The Philippine Online Chronicles

genius is like light and air – the patrimony of all,

as cosmopolitan as space, as life, and as God.”

- Jose Rizal

Madrid, Spain

June 1884

It was the late 1800s and all of Europe was drunk in the glorious haze of the Belle Epoque, an era of great art, of promising advancements in science and industry, and of noble ideas. In the midst of all this excitement, this joie de vivre, two Filipinos were the toast of Madrid’s Exposition Nacional de Bellas Artes: Felix Ressurrecion Hidalgo, winning 9^th silver medal for Jovenes Cristianas Expuestas al Populacho; and Juan Luna, winning the top prize for a painting called El Spolarium. In a gathering of Filipino expats at Restaurante Ingles, celebrating their compatriots’ victory (I would like to think they were drinking sherry while listening to a little flamenco), an unknown four-foot-eleven young male doctor made a little speech, putting their victories in perspective: “I desire to unite with you in a single thought, in one sole aspiration: the glorification of genius, the exaltation of the Fatherland…Luna and Hidalgo are the pride of Spain as well as of Filipinas. Though born in Filipinas, they might have been born in Spain.”

This was Jose Rizal, years before La Solidaridad, before Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo, before La Liga Filipina. This was our National Hero, basking in the glow of the Belle Epoque, in the cool summer air of Europe.

History and mythology

It is interesting that our most recognizable historical figure is also simultaneously – outside of Emilio Aguinaldo – our most criticized. Rizal was placed on a pedestal after the Revolution, resurrected as a symbol, and glorified to the point of deification. Naturally, whenever man becomes legend, there will always be a tendency to want to debunk the myth. This has now been going on for decades, probably longer than what it took for us to create the myth. In fact, Rizal has been accused of being overrated for so long that he now actually seems underrated.

All the questions and points of contention may be debated by scholars for years, but in the eyes of all the armchair critics all over the country – from taxi drivers to our lolos who deliver their views on the matter as if they were there at the time – the problem with Rizal has little to do with historical facts and more to do with image. It’s a PR problem that boils underneath questions about Rizal’s nationalism; in every mention of the retraction issue, his real feelings about the revolution, and whether or not he truly wanted Philippine Independence.

Rizal will once again be talked about ad nauseum on Rizal Day and in the days after that. Even as the debates center on his nationalism and his heroism, the real issue has actually very little to do with both. The real issue we have with Rizal is that he has no street-cred. That overcoat certainly doesn’t help either.

International man of mystery

One of the more underrated facts about Jose Rizal that I find truly fascinating is this: between May of 1882 and February of 1892, Rizal was in his homeland for a total of six months. Think about that for a minute – for his entire 20s, during the most formative years of his adult life; basically for most of his adult life – our National Hero was rarely seen in the Philippines. Instead, he was all over the map. His ten-year itinerary reads like the complete Lonely Planet catalogue: Madrid, Barcelona, Paris, Strasburg, Heidelberg, Leipzig, Dresden, Berlin, Bohemia, Vienna, Munich, Brussels, Stuttgart, Switzerland, Rome, Marseilles, Singapore, Hong Kong, Yokohama, Tokyo, San Francisco, New York, Liverpool, London. The list actually goes on, but you get the idea.

What was Rizal doing the whole time? Oh nothing, just studying, observing other cultures, rubbing shoulders with Ferdinand Blumentritt and other European scholars, learning foreign languages, translating German works to French, rewriting Spanish historical books about the Philippines, writing and publishing Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo, and chasing skirts of all over the world; that’s all [here’s a quick list of Rizal’s international dating resume: Consuelo Ortiga (Spanish), Osei-San (Japanese), Gertrude Beckett (British), Nellie Boustead (French), Suzanna Jacoby (Belgian), and Josephine Bracken (Irish)].

Rizal was the quintessential Casanova, the quintessential cosmopolitan; and he was all that during the exciting advent of the modern era. As I picture Rizal hanging out in some café in Paris, staring at the half-finished Eiffel tower, I cannot help but be amazed at the image of an indio traveling the brave new western world – the same western world that called Africans “negroes” and Orientals “chinks” and treated them as second-class citizens. Not only did Rizal and his fellow Ilustrados feel comfortable within the “enlightened” confines of white racist 19^th century Europe; they blossomed and excelled there.

The new myth

Those who diminish Rizal’s legacy love throwing that term around as if it were a slur – “Ilustrado.” Andres Bonifacio is the more appropriate national hero, they say, because he was a plebeian, a true-blue warrior who fought in the trenches. But this is the class fallacy at its most glaring. Rizal, like Luna, wasn’t a rich boy (while Rizal was in Europe, his mother had to sell one of their horses just so he could afford to stay there). Bonifacio wasn’t an uneducated war freak from Tondo either; he was an Ilustrado himself, in the truest sense of the word, which means “enlightened” and not in its revised context, which means “privileged” and “upper class.” Bonifacio educated himself through European literature and the works of Rizal, even sharing his obsession over the French Revolution.

The truth is Rizal was no more a haciendero than Bonifacio was an illiterate. But modern Philippine society can only think of them in terms of modern day archetypes – the smart but cowardly Atenean and the poor but street-smart Tondo Boy. We reduce them into terms that can be understood today, and because of this something gets lost in the revisionism: that within the context of 200-plus years of subjugation, of being told that you are nothing but a stupid indio who should know your place, there is no greater form of rebellion than enlightenment. We don’t understand that in this day and age where you are probably reading this on a tablet you literally control with your fingertips, the same way we can’t possibly imagine what Spanish sherry might have tasted like in 1884.

The Ilustrados’ exposure to Belle Epoque Europe made Revolution possible. This is an underrated fact. It made Pinoys like Rizal, and consequently, Bonifacio, realize that equality was possible, that freedom was possible, that self-expression and intellectual pursuits were possible – things that we indios couldn’t see behind our salakot, while we sweated and toiled for our Spanish masters, accepting the fate given to us by God, according to the King of Spain.

Pinoy pride

I love reading accounts of the Ilustrados in Europe because I love the idea of Pinoys being a part of one of history’s most romanticized Golden Ages. The idea of a Pinoy painter excelling in the country of Goya, in the age of Monet and Cezanne. The idea of a Pinoy doctor writing novels in the land of Goethe. The idea of a Pinoy discovering his global potential for the first time in world history.

It is easy to take these things for granted today, to use Rizal’s stay in Europe as proof of his detachment from the struggle, to reduce its sheer importance as a mere footnote in history. It is far easier to rave about Charice Pempengco on Oprah, or Maria Aragon at a Lady Gaga concert. “Batang Fil-Canadian, Kayang Makipagsabayan kay Lady Gaga! Su-su-nod!” It is easier for the “Rizal wasn’t Filipino enough” argument to be made by Pinoys of all walks of life – the taxi driver, listening to “Teach Me How to Dougie” on the radio; the college student eating Chinese-influenced fishballs, sweat pouring from his Korean-syled hair; the yuppie, drinking cappuccino inside an American-franchised coffee shop; the history professor, typing her paper on her word processor, copyrighted by an American company.

It’s easier to believe that being Pinoy means being local and not foreign, international, and mixed, which we all are. It’s easier to believe in myths than to actually read history.

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Online sources:

WikiPilipinas entry on Rizal: http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php?title=Jose_Rizal

Rizal’s Travels: http://www.joserizal.ph/tr01.html

Ambeth Ocampo article: http://knightsofrizal.org/?p=283

Print source: “Rage!: Juan Luna/Antonio Luna/Trinidad Pardo de Tavera” by Alfredo Roces (Solidaridad Publishing House, 2008)