1|Page

MODULE 5- RIZAL’S ROLE IN NATION BUILDING

“I have always loved my poor country, and I am sure that I shall love her until death, if by chance men are unjust
to me; and I shall enjoy the happy life, contented in the thought that all I have suffered, my past, my
present and my future, my life, my loves, my pleasures, I have sacrificed all these for love of her. Happen that
may, I shall die blessing her and
desiring the dawn of her redemption.”
– Jose Rizal

Objectives: What will you learn from this module?

At the end of the module, you should be able to:

1. Appreciate the life of Jose Rizal and its role in nation building;
2. Understand how Rizal awakened the national consciousness; and
3. Recognize how the sacrifices of Rizal and other great men became the rallying point for the
Filipino’s walk for freedom;

Introduction

Rizal had an immense love and constancy for his country which meant love for justice, for liberty
and for personal dignity. He was the first Filipino to express the ideals about Philippine nationalism in his
writings, eventually became the rallying point of national unity for his people and to elaborate nationalism
as tangent to freedom and emancipation. This was the time when the Filipinos had no sense of national
consciousness nor a desire for independence. In his novels he envisioned a dignified society, an
emancipated people and a progressive nation mature in political freedom. This dream was nursed at a
time when it was political treason for a Spanish subject to conceive of a society independent of Spain.

Analysis:

Below are the excerpts from the speech of the former president Jose P. Laurel delivered over Station
PIAM Manila, on February 29, 1944, addressed to the Filipino youth. Analyze the passage and identify at
least five (5) lines that signify the roles of youth in nation building. Provide a short explanation why.

YOUTH OF MY BELOVED LAND:

In this critical period of our history, we need the heart, the soul and the vigor of the youth of
our land to help us build our country on the most enduring basis of brotherhood and solidarity of all
Filipinos. I am, therefore, happy to know of the integration of the Filipino youth and that the Filipino
youth is now on the march. The question is: Where is it going? Is it marching with irresistible will and
determination toward progress and civilization, peace and order, and the prosperity and happiness of
the Fatherland? If it is, I, as the chosen head of our nation and our people, heartily welcome it and bid
it Godspeed.

It is trite saying that the future belongs to youth, especially to those dynamic, aggressive and
self- confident young men and women who have foresight. Thus, they have the bounden duty to ensure
it. So much faith the greatest Filipino patriot and hero, Rizal, had in the youth of the land that while he
was still in his teens, he dedicated to it his prize-winning poem entitled “To the Filipino Youth,” and he
called the Filipino youth not without reason and justification “Fair hope of my Fatherland.”
Module V RIZAL’S ROLE IN NATION
BUILDING
2|Page

Module V RIZAL’S ROLE IN NATION

BUILDING
 Several years later, when Rizal was in Madrid, he thought again of the Filipino youth. On the
occasion of the signal honor and distinction conferred upon the famous Filipino painter Juan Luna
when one of his paintings was awarded the highest prize in the artistic world, Rizal offered a touching
toast. He expressed the fervent hope that the worthy and commendable examples of Juan Luna, and
Resurrection, another famed Filipino painter, will be imitated or emulated by the Filipino youth. In the
course of a few years that youth had become to him more than the “fair hope of my fatherland”; it had
become the “sacred hope of my Fatherland.”

Rizal’s fair and sacred hope is represented by the young men and women of today, by you, the
Filipino youth on the march, you who will be either the leaders and masters of your country and your
country’s fate tomorrow or the hewers of wood and drawers of water for other people more
ambitious and far-seeing than you, men with vision, with courage, and with an indomitable will to
succeed whatever be the obstacles.

As a Filipino youth, have the you made good or are they making good? Were Rizal living today
would he be proud of you? Would he say, if he could see you from beyond the tomb, that he did not
die in vain, that his country’s sacred and beautiful hope has not disappointed him and those who like
him had given their full measure of sacrifice for the glory of their Fatherland?

As ye sow, so shall ye reap. Are the Filipino young men and women of today sowing the seeds of
peace and prosperity so that they will reap the fruits of progress and tranquillity? Man is the archetype of
society. Both society and the nation grow as the individuals grow. Unless our youth prepare for the
future, there will be no future for them.

No.1 __________________________________________________________________
_ _
_ _

No.2 _______________________________________________________________
_ _
_ _

No.3 _______________________________________________________________
_ _
_ _

No.4 _______________________________________________________________
_ _
_ _

No.5 _______________________________________________________________
_ _
_ _
 LESSON V. RIZAL’S ROLE IN NATION BUILDING

Abstraction

A. Rizal’s Blueprint of Nation Building

Despite political inhibitions during his time, Rizal aimed at the restoration of his people’s dignity,
the recognition of their human rights and for the Filipinos to have an equal representation in the
government. Rizal’s political conviction and concept of nationalism matured between 1882 and 1887.
From a distance he gained a better perspective of his country’s problems. He saw how his country
suffered from the abuses, maligned by vices of the Spaniards and the Filipinos alike, helpless
with their oppressed unhappy and indolent people. Rizal had an immense sympathy for his people
and enduring love for his country. He began to understand now that the prolonged subjugation of
his people was caused primarily by two factors, namely, the absence of national consciousness
and the poor training and education of the people. Gradually, his own lifetime plan emerged into
a reality of direction and dedicated leadership.

He not only showed his people how national identity emerges from the ideals of nationalism;
he also conceived an idealism of dedication and intrepidity for the betterment of the Philippine
society. Hence, his blueprint for nation building includes the importance of education, instilling racial
pride and dignity among the people, the promotion of national consciousness, the re-orientation of
values and attitudes, and the willingness to sacrifice for the country.

B. Rizal’s Noble Mission

Rizal remembered those who were brutalized by the masters, and described how his mission came into
being to his letter to Mariano Ponce and Companions on April 18, 1889 as Rizal’s Correspondence with
Fellow Reformists. He also elaborated further his mission which he considered as a duty when he wrote
his parents in May, 1882.

“My mission,” he told his former mentor at the Ateneo, Father Francisco Paula de Sanchez, “is to
make men worthy.”

“At the sight of … injustices and cruelties, while still a child, my imagination was
awakened and I swore to devote myself to avenge one day so many victims, and with
this idea in mind I have been studying and this can be read in all my works and writings.
God will someday give me an opportunity to carry out my promise.”

(Letter to Mariano Ponce and Companions of La Solidaridad, Paris, 18 Apr 1889)

“If we have no duties, if we live for no one but for ourselves, if selfishness were, even not
a virtue, a state that is not censurable, how happily I would spend my life beside my
family neither demanding nor wishing for anything, neither expecting nor hoping to be
useful to anyone but myself. But has God not made anything useless in this world, as all
beings fulfill a role in this sublime drama of creation, I, too, have a mission to fill as for
example: alleviating the suffering of my people.”

(Asuncion Bantug. “The Novel that Shook a Nation,” The Saturday Herald, June 17,
1961, p. 41)
C. Rizal’s Early Experiences and the Nascence of His Mission

Rizal saw unbridled force and violence committed by those supposed to be in charge of maintaining public
peace and order in town. Needless to say, social injustices were prevalent during his time. Few of the
injustices that Rizal experienced firsthand were the imprisonment of his mother by persons whom his
parents considered as their friends, his experience of discrimination during a literary contest held by the
Liceo Artistico-Literario de Manila in 1880, he also experienced a similar beating when he was given a lash by
the lieutenant of the civil guard, Lieutenant Porta, for his failure to salute him one night.

“Since then, though still a child, I have distrusted men and friendship. I do not want to tell
you our resentment and profound sorrow.” (Reminiscences and Travels, pp. 12-13)

“Putting on the vizor, I took part in literary contests, and fortunately I won; I heard the
sound of sincere and enthusiastic applause; but, we revealed ourselves, and the
applause was transformed into coldness, into mockery, into insult, and the defeated one
was honored instead.” “Victim of a brutal aggression, I demanded justice, believing in
it… I complained to the captain-general but they did not do me justice.”

“On the day when all Filipinos should think like him (M H del Pilar) and like us, on that day
we shall have fulfilled our arduous mission, which is the formation of the Filipino nation.”
(Letter to Mariano Ponce, 27 July 1888).

D. Rizal Awakens the National Consciousness

He was aware that a regenerated individual would easily understand and feel love of country. Thus,
he intended to awaken the Filipino’s passion in the quest of national dignity through his writings. A literary
piece, “Love of Country” published on August 20, 1882, was one of Rizal’s early steps in setting an ideal for
his people, the search for national identity. To Rizal, love of country is the national ideal. The sincerity of
Rizal’s love of country became the crowning glory of his patriotism which, in turn, had influenced many
patriots after him.

“Whatever our condition might be then, let us love our country and let us wish nothing but
her welfare. Thus, we shall labor in conformity with the purpose of humanity dictated by
God, which is the harmony and universal peace of His creatures…” “My dream was my
country’s prosperity… I would like the Filipino people to become worthy, noble, and
honorable.”

Rizal aimed at making Spain understand the problems of the Filipinos who in turn would know what
they could do for themselves to attain their aspirations. Due to lack of funds, it took him three years to
write the book Noli Me Tangere, which was published in Berlin, Germany and completed on February 21,
1887. Another significant work in awakening national consciousness is his work El Filibusterismo which
was published in Ghent, Belgium on September 18, 1891. In March, 1889, upon learning that some
Filipinos were arrested and imprisoned, he wrote the members of the La Solidaridad Association, urging
them to work harder.
E. Education as the Instrument for Social Progress

For Rizal, education stands as the foundation of society and the cure for societal ills. He
pleaded to government authorities to take necessary steps to improve the quality education of the
Filipinos. He laid down feasible arguments in favor of the Filipinos’ dire need for education. Rizal
opened the mind of the Spanish authorities about the possible outcome that may arise from denying the
people the benefits of education. The enriching effects of Rizal’s study abroad made him see how
education could bring social progress. He consistently urged his fellowmen to do everything they
could do for the education of their generation.

“We believe, that the cause of our

backwardness and ignorance is the lack of
means of education, the vice that afflicts us from
the beginning until the end of our careers, if not
the lack of stimulus of a doubtful future, or the
fetters and obstacles that are encountered at
every step.”

F. The People’s Welfare Is the Concern of Governments

Rizal argued that the promotion of people’s welfare must be the main function of any
government, including the governments of colonies. Social justice must be upheld in the society
regardless of race, education and family background.

The first observation of Rizal is that a colonizing country must know her colony, second
observation was on the status of the Philippines under Spain’s colonial system of administration. The third
and timely observation of Rizal about colonizing powers is it revolves around the use of prudence and
tact and the fourth current observation was the rulers’ lack of concern for the governed. Rizal requested
Spain to change the basis of her colonial policy in the Philippines. His fifth observation is that the policy of
the government must be sincere and consistent to keep the loyalty of a country. The sixth observation
is that he foresaw how social progress was possible if there was cooperation between the government
and the people. The seventh observation is that the government must keep the lines of communication
open if they need the support of government.

Rizal’s nationalistic mission was through more reforms and not total independence. During, Rizal’s
four- year exile in Dapitan, he expressed to Ricardo Carnicero, the Politico-Commander, several reforms
aside from the freedom of the press and representation in the Spanish Cortes. These were:

1. Secularization of the parishes and distributing the curacies;

2. Reform in all branches of the administration;
3. Encouragement of primary education and removing friar intervention in it;
4. Higher salaries for deserving;
5. Opportunity for appointment to the government;
6. Improvement of the moral tone of the administration; and
7. Creation for schools of arts and trade in provincial capital of more than 16,000
people 8. Freedom of religion
 G. The Ultimate Means at Nation-Building Is National Unity

Rizal viewed the refusal of any individual in fighting injustice as a form of social evil. In a letter
to Rev. Father Vicente Garcia, a Filipino doctor of Sacred Theology, Rizal stressed the ideal of social
justice which will unify his people. In the Philippines, there was individual progress and not national
progress. Rizal never lost faith in the capacity of his people to work together in spite of these
observations.

“The individual should give way to the welfare of the society… whoever wants to take part
in this crusade (for reforms) ought to have renounced beforehand life and fortune.”

“Let us then work together… let us apply the remedy, let us build, no matter if we begin
with the simplest, for later we shall have time to erect new edifices on that foundation.
Step by step one reaches the Temple of Progress whose numerous and fitful steps are
not climbed without faith and conviction of the soul, in the heart courage necessary in
encountering
disillusions, and the gaze fixed in the future.”

(Miscellaneous Writings of Dr. Jose Rizal, p. 15)

A
Application:

Based on Rizal’s perspective of national unity as the ultimate means at nation-building, make a position
paper about the statement below:

“Could the collective strength of the country during Rizal’s time ensure a good chance of victory?”
Why or Why not?
Items to follow:

Format

- Not more than 1 page

- 12-point font, Calibri light, 1.5 spacing
- Normal
margin Content

- The introductory paragraph has a strong hook or attention grabber that is appropriate for the
audience. This could be a strong statement, a relevant quotation, statistic, or question addressed to
the reader that support your position
- Outlines the main points to be discussed
- Provide citations or proper referencing
A
Assessment:

Identification: Provide the answer to the following questions/statements below. Write your answer on the
space provided in each item.

1. What are the two factors that prolonged the suffering of the Filipino people from subjugation?
_ _ _ _
2. What was the noble mission of Jose Rizal which he told Father Francisco Paula de Sanchez
about?
_ _
3. What was the piece of literature written by Rizal that was intended to set an ideal for his
people in pursuit of their national identity? _ _
4. What was the national ideal for Rizal? ___
5. What was the biggest factor why it took him three years to write the book Noli Me Tangere?
_ _
6. When was the publication of El Filibusterismo happened? _ _ _
7. Rizal considered as the society’s foundation of society the cure
for societal ills.
8. What was the main function of any government, including the governments of colonies according
to Rizal? _ _
9. For Rizal, refusal of any individual to fight against injustices is also a form of _ _.
10. According to Rizal, social progress was possible if there was cooperation between the
_and the _ .