José Rizal
José Rizal was a prominent Filipino doctor, writer, and reform advocate, born on June 19, 1861, into a respected family in the Philippines. Educated at prestigious institutions such as Ateneo de Manila University and the Universidad Central de Madrid, Rizal displayed remarkable intellectual and artistic talents from an early age. His literary works, notably the novels *Noli Me Tangere* and *El Filibusterismo*, critiqued Spanish colonial rule and the Catholic Church's complicity, igniting a call for reform among Filipinos. Despite advocating for peaceful change, Rizal was arrested and executed by the Spanish authorities on December 30, 1896, at the age of thirty-five, accused of sedition amid a burgeoning revolution. His death transformed him into a martyr and a national hero, significantly influencing the Philippine struggle for independence, which culminated in 1898. Today, Rizal’s writings and his legacy are celebrated in the Philippines, where December 30 is observed as a national holiday, and he is revered as a symbol of the nation’s quest for freedom and identity.
José Rizal
Physician, writer, activist
- Born: June 19, 1861
- Place of Birth: Place of birth: Calamba, Laguna Province, Philippines
- Died: December 30, 1896
- Place of Death: Place of death: Manila, Philippines
Education: Ateneo de Manila University; University of Santo Tomas; Universidad Central de Madrid
Significance: José Rizal was a Filipino doctor and writer whose written calls for reform upset the Spanish government, which had colonized the Philippines. When revolution broke out there, the Spanish accused Rizal of sedition and rebellion, and he was executed at the age of thirty-five. He is considered a national hero in the Philippines.
Background
José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda was born on June 19, 1861, as the seventh of the eleven children born to Francisco Rizal Mercado and Teodora Alonzo Y Quintos. His family was wealthy and respected, yet hid his mother's Chinese ancestry because they feared the anti-Chinese sentiment of the Spanish people who had colonized the area. The family used the surname Mercado; Rizal dropped that name and the other parts of his surname when he entered college to make it harder for people to connect him to his only brother, Paciano, who was associated with several clergymen who had been executed for rebellion.
Rizal showed intellectual and artistic promise from an early age; he was reading and writing by the time he was five. His parents sent him away to boarding schools, where the work was rigorous and the discipline strict. He excelled in his studies and the arts, writing at the age of eight "Sa Aking mga Kabata," a poem written in the Tagalog language.
He graduated from Ateneo de Manila University at the age of sixteen in 1877, and then entered the University of Santo Tomas, where he earned a surveyor's degree a year before he was old enough to be licensed at the age of eighteen.
In 1878, Rizal began studying medicine at Santo Tomas to become an ophthalmologist, but he dropped out after deciding that the Dominican instructors were discriminating against their Filipino students. Instead, he traveled to Spain to study at the Universidad Central de Madrid. He graduated with a degree in medicine in 1884 at the age of twenty-three. He completed another degree, a graduate degree in philosophy, at the age of twenty-four.
Life's Work
Rizal was fluent in twenty-two languages and travelled extensively during his lifetime. While in Berlin in 1887, he published a novel titled Noli Me Tangere (in English, Touch Me Not), which satirized Spanish clergy in the Philippines and called out the Catholic Church for supporting the oppressive Spanish colonizers. A few years later in 1890, he republished Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas, a novel written by Antonio de Morga, which spoke of the successes of the Filipino people before the Spaniards colonized the islands. Rizal added his own notes to the reprint.
In 1891, he published another original novel, El Filibusterismo (The Filibustering), also known by the alternate title The Reign of Greed. As a sequel to Noli Me Tangere, this novel continued the story of the protagonist and his attempts to reform his country as his Filipino compatriots suffer at the hands of the Spanish colonizers. Rizal also wrote a number of articles urging changes in how the Spaniards governed the Filipinos and supporting his countrymen. In particular, Rizal advocated for freedom of speech and assembly as well as equal rights for the Filipinos. He also wanted the Philippines to become a province of Spain with all the rights that would entail and to have Filipino priests assigned to local parishes instead of Spanish clergy.
Although he was considered an enemy by the Spanish, Rizal was well liked and well respected among Filipinos and among the many individuals he encountered in person and through the letters he wrote to learned men around the world. His words were especially meaningful to his fellow Filipinos, who took them as inspiration for their fight against the Spanish colonizers.
When the Philippine revolution began on August 26, 1896, the Spaniards seized on Rizal as an instigator of the rebellion. He was arrested, and false witnesses were brought forth to accuse him of insurrection. Although Rizal had taken action only with words and spoke out against the violent course the rebels chose, he was tried in a sham trial and found guilty of rebellion, sedition, and forming illegal associations. He was sentenced to execution.
Rizal spent nearly two months in Fort Santiago at the end of 1896 between his sentencing and his death. During that time, he wrote a poem that he left untitled that has since been named "Mi Último Adiós" ("My Last Farewell"), which spoke of his love for his country and countrymen. On December 30, 1896, in an area of the fort then known as Bagumbayan Field, Rizal was killed by firing squad. He was thirty-five years old.
Impact
Rizal's death made him a martyr to the cause of freedom and a hero to the Filipino people. Inspired in part by his courage and words, the revolution continued until 1898 when the Philippines ultimately declared independence from Spain on June 12. Rizal is credited with helping the nation come into being.
The two novels he wrote and his last poem, "Mi Último Adiós," are considered national works of art by the Filipino people and are part of the school curriculum there. The day Rizal was killed is a national holiday in the Philippines, and the fort where he was imprisoned and killed includes a shrine and museum dedicated to his memory.
Personal Life
Rizal was associated with nine women during his adult life, based on information recorded in his own prolific diaries and journals. One of them, Josephine Bracken, brought her blind father to be examined by Rizal several times. They fell in love but were unable to marry because the bishop would not sanction the marriage. They were ultimately married two hours before Rizal faced the firing squad.
Bibliography
"Dr. José Rizal." Austrian-Philippine Website. Asian/Pacific Studies & Information Service, University of Vienna. Web. 25 May 2016.
"Dr. Jose P. Rizal." Center for Philippine Studies. University of Hawaii. Web. 25 May 2016.
"José Rizal." World of 1898. Library of Congress. Web. 25 May 2016.
"Rizal in Focus." JoseRizal.ph. Jose Rizal University. Web. 25 May 2016.
"Who Is José Rizal?" Philippine Folklife Museum Foundation. Philippine Folklife Museum Foundation. Web. 25 May 2016.
Zanker, Andreas T. "'I Enter the Future with the Memory of the Past': José Rizal, the Philippines and Classical Antiquity." International Journal of the Classical Tradition, vol. 31, 2024, pp. 59-89, doi.org/10.1007/s12138-023-00647-9. Accessed 30 Sept. 2024.