themselves to continue and finish what
the Supremo had started in 1896.
And it is in this light that one arrives at a full comprehension
of a Felipe Salvador, himself a Colonel of the Revolution, but
better known as the founder of the Santa Iglesia. Writing in 1910
when almost all surviving participants in the events of the last
decades have accepted American sovereignty, Salvador had this
to say about what his congregation signified. If anything, given
Salvador’s religious rebellion manifest even in his youth, it would
be impossible to read anything Roman Catholic at all in the fol-
lowing:
Itinanong po sa akin kung ano ang layon ng Santa Iglesia at

ang isinagot ko po ay pananalangin, at paghingi ng awa sa
Panginoong Diyos. Sinabi ko rin po na ang Santa Iglesia ay
nananalig sa Panginoong Diyos, gumagawa ng matibay na
pananampalataya, at sumusunod sa utos ng Diyos.88
But if anything a Felipe Salvador may as yet serve as a final

point by this paper against those who hold that the main emblem
of this ethos, “Katagalugan,” cannot, in any way, be considered
as a “national” concept, much less an operative national con-
cept. For while the figures on the early rapid growth and breadth
of both Aglipayanism and the Iglesia ni Cristo can already suffice
to expose the errors of such views, there can be no more dra-
matic way to demonstrate that regionalistic differences indeed
appeared then to the masses as superfluities or elite categories
than the following words of the Colorum leader, Pedro Calosa, in
1966. Himself seen as another “prophet” or “king” by the Panga-
sinense and Ilocano masses who revolted in Tayug in 1931,
Calosa’s eloquent words might indicate not only who/what could
be the entity/ethos behind a Felipe Salvador and himself, but as
well as who/what could be not behind the host of new genera-
tions of ilustrado and ilustrado-rooted leaders who, with their
respective ideas, had sprung up and were accorded greater promi-
nence in the course of later Philippine history. Asked by his inter-
101
viewer “how does he feel about God,” Calosa, then already an

old man but with a much older idea, responded:
God is goodness, God is justice, God is in the people. He

was in Felipe Salvador, he was in Maria de la Cruz, he is
everywhere. He is in the mountains, he is in the forests,
God lives in the fields and in the water. Since he lives in the
people, and in land, and in water, there can only be love
and justice when the people, the land, and the water are
one.89
E
NOTES
1
2
If at all, one sees a best example of this in a Rizal who rightfully will be
called by later historians as the ‘First Filipino.’
3
4
Karl Marx, “Introduction’, Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right (Lon-
don: Cambridge University Press, 1970), p.141.
5
Marx, ibid., P.142.
6
7
Emilio Aguinaldo, ‘My Dear Brothers and Old Companions.”Cited in Fast
and Richardson, Roots, p.91.
8
See Constantino, Revisited, p.222-231.
9
10
It was, of course, the date when the Filipino sentry was treacherously
shot by his American counterpart at the other end of the San Juan bridge and
which officially started the Filipino-American War.
11
See Rizal’s elucidation on this pejorative in his essay “On the Indolence
of the Filipinos.”
12
It simply took all of nine months---from February to November---of Ameri-
can troop movements to totally undo the Revolution.
13
In the Katipunan’s Kartilya, there was actually this all-important qualifi-
cation of what Katagalugan actually meant. To wit:
...Ang kabagayang pinag-uusig ng Katipunang ito ay lubos na
dakila at mahalaga; papag-isahin ang loob at kaisipan ng lahat ng
Tagalog (sa salitang Tagalog katutura’y ang labat ng tumubo
sa Sangkapuluang ito, samakatwid, Bisaya man, Iloko man,
Capangpangan man, at iba pa ay Tagalog din) sa pamamagitan
ng isang mahigpit na panunumpa, upang sa pagkakaisang ito’y mag-
kalakas na iwasak ang masinsing tabing na nakabubulag sa kaisipan
at matuklasan ang tunay na landas ng Katwiran at Kaliwanagan.
102
14
Benedict Anderson’s main point in his book Imagined Communities
concerned of course this view of “nationalism” as simply an “invention.”
15
Constantino, Revisited, p.277, 280.
16
17
Constantino, Revisited, p.280-281.
18
Taylor, Vol.2, p.413.
19
20
21
22
Fast and Richardson, Roots, p.111
23
Ileto, Underside, pp.492-493
24
See for instance Dean Worcester’s book the Philippines Past and
Present (New York: MacMillan Co., 1914) Vol. 1.
25
See chapter “Insurgent Rule in Cagayan Valley,” Past and Present.
26
Ileto, Pasyon, p.7.
27
Ileto, Underside, p.494.
28
29
30
Needless to say, one will find this deeply-held notion in almost all major
history textbooks in the country, past and present!
31
Vicente Rafael, Contracting Colonialism (Quezon City: Ateneo Univer-
sity Press, 1988), 230 pps.
32
Rafael, Contracting, p.53.
33
Rafael, Contracting, p.55-83.
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
Schumacher, Making, p.189.
44
UP Newsletter, July 30, 1992, p.1, 7.
45
Ferdinand Blumentritt, Dictionario Mitologica de Pilipinas, pp.34, 35.
Cited in Blair and Robertson, Vol.3, p.163.
46
47
48
Isagani Cruz, ‘Si Lam-Ang, Si Fernando Poe Jr., at si Ninoy Aquino:
Ilang Kuro-Kuro sa Epikong Filipino’, Diliman Review, January-February 1985,
pp.7379.
49
Cruz, Lam-Ang, p.73-79.
50
Cruz, Lam-Ang, p.76.
51
Cruz, Lam-Ang, p.76.
52
Phelan, Hispanization, p.56.
53
54
103
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
Jaime Bulatao, S.J. ‘Split-level Christianity,’ Brown Heritage (Quezon
City: Ateneo University Press, 1967), p.17.
63
64
Ileto, Underside, p.48.4.
65
Rizal, Historical Events in the Philippine Islands (Manila: National
Historical Institute, 1990) pp.289, 292.
66
This view is not entirely a new proposition in retrospect. Without this
author’s prior knowledge, the general contours of this view has been asserted
before by Jesuit priest F.R. Demetrio in his book Myth and Symbols: Philip-
pines (Quezon City: National Bookstore, 1990) 500 pp. To wit:
The pasyon is essentially a recounting of the life and deeds of

Jesus Christ in His work of Redemption during the commemoration
of His Pasyon and Death. In the minds of the folks, Jesus Christ of
whom the Bible and the Gospels speak, was Himself a hero, a bayani.
His birth, His public life, His Death and Resurection are even more
wonderful and worthy of admiration than the life and deeds of the
heroes whose names and works have come clown through the cen-
turies through the memory of the folk: Lam-ang, Handiong, Pablo
Maralit, Juan Guintu, Labaw Dunggon, Agyu or Bantugan. Perhaps
these heroes and their stories have penetrated the minds and hearts
of the early peoples of this archipelago because of the immemorial
custom they had of singing the praises of the dead heroes, particu-
larly during their funeral rites. Thus the Filipinos at the time of our
contact with Spain naturally fell in for the new hero whom the Span-
ish missionaries brought along with them. And, as it was their won’t
to sing the praises of heroes long since gone at the funeral obse-
quies of some great and beading individual, linking the more re-
cently deceased’s life and work with the life and work of the
earlier’heroes, the practice of the Pasyon to commemorate the life
and death of Jesus Christ seemed a very natural extension of an
ancient socio-religious pattern. The development and sincerity with
which the early Filipino folk accepted the new hero, Jesus Christ,
led them to transfer to Him the affection, concern and love which
before His appearance on the scene they had given to their native
heroes for many long centuries.
67
Schumacher, Making, p.107.
68
With the exception of Agoncillo who devoted an entire chapter on the
Aglipayan Schism, textbook writers generally ignore Aglipayanism, and much
less, or almost nil, with regards to the Iglesia ni Cristo.
69
Bulatao, Split-level, p.29.
104
70
Achutegui and Bernad, Religious Revolution in the Philippines (Mani-
la: Ateneo University Press, 1960) Vol.1, p.294.
71
Louis Whittemore, The Struggle for Freedom: The Philippine
Independent Church (Connecticut: Seabury Press, 1961), pp.129.
72
Achutegui and Bernad, Religious, p.308.
73
William Henry Scott, “The Philippine Independent Church in History,”
Siliman Joumal, Vol.10, No.3, p.10.
74
Achutegui and Bemad, Religious, p.266-267.
75
Whittemore, Struggle, p.147-148.
76
Scott, History, p.3.
77
Gavino Belen de Lara, Mga Banal na Katuruan ng Iglesia Filipina
Independiente (Manila: General Printing Press, 1935), 56 pps.
78
Belen de Lara, Banal, p.6.
79
Belen de Lara, Banal, p.50.
80
81
Belen de Lara, Banal, p.18-19.
82
It should not actually come as a surprise that another student of the IFI
history and theology would call the wanderings of IFI as the triumph of “Batha-
laistic philosophy.” See unpublished thesis by Francis Wise, “The History of
the Philippine Independent Church,’ submitted to UP Graduate School, 1955.
83
Arthur Tuggy, Iglesia ni Cristo: A Study in Independent Church
Dynamics (Quezon City: Conservative Baptist Publications, 1976), p.107.
84
Tuggy, Iglesia, p.190.
85
86
87
Albert Sanders, “An Appraisal of the Iglesia ni Cristo,” Studies in
Church History (New York: Cornell University, 1969), pp. 356-357.
88
See Jose P. Santos, Ang Tatlong Napabantog na Tulisan sa Pili-
pinas, (Manila, 1936).
89
105
106
Delusions or Visions?
IT IS INDEED a sad commentary on the state of Philippine

scholarship and historiography that, until now, this intellectual
capacity on the part of the indio to at least withstand being over-
whelmed by cosmopolitanizing influences and, at most, to
appropriate these influences to suit his particular situation has
not been given its proper reckoning or worse yet, has rather been
largely ignored by scholars and historians. And hence, one sees
the spectacle of these scholars invariably attributing every
historically significant phenomena to a seemingly overriding
external or foreign motif-idea: thus the idea of Catholic conver-
sion in “folk Catholicism,” “liberal and masonic influences” on the
part of the Katipunan and the 1896 Revolution, “Unitarianist doc-
trine” on Aglipayanism, “Protestantism” on the part of the Iglesia
ni Cristo, and so on and so forth.
But inasmuch as it cannot be denied that these scholars have
nevertheless been oftentimes generally accurate and faithful in
their narration of the respective historical periods they have stud-
ied, and inasmuch too that it cannot be denied that foreign
leitmotifs one way or another have indeed exerted their influence
in the course of events, if at all, what ought to be acknowledged
is the fact that what these scholars have afforded is no less than
an accurate narration of the continuity in the character of the
ilustrados and their consequent offspring in Philippine society:
that, as an intellectual force, it is rather these ilustrados and their
offspring who each time are only too glad to let themselves be
overwhelmed by cosmopolitanizing external or foreign influences
such as these. And so if anything while it may be said that it is in
this character of the ilustrado in which one finds the second half
of the reason why the character of the indio persisted throughout
the centuries, some final points need to be said first about the
other half: the inherent ingenuity on the part of the indio.
This paper recognizes that this proposition of ingenuity is not
as though it is a totally new proposition or one that is completely
hidden for a long time until now. In fact, on the contrary, insofar
as other social science disciplines have already yielded their own
“disciplinal” findings that can only sufficiently suggest the gen-
eral and even the specific contours of this paper’s discussions.
Some anthropologists, for instance, have already allowed other
107
scholars to have a peek on this peculiar nature of the indio’s pre-

colonial society that ultimately warrants the hypothesis and the
conclusion that try as they might, the Spanish missionaries of the
later centuries could not really be expected to effect a conver-
sion akin to that of Mexico and the other Latin American coun-
tries. This is because, aside from the important issue of language,
the pre-colonial society of the indio, unlike the towering civiliza-
tions of the Aztecs, the Incas and the Mayas, was, at the onset of
the Spanish conquest still in a state of flux: classes had not yet
fully evolved, power had accordingly not yet been made abso-
lute and arbitrary, and social and religious institutions had not
yet been firmly established inasmuch as they were still in the
process of continuous definition and metamorphoses.1 As it was,
this indefinite and inordinate character of the indio’s society could
not but naturally manifest itself actively in his language and so-
cial behavior. And, if at all, it was nothing but this fluidity that all
along had been behind what Phelan had correctly identified as
the main problem of Christian “conversion”: that the natives,
inspite of their displayed enthusiasm for Christianity, sorely lacked
a “solid grasp” of its doctrines. And if it is any indication, the
rather famous exhortation of an eighteenth century missionary
like Ortiz to his fellow missionaries on what should be done re-
garding the indio’s propensity to believe in the nuno2 — i.e., to
“examine their doctrines, customs, abuses and superstitions, and
having examined them impugn them and disabuse the said Gen-
tiles of them because unless their roots are cut, the bad weed
will sprout again, no matter how many times you cut them”—
repeated throughout the centuries of Spanish colonial rule inas-
much as indeed the “bad weeds” sprouted again and again, it
would appear that centuries after their so-called conversion of
the natives, these friars did not really know what they had set
their feet on, insofar as the ‘grounds” where the “seed” of Catholi-
cism was supposed to have taken root and come to fruition did
not really “solidify” nor have proven to be sufficiently arable and
fertile.
And if only to pursue this analogy to its ultimate conclusion,
it might be asked what could be that “ground” which appears to
108
be so but was not solid as it was thought to be? Indeed, what

else but a quicksand!? And with this image of a trap, perhaps the
whole story of the Spanish conquest of the Philippines could now
be more appropriately retold: that, unlike in Mexico and in the
Latin Americas where Spanish conquest had been completely
successful and thorough inasmuch as it had been conducted
rather systematically,3 the Spanish conquest of the islands had
not been that completely successful and thoroughly penetrating
inasmuch as the unsystematic character of the indio’s pre-colo-
nial societies prevented beforehand such a complete success.
In other words, whereas in Latin America, given a prior “solidifi-
cation” which, in the first place, was the basis for its towering
civilizations, the Spanish conquerors knew at least what they were
systematically up against and, therefore, how to systematically
impugn them. In the Philippines, given the generafly fluid, inordi-
nate and unsystematic nature of its pre-colonial societies, the
Spanish conquerors were bewildered at each turn and so had to
turn from time to time to improvisations.4 But inasmuch as the
greatest improvisation they could have had equipped themselves
with—i.e. language — was not given the pervasive importance it
should have deserved, what happened was that instead of the
conqueror’s culture vanquishing the indigenous culture and in-
stituting itself as, in turn, the supreme replacement, it was rather
the indigenous culture that “vanquished” the conqueror’s by the
mere fact of surviving successfully what could otherwise have
been its dreaded and fatal onslaught. And if only as a further
indication, whereas in the Latin Americas, the most obvious proof
of the success of the previous Spanish conquest consists in the
fact that, indeed, it can rightfully be called as the Latin Americas,
in the Philippines, the best proof of the failure of the conquest
consists in that its Latinization stops short in the ‘Philip” aspect
of its formal name. But even in this regard, however trivial it may
seem, there is something instructive yet. It ought to be noted that
aside from the pedestrian and self-evident fact that the appella-
tion “Filipino” has not yet reached substantive and significant
emotional proportions on the part of the indio, insofar as to him
the appellations “Tagalog” or “llocano” or “Cebuano” are more
109
efficacious and operational than “Filipino,” the popular nickname,

the “Filipino” nonetheless gives himself does not derive at all
from the proper noun “Philip,” but rather from the suffix “pines”
part, as in “Pinoy” and “Pinay.” If at all therefore, it may be said
that it is curiosities such as these that may yield deeper insights
on Philippine society which ought to be the focus more of linguis-
tic analysis in historical research.
But inasmuch as it may still be said that this proposition re-
garding the indigenous culture “vanquishing” the conqueror’s
culture may, in turn, sound like a Phelan with more of sheer bra-
vado to show rather than concrete proofs, and inasmuch too that
admittedly this proposition definitely needs further concrete and
detailed research, it is believed by this paper that folklore stud-
ies have hitherto already provided suggestive, if not sufficient,
indications in this respect. For instance, studies on the “origin
myths” of the pre-colonial indio have shown that the various
peoples of the islands have in their possession a rich, varied and
ingenious belief-system which can accomodate everything, even
this sad prospect of a Conquest. In this wise, it will prove to be
instructive to refer to F. Landa Jocano’s extrapolations on this
particular “origin myth,” as recorded by the Spanish missionary
Miguel de Loarca.5
The myth began by narrating a world with only the sea and
the sky, without land. One day a kite appeared, and having no
place to land, decided to make the sky and the sea quarrel with
each other. Out of this elemental war was created the Philippine
Archipelago. On one of these islands a reed grew and upon break-
ing up into two sections, there came out the first man and woman.
With their consequent marriage and copulation, there soon came
forth many children. And one day, coming home tired and hun-
gry, the father, for some reason or another, became angry with
the children who, in turn, scampered to different directions. Some
hid themselves inside the rooms, some behind the walls, some in
the fireplace and others fled to the sea. Henceforth, Jocano quotes
what may well be Loarca’s most important detail insofar as this
paper is concerned:
110
It is said that those who fled to the most hidden rooms are
the chiefs of the islands; those who remained nearer the
outside are the timaguas; those who hid themselves at the
fireplace are the blacks; and those who fled out to the sea
through the open door, are the Spaniards, and that they
had no news of us until they beheld us return through the
sea.6 (emphasis supplied)
Given such ingenious appropriation, Landa Jocano then had

this to say, which might as well serve as this paper’s final point
on the particular subject in question.
The note about the coming of the Spaniards is an interest-

ing leitmotif in that it suggests the manner in which the people
accommodated into their belief system foreign cultural ele-
ments, the persistence of which in their midst needs justifi-
cation. It shows the ability of Filipino culture to respond to
socio-political pressures from the outside, as a result of con-
tact with other peoples.7
But then, again, not quite this paper’s final point, insofar as
the tremendous implications of the ability of origin myths such as
the one narrated by above might serve to undergird the following
discussion on this another important, if not the most important,
aspect of the indio’s continuity. For if at all, while it might be held
that the generally inordinate and fluid nature of the indio’s pre-
colonial society could only account for his historically ingenious
predisposition, it might be asserted in turn, that it was in this
demonstrable ability of his origin myths (which were nothing less
than that proud primal view of the indio that he was, in fact, the
raison detre of the universe and everything in existence and those
yet to come) to accommodate and eventually vanquish any per-
sistent cosmopolitanizing influence where such predisposition
would find, at most, the episodic reinforcement and sustenance
which could account for his ultimate historical continuity, or, at
least, the historical basis of his world-famous inner strength and
tenacity.
111
Immediately in this respect, that heretofore intriguing but

trenchant observation by previous scholars like Kessing and
Sturtevant regarding Philippine culture8 —that if anything, it pos-
sesses this so-called “high messianic potential”—takes optimum
importance in the discussion. But inasmuch as a Sturtevant in
his book, Popular Uprising in the Philippines, would initially
concede the uniqueness behind the “highness” of this “poten-
tial,” and would then surprisingly dismiss it altogether by stating
that, in any case, such as “potential” is not exclusive to the indio
insofar as similar protest by nativistic prophets, social bandits
and millenarian saviors are allegedly nothing but commonplace
among cultures “undergoing fundamental dislocations,” perhaps
his otherwise trenchant observation must be made sharper still
for it to arrive at the status of a truism. And which may well be the
case since this paper has already sufficiently implied who, if may
just be the ones responsible for such “dislocations” in the first
place. And inasmuch as the same Sturtevant would fall into the
ultimate error of proscribing that, given these “delusions” alleg-
edly gripping rural society, the elite and the middle class must
henceforth introduce in their concept of nationalism a “compas-
sionate element” for their “less fortunate” countrymen (as if what
all these past centuries fatally lacked was only compassion on
the part of these gentlemen!), perhaps it is really incumbent for
this paper to still supply and elucidate on what could well be the
substantive basis and the omnibus significance of this unique
“highness” of the messianic element in Philippine culture, if only
to prevent future scholars from making such a haphazard pre-
scription, and these gentlemen-audience, in turn, from believing
in such prescription.
And if anything, such substantial basis could not be any far
off from this: that this “high messianic potential,” derived as it is
from the all-too-often compelling nature of these messiahs, is
ultimately not so much a self-evident or genetic irrationality in
Philippine culture which, each time, necessarily warrants a “privi-
leging of status” of sorts on the part of the rational ilustrado and
his forebears. This is because insofar as though indeed it may
appear as an irrationality from the point of view of all convention-
112
alities, it is nonetheless an irrationality which is the major prod-

uct of the greatest rationality of all: history! And not just any his-
tory for that matter, much less a universal one that proceeds from
the iron law of the struggles between classes, or much much less
still, a unilinear one that makes heroes only among the ilustrados,
but the indio’s own substantially uninterrupted history! Meaning
to say, these messiahs, far from being rightfully seen as feeding
on the “gullibility” of the ordinary indio, ought to be seen right-
fully, in turn, as actually feeding on his historical ingenuity which,
in turn, is predicated on the aforementioned proud primal view.
And thus, for each time the apocalyptic New Jerusalem or any
other New Jerusalem-like visions which have always accompa-
nied these messiahs have adhered faithfully to the view of the
all-importance of the Philippines and its people, it may be said
without much doubt that the compelling influence that these messi-
ahs have on their followers derive primarily from the fact that the
former are merely acting out the role of the storytellers of old
times for the latter, and that their apocalyptic visions are there-
fore essentially nothing but the reformulation, the reinterpreta-
tion, or simply, the weaving back together again of the indio’s
origin myths of antiquity. And while many significant propositions
may be derived in this respect, the least that can be said is this:
given the historically tight embrace between the rural indio and
her rural historian, this advice by a scholar like Sturtevant to the
prospective ilustrado lover will really sound like a trifle: that “com-
passion” is the key after all, when all along it can only be a seri-
ous and equitable marriage proposal.
If anything therefore, all these unavoidably exert tremendous
significance on what the organizers of this contest have required
of papers like this: that apart from containing a “critique of the
continuing multi-faceted crisis” in the country, it should also “pro-
vide a vision and program of action to inspire and guide the tran-
sition into the next century.” For in the light of what has been
hitherto discussed by this paper, it will immediately appear that
this requirement of still providing an inspiring and guiding vision
becomes yet another cruel superfluity, inasmuch as the entity
that this vision is ultimately supposed to inspire and guide, the
113
indio, has had his own distinct and definitely inspiring vision all
this while. In short hence, what this paper is saying is that, after
retracing the shadows of the indio’s character and personalty
against the foreground of the ilustrado, and there finding that the
former had after all his own, albeit more dazzling illuminations, it
could do nothing of the sort—that of providing still another vi-
sion—inasmuch as it could not but finally refract, even for just
once, this oftentimes conveniently ignored or forgotten light.
And in this wise, it may be said that there can be no other
dazzling light which deserves to be refracted contemporarily than
this latest and newest vision of the indio as refracted in turn by a
certain Auggusta de Almeidda.” Apparently belonging to this
organization of spiritual groups which has this very revealing name
KAMEIPILI (for Katipunan ng Mga Magkakapatid na Espiritwal
ng Inang Pilipinas) the least that can be said of an Almeidda writ-
ing under the title “The Hand of God Returns to Pilipinas,” and
integrating in it, among other things, EDSA 1986 and the Mount
Pinatubo eruption, is that just like the rural historians of old, she
simply is refashioning once more the origin myth of the indio, and
affirming in turn what this paper has so far elucidated as his own
integral historical development. Almeidda began narrating her
apocalyptic vision in this manner which obviates the need for
any emphasis at all:
The history of Pilipinas is deeper than we know today, deeper

than we imagine. It is the history of the whole human race
encapsuled in a small country in the East.The living reality
of evolution in the earthworld is called ‘Pilipinas’, wrote a
14-year-old spiritual channel two years ago. This declara-
tion in a single sentence sums up the totality of our search
for and research on the hidden history of Pilipinas begun
many years ago and culled from the sacred shrines of
Banahaw and Arayat and all corners of the land where spiri-
tual groups are found...Combining the secret lairs of the
spiritual cults from Luzon to Mindanao, we put together
pieces of a grand puzzle. The finished picture reveals un-
known facts, hidden secret of the Filipino nation. It tells of
114
our astounding history—hidden as it were, from our people—

from the beginning of man to the present, and points to a
destiny of sheer greatness and pre-eminence. We cannot
imagine at this point that our country, so blighted at this time
by the worst natural disaster of an erupting volcano, the
worst economic crisis and political uncertainties, can recover
at all from all this, much more be able to turn the odds around
and become the center of a future world government, the
wealthiest nation on earth, the leader nation of the 21st cen-
tury.
Thereafter, Almeidda proceeded to demonstrate what the

pieces of the “grand puzzle” precisely consisted of. After assert-
ing that the first man, the Tao, was brought down with the fall of
“Lemuria” or Pilipinas many years ago as a result of “priestcraft
and black witchery and fanaticism that priestcraft brought with
it,” she said that there soon came forth many symbols which “like
blazing torches in the night” saw the Tao through the darkest
times of history. The Philippine tricolor, for instance, is one blaz-
ing symbol in that:
If one inverts the Filipino flag, the word Tao can be found.
T is formed by the base line and the middle line, A by the
two diagonal lines of the triangle and the connecting line
between them, O by the sun inside the triangle. We are the
only nation that has all this in our flag. The word Tao mean-
ing man is our very own. It is the upright man, God’s living
temple, the Alpha and Omega of God’s creation. It tells of
our race where the entire race of begun. The Filipino is the
first created man on planet Earth. The brown race is the
first race of mankind.
However rambling, delusionary and textually improbable

these extrapolations on the tricolor may seem to the conventional
reader, what must be stressed is the fact that the rational context
behind these significations is oftentimes of greater importance
than the literal meaning of the text themselves. For instance, in
115
the light of what this paper has discussed on the real nature of
the Katipunan and the 1896 Revolution, who can really dispute
this particular context of the above signification on the tricolor:
Jose Rizal and the rest of our heroes, from Bonifacio to

Mabini held the torch for us in their time. They formed the
Katipunan which was a spiritual brotherhood, very much like
our spiritual cults today. Remember the three Ks of the
Katipuneros, the triangular flags with the sun at the center
that must have mystified and frightened the Spanish friars
and governor-general at the time into more irrational acts
that sealed their fate in Pilipinas. These were the spiritual
symbols of the Motherland of Lemuria brought back to life
to awaken the fuerza espiritual of our race. It was our spiri-
tual nationalism coming back to life to awaken the Katipu-
neros into a revolution that severed our karmic ties with step-
mother Spain.
From this otherwise generally accurate historical view,

Almeidda henceforth discussed the context and the ultimate
meaning of her rather perplexing title:”The Hand of God Retums
to Pilipinas.” Apparently, the context she was referring to con-
cerned that 1986 snap elections campaign where the ‘L” handsign
of the opposition forces clashed directly with the “V” handsign of
the Marcos forces. Or in her own words:
Very few Filipinos realize that the Hand of God was divided
in the country in 1986. The Hand of God split into two when
the L and V signs were raised separately by then political
foes Corazon Aquino and Ferdinand Marcos. Even fewer
realized that L stood for Luzon and the V stood for Visayas,
resulting in the absence of a hand sign for Mindanao. The
third island of the three sisters was left out in this political
war of hand signs. The neglect resulted in the Mindanao
secessionist movement from the rest of the country. When
the hand of God was divided in Pilipinas, our nation too was
divided because of it.
116
Again, in the light of the utter tenuousness of these significa-

tions (e.g., certainly the Mindanao secessionist war dated way
back in the 1970s!), the key to the proper understanding of them
lies in the apparent operational meaning of this concept “Hand of
God.” For it would seem that just like this other “preposterous”
concept a century earlier (i.e. the “Katagalugan” of the Supremo
of course), this “Hand of God” could very well be pertaining to
none other than this most important concept after all: nationhood.
And which might well be the correct case since, in the succeed-
ing paragraphs, Almeidda would assert that this “Hand of God,”
if anything:
brings together the thesis and antithesis of events in our

history so that a synthesis might appear. The Hand of God
is the synthesis. We find that it brings together for the first
time in one hand the opposing L and V signs, so that out of
this conjunction it forms also the letter M, and it stands for
Mindanao, the island that was left without a hand sign in
1986. Inang Pilipinas (Pili ni Ina) becomes whole and united
again as one nation.
And so it might fairly be said that all along, she was pertain-
ing to this notion of a nation becoming real at long last. And inas-
much as elsewhere in the same essay, Almeidda, after deliri-
ously stating that Pilipinas was the Lemuria of old, would, in the
same breath, likewise deliriously state that “like an event coming
full circle, Inang Pilipinas ascends the ladder of her singular and
pre-eminent destiny” due to her being the Lupang Hinirang or the
“newborn nation Israel,” it may be said that, perhaps, the only
way to understand all these contradictory delirium is to reckon
squarely with its converse: indeed. what else but the “secular”
reality that the “Philippines” as presently conceived of do not
constitute as yet what it takes to be called a nation! And if only to
complete the eschatology of the indio’s origin myth as recast by
an Almeidda, below is her concluding paragraph of the usual
“fire and brimstone” but which may yet further be instructive as to
how the ingenuity of antiquity still manages to explain wonder-
117
fully even a phenomenon which qualifies outright as an unmiti-

gated disaster:
But the forces of darkness and evil in our land must first be
met head-on with a great force that will slay and destroy its
body and exorcise its tentacles. This greater tremendous
force is the Hand of God. And it is blinding one-pointed su-
pernatural energy that wields itself like a double-edged sword
and extracts the true measure of all without exception. As
an aside, the spiritual people whisper among themselves
that the disaster of Pinatubo implies a great deal more of
meaning that is generally known or seen. Tubo or gain no
longer belongs to man; this time it belongs only to God.
Alas, for those who can decipher the wisdom behind these
lines, the challenge hurled by the indio of the centuries past and
the centuries ahead, it would seem, has basically remained the
same! How precisely do the latter-day ilustrados help in making
these not-so-wild visions the ultimate and concrete realities of
this nation?
E
NOTES
1
Studies for example by William Henry Scott, among others, have al-
ready allowed readers this view.
2
Cited in Rafael, Contracting, p.107.
3
Though it may be said Phelan concluded erroneously that Christian con-
version was more successful in the case of the Philippines, he would nonethe-
less admit that Mexico’s was more “direct” and “thoroughgoing.’
4
This may be said to consist the essence of the ‘divide and rule’ stratagem
of the Spaniards throughout their colonial rule.
5
Cited in F. Landa Jocano, ‘The Philippines at Spanish Contact: An Essay
in Ethnohistory’, Brown Heritage, p.83.
6
Jocano, ibid, p.83.
7
Jocano, ibid, p.84.
8
9
Sturtevant, ibid, p.266.
10
Auggusta de Almeidda, “The Hand of God Returns to Pilipinas,” Sun-
day Inquirer Magazine, Vol.6, No. 19, July 14, 1991.
118

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Retracing the Shadows, Refracting the Light

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

All Rights Reserved.

already too potent—what with an absolutely rapacious elite, a

records kept in ancient libraries, so must Philippine society be

point where I started with the simple empiricism of the British

Industrial Revolution became important watersheds in the

with a local circumstance. Indeed, what could be more ironic than

THOUGH I WROTE this manuscript sometime between June

moulded this nation’s history in the past centuries. In fact, if the

Fernando Cao and the Veneration

THERE IS ALWAYS something intriguing and controversial

Left-wing elitism, borne out of the romanticism of the past

to its leadership’s lack of imagination than a failure of strategy

There is a stubbornness in Cao that evokes echoes of aca-

lar consciousness is a systematized consciousness with founda-

His face is turned towards the past.

--- Walter Benjamin,

ON JUNE 22, 1992, there occurred another one of those

naldez Pen. Apparently, Pen was simply demonstrating against

ened and, contemporarily, appear to be already unbridgeable.

a Kataastaasang Kagalanggalangang Katipunan ng mga Anak

...I think we can face what has happened realistically, so

SOMETIME IN JULY 1896, a few weeks before the un-

the Katipunan was indeed prepared to stage a revolution, then

they, the leading members of the secret society, tasked them-

of incontrovertible evidence suggesting the first, his own lines

There can be no better demonstration of the fact that the power

the iceberg so to speak, but to grapple with the iceberg itself,

below” or being another instance of “class struggle” or, still, a

tion faces not only a facile revisionism on the part of Schumacher

And while some historians have correctly diagnosed the fact

“proofs” as ultimately true.26 And thus, inasmuch as an Ileto,

With his padrino or sponsor, the neophyte, in black habi-

faith, courage and constancy, all the brutalities and inequi-

Whether or not these rituals were, indeed, masonic in origin

Agoncillo had noted the “deep emotions” and “enthusiasm”

“Sacred ideals” and “moral transformation” themes in a

The ceremony is considered inviolable. This is observed in

Apparently, the ceremony had undergone a modification in

Ytong Katagalugan na pinamamahalaan ng unang panahon

malabis ang pagyabong ng lahat ng pagkakakitaan kaya’t

If at all, it is this portion of Bonifacio’s essay which constitutes

lence of the Filipinos” nor the annotations of Morga’s Sucesos

Further on, when questioned as to whether nationalism and

From the beginning. That is why I can really be proud

our municipal building is Tabok, King Tabok. There, ac-

It is an old town, a very old town. In fact, there is a golden

ultimately depict the Supremo as though he was indeed a mere

In the district of Malolos in the province of Bulacan, an

If anything, a continuity as early as this should merit a second

thereby that the revolutionaries were not dependent on nor guided

The divata, or demon, appeared to some Indians in the

Spaniards, the divata would cause the mountains to rise

Or that, furthermore, a reflection on the significance of a

He was baptized and, although a young man showed that

Immediately, therefore, that “half a Christian conscience”

noses of religious images61 could only indicate further that this

either by a “mass-idea of utopian socialism” or by the pasyon;

mga Tagalog” of that pre-colonial legacy which Tagalog society

the aftermath of these Bonifacio executions is seemingly consid-

of “kings” and “prophets of the devil” that surfaced to contest

Immediately, the demon offered them, for its execution, the