University of San Carlos Publications

MARIA CLARA AND THE THREE MEN IN HER LIFE: An interpretation of Rizal's 'Noli me
tangere'
Author(s): Quintin C. Terrenal
Source: Philippine Quarterly of Culture and Society, Vol. 4, No. 1 (MARCH 1976), pp. 1-18
Published by: University of San Carlos Publications
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/29791232
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MARIA CLARA AND THE THREE
MEN IN HER LIFE
An interpretation of Riza!'s 'Noli me tangere'
Quintin C. Terrenal, S.V.D.
I propose in this paper to discuss the follow?
ing topics: the approach to the relevance of
Rizal and the Noli, the meaning of Maria Clara
and the three men in her life, and the general
proof of, and the main objection to, this inter?
pretation.
I. The Approach to the Relevance of Rizal
and the Noli
From his tender years, the average Filipino
citizen is exposed to the rhetoric that Rizal is
one of the nation's foremost heroes. He is told
the story of Rizal's life in greater or lesser
detail. He listens to the praises heaped on
Rizal's writings, especially on the Noli and the
Fili. As he grows to maturity, the average Fili?
pino encounters Rizal only intermittently in
the field of his consciousness and, even then,
never massively. This periodical renewal of
acquaintance occurs when the usual barrage of
Rizaliana is thrown at him in connection with
the December thirtieth celebrations, which get
some coverage in the dailies and in their Sun?
day editions.
On my part, I once forced myself to wade
through The Great Malayan, Rizal's biography
by C. Quirino (1958), for the purpose of
equipping myself with sufficient understanding
of Rizal and his works, to serve me as a basis
for knowledgeable discussion about him, es?
pecially with foreigners. Thence, I went on to
enjoy immensely the humor of the Noli and
the purposiveness of the Fili, both of which I
read as the romantic novels they are. Their
characterizations and descriptions of the locals
appealed to me, because they mirrored life in
the province. I could quite easily wedge their
plots into Philippine history, of which I had a
smattering. I dipped from time to time into
the "document versus forgery" controversy,
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ippine Quarterly of Culture and Society
4(1976) 1 - 18
which whirls around Rizal's retraction of Free?
masonry. But when the discussions in Congress
concerning the unexpurgated editions of the
two novels swirled interminably around typo?
graphical mistakes ? so at least my memory re?
calls that traumatic experience of listening to
the radio broadcasts of the sessions ? I
definitively shelved Rizal. I took the titles of
his novels in their literal sense: Noli, Fili . . . ,
which means: "Do not, my son . . . ," to which
I added the strongest injunction to keep off
Rizaliana in the future, if I wished Rizal to re?
main a hero in my mind.
After living long years according to this non
sequitur, in the autumn of life I ask myself: I
am an average Filipino and if most of my
countrymen have gone or are going through an
experience of Rizal similar to mine, what good
does it do to sing the praises of Rizal, his deeds
and his writings when we, his countrymen of
today, find him of so little relevance that we
do not bother ourselves to think of him to any
significant degree? Personally, I cannot believe
that "the Pride of the Malay Race" is deserving
of such neglect, which would be indicative of
his minimal relevance to me and my con?
temporaries. In the hope and for the purpose of
initiating a dialogue with my readers, I am
sharing the following reflections in an attempt
to discover, what in truth Rizal and especially
theJVoZiishould mean to us Filipinos during the
present stage of our national development.
The Noli was the first book which brilliantly
flashed forth the message of Rizal to his con?
temporaries. It has been hailed as the bible of
Filipino national consciousness, and every
citizen is expected and exhorted to read it in
order to derive from it the lessons which
should become the principles governing his
attitude towards his native land (Daroy 1966:
 2 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY
176-77). In opposition to this predominant
view, a second opinion contends ? and validly
at that, it seems to me ? that the Noli becomes
a bore, if approached as a "must"-reading be?
cause of its propagandistic doctrines and for
the purpose of waving the flag of one's own
patriotism. On the contrary, the Noli should
be read for fun, (Carrion 1961:153-55; Joaquin
1956:27), and in the process the reader pre?
sumably takes in its social overtones and
political undertones in their historical pers?
pective.
I mused to myself that it should be possible
to find a middle road which allows the reader
to enjoy the virtuosity of Rizal the novelist,
and at the same time lets him discover the
message of Rizal the patriot and the hero.
This approach should result in seeing Rizal as
relevant to the reader in the living present. In
line with this trend of thought, I would like to
propose the view that the Noli, and hence Rizal,
have relevance to our present era, however dif?
ferent our circumstances today may be from
those of Rizal's own time. I cannot believe that
Rizal has become an irrelevant hero and out?
dated model for me and my contemporaries in
our love of the Philippines. To reduce Rizal's
significance for his countrymen of today to the
status of an almost forgotten hero, who gave his
life for our common native land, is to reduce
him to the level of the many other heroic
countrymen who also gave their lives for the
sake of the Philippines, say, in Bataan or on the
road to Capaz. To limit the relevance of Rizal
and his writings primarily to his contemporaries
(Constantino 1970:21) is to deny to the first
and foremost spokesman of Philippine national
consciousness a position of enduring pre?
eminence with respect to the present stage of
our national development as well as to the
generations still to come. Such a move reduces
Rizal to a trivial figure and assigns to him a
place of mediocrity in the pantheon of our
national heroes. This prompted me to re-read
the Noli in order to discover for myself the
message which Rizal gives in this, his master?
piece, which changed Philippine and Spanish
history (Reines 1971:60), and to grasp the
meaning of the Noli which makes Rizal relevant
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to me and my contemporaries. There is scarcely
anybody, I trust, who would deny that in the
Noli, Rizal left a message to his countrymen
which is meaningful for all posterity. Our
tradition hands down this message from gene?
ration to generation. This message must surely
have a meaning for us in our times, which, if
not quite the same, will be at least analogous
to that which it had for Rizal's contemporaries
in their time. Our national culture embodies our
history. The Noli has always been regarded as
one of the foremost documents of our Filipino
national heritage, because it initiated the con?
sciousness of our Filipino nationality. Just as
the Noli guided our ancestors during our cul?
ture's toddling steps in nationhood, so, too,
now as we continue actualizing the possibilities
for the perfecting of that culture so begun, the
Noli should guide our generation along the lines
of development which are inherent in that same
national spirit.
The Noli comes to us from its own historical
past. To understand it, one cannot expect that
there is waiting in it a definite meaning ready
for our grasp. It only means that tradition
hands down and entrusts the Noli to us, so
that by understanding it even better than the
way it was understood in preceding historical
epochs, Rizal's own not excluded, we make the
meaning of the transmitted text of the Noli our
own (see Gadamer 1965; 252, 255, 338, 344,
346). For this reason, the chief attitude of the
mind in approaching the Noli should be open?
ness. The validity of openness as the correct
attitude lies in this fact: only by means of it
can one come to grasp the essential experience
of understanding the Noli, which is not this or
that experience, but the experiencing of its
meaning, which is valid and determined for all.
II. Maria Clara and the Three Men in Her Life
A. Maria Clara in Rizal's Era
If one treats the Noli simply as a piece of
romantic writing, one may see in Maria Clara a
faithful reproduction of the commonly accept?
ed inconsistency of woman. Santillan-Castrence
points out that one may see her as a beautiful
 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 3
and incomprehensible child grown into a
beautiful and not too comprehensible woman,
as Ibarra found out as he murmured to himself
in bewilderment: "Oh, only a woman after
all! " (Santillan-Castrence 1960:6-7). Again,
one may simply be struck by the novelist's
vivid characterization of Maria Clara. Carrion
remarks that one can point to the descriptions
of this innocent, virgin-lily, ideal and pure girl
and exclaim: "This is Maria Clara! " (1961:
145, 151).
In contrast to this purely literary approach,
one can appreciate Maria Clara, transcending
her relevance to literary appreciation, and
stressing her relevance for the beginnings of the
Filipino national consciousness as the repre?
sentation of her native land; this is what
Joaquin points out (1956:25). Radaic, too, sees
in Maria Clara the image of the sad fortune of
Rizal's country (1961). Rizal's depiction of her
as the tragic heroine has for its primary deno?
tation the Maria Clara who is the most im?
portant female character in the novel. But in
addition to, and by means of, this primary
depiction, a secondary characterization,
achieved with as great delicacy of feeling as the
first, denotes Maria Clara as the image of the
sad estate of Rizal's beloved fatherland (Radaic
1961:47). In other words, Maria Clara is, first,
on the level of reality in the context of the
story, the artistically evoked picture of the
heroine of his novel, but on the level of the
ideality or my thos which underlies the context
of the entire dramatic work, she is at the same
time the symbol of Rizal's fatherland (ibid.: 61).
Similarly, Retana (1961:138) considers the
good and self-sacrificing Maria Clara the symbol
of the Motherland. He believes that this
passionate novel produces through the heroine
a vision of Filipino life in all its aspects, but
most especially in its politico-social aspect
(ibid.: 132).
Who, then, was Maria Clara to the con?
temporaries of Rizal? It can be safely affirmed
that for them Maria Clara stood for the
Philippines. Rizal himself professes this view
by means of Ibarra's thoughtful words: "Me
parecia que eras el hada, el espiritu, la encar
nacion poetica de mi Patria, hermosa, sencilla,
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amable, candorosa, Hija de Filipinas, de ese
hermoso pafs que une ? las grandes virtudes de
la Madre Espafla las beilas cualidades de un
pueblo joven, como se unen en todo tu ser
todo lo hermoso y bello que adornan ambas
razas; y por esto tu amor y el que profeso ? mi
Patria se funden en uno solo . . ." (Noli Me
T?tigere, Phoenix Publ. House, 1959. 1:44. All
subsequent citations of the Noli refer to this
edition).
B. Maria Clara Today
Commenting from the artistic point of view
on this understanding of Maria Clara as the
Philippines personified, Joaquin relates that in
the nineteen-twenties Maria Clara was turned
into a sentimental stock figure. In turn, the
succeeding generation evaluated her not as a
paragon but as a caricature, seeing her as the
love-child of a friar, and hence, an object of
disgust on whose head were visited the sins of
her father, although she herself was but an
innocent girl (Joaquin 1956:23). In disagree?
ment with this last evaluation of Maria Clara,
Joaquin points out that Rizal nowhere an?
nounced that he was going to depict an ideal
woman, let alone an ideal Filipino woman.
On the other hand, he also notes that Rizal's
loving and tender characterization of Maria
Clara refutes any interpretation of her as a des?
picable half-breed, as a pure caricature. On the
contrary, Maria Clara was clearly the "hija de
mi desventurada patria," for Rizal and his con?
temporaries (ibid.:25). This author defends the
privilege of the novelist to create his own
characters as he pleases, and he views Maria
Clara emerging as a character that reached the
highest form of literary immortality, namely,
that of a folk figure. The shift of cultures
through the years has obscured this original
figure, and the deplorable lack of literary taste
of a misguided generation took exception to
the racial stock of the heroine, presuming to
decree on the novelist not to make a half-breed
his heroine (ibid.:21).
Approaching Rizal from another angle, Cons?
tantino considers him an ilustrado who rises
within the context of a mestizo culture, which
developed around the ideological framework
 4 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY

embraced by the affluent indios and mestizos posing my hypothesis, already alluded to: I
of Rizal's era. This ideology projects the need hold that the preeminent relevance of Rizal to
of subjecting the indio to the process of be? his own era, insofar as he was the foremost
coming hispanized first, in order to be able to awakener of the Filipino national conscious?
transform him thereby into a Filipino. This ness, continues today in undiminished lustre.
multilayered metamorphosis called for the By this I mean that Rizal's relevance recog?
elevation of the indio to the level of whatever nized earlier as that of the initiator, has indeed
degree of hispanized culture was retained by been superseded by his present relevance, which
those peninsular Spaniards whose fate decreed ? I hold ? should be recognized as that of the
them to come and stay in the Philippines. Once ever-present guide of our Filipino national
this initial stage had been achieved, Rizal hoped consciousness. This supersedure, however can?
that the Philippines could then be regarded as not possibly have the sense of the prior removal
sufficiently assimilated to Spain, and hence, of the earlier and its subsequent replacement
worthy of becoming a province of that mother? by the later kind of relevance. On the contrary,
land. This original goal, however, gradually I affirm that this surpassing can only have the
changed into its very opposite; namely, the sense that Rizal's relevance for generations of
hispanizing process was directed towards the yesteryears has been historically completed
development of a distinctly Filipino national and organically integrated in his relevance for
consciousness. Once the indio had lifted him? us today. Expressing the same position in a
self up to the level of Hispanic culture exhibited slightly different way, I contend that Rizal's
by peninsular Spaniards living in the Philip? original relevance gained by his writing the Noli
pines, he became conscious of his own race, continues today, without any loss of the im?
thereby becoming a true Filipino (Constantino portance it had for the preceding epochs of our
1970:11-12). It was the urbanized indios, the history, and in an essentially unchanged man?
Spanish mestizos and the sangley-mestizos who ner. His relevance today, I believe, should be
embraced the ideology of hispanization and viewed in a wider context than the original,
who began calling themselves Filipinos. They because the later context incorporates the
thus appropriated to themselves a name which earlier into itself, and in the process of assi?
originally referred to those Spaniards born of milating it in coordination with all the insights
pure Spanish parents in the Philippines. Cons? which have presented themselves throughout
tantino is of the opinion that even in his own the intervening years, the present-day context
era, Rizal had this limited relevance as the has raised the present relevance to the status
spokesman for nationalism in the name of the of a higher-level synthesis.
indio, even if he himself was not of the indios. The interpretation which I am proposing
{ibid: 15). The coming of the Katipunan placed lays out the total meaning of Maria Clara in the
even greater limits on Rizal's relevance during following terms: Just as she symbolized the
the entire revolutionary period following his incipient Filipino culture in Rizal's era against
death (ibid.: 19-20). Today, his relevance is to a the horizon of the ideology of hispanization, so,
great extent outdated, and Rizal's status of too, now does Maria Clara symbolize the
being a hero must similarly be viewed in its maturer Filipino culture of today against the
proper historical perspective (ibid.:20-21). horizon of the enlarged ideology of Western?
This means that ". . . when the goals of the ization. By the expression "Filipino culture of
people are finally achieved, Rizal ? the first today," I understand the folkways of our pre?
Filipino - will be negated by the true Filipinos dominantly Christianized lowland tribes, whose
by whom he will be remembered as a great ilustrado class possesses a passable acquaintance
catalyzer in the metamorphosis of the deve? with the English language. This interpretative
loped indio" (ibid.: 23). attempt accepts as generally valid that appre?
At this juncture, if I may be allowed, I would ciation of Rizal as the initiator of a mestizo
like to take up the thread of discussion by pro culture, whose immediate goal was to trans

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 T errenal / MARIA CLARA 5
form the indio into a Filipino through the
necessary process of hispanizing him to the
level of the peninsular Spaniard living in the
Philippines in those times. This original Filipino
culture clearly owes its inauguration to the
vivid portrayal of the sad estate of the Philip?
pines then, as symbolized by the mestizo. Maria
Clara, the ill-fated heroine of the Noli. This
new approach to Rizal and the Noli contends
that Filipino culture, which Rizal initiated
as a mestizo culture, has gone on developing in
that fashion up to our own days. The blending
components of this mestizo culture were sym?
bolized then, as they are symbolized now, by
the mixed racial strains of Maria Clara. Ela?
borating on this point, this new interpretation
views from its all-embracing and synthesizing
higher-level point of vantage the need to stress
the fact, that Maria, Clara, in whose bloodstream
run diverse racial strains, properly symbolizes
and will continue predominantly to symbolize
our distinctive Filipino culture, constituted by
contrasting Oriental and Occidental charac?
teristics. Having said this with emphatic clarity,
this new hypothesis goes on to assert that this
primary symbolization is intensified by the
addition of a new but subordinate symbol?
ization. This secondary symbolization exhibits
the essential notes of the same mestizo cul?
ture under the figures of the three men who
enter the life of Maria Clara with varying
degrees of an Eros-relationship reciprocated by
her.
The first man in Maria Clara's life is her real
father. Padre Damaso unmistakably typifies the
deep and lasting influence which Catholicism
exerts on the life of Filipinos today, as they
continue practicing that religion for the most
part in terms of hispanic devotionality. The
second man is Crisostomo Ibarra, to whom
Maria Clara was betrothed before he left for
Europe. Early in the Noli, during the dinner
party, Ibarra, recently arrived from abroad,
expresses his great liking for free Europe, but
this liking is less than that which he has for
Spain, which he considers his fatherland, se?
cond only to the Philippines. He tells how he
spent a year in England where pure English is
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spoken everyday, in contrast to the pidgin
English one occasionally hears in Hongkong
(1:20). Crisostomo Ibarra is easily recognizable
as the symbol of two institutions, which Uncle
Sam left as his most outstanding gifts to his
"li'l brown brother" (if the somewhat mixed
up metaphor be allowed). The first institution
is the truly magnificent educational system in
the Philippines today. Its medium of instruction
is essentially the English spoken in America,
although it is spoken here with broader vowels
and the staccato Filipino pronunciation, while
in writing it, our style of expression is liberally
accommodated to our native, expansive sense
of propriety. Nevertheless, our Filipino English
of today, which we ourselves humorously refer
to at times as "carabao English" and at other
times as "bamboo English", is certainly not of
the pidgin variety. It is the soul of our present
ilustrado approach to our own Filipino culture,
as we struggle to bring all our people to universal
literacy and universal education. More im?
portantly, the mastery of English is the needed
means for blending our East-Asiatic sensibilities
flowering under the tropical sun, with imported
Western patterns of thinking, nurtured in tem?
perate zones. The second institution which
Uncle Sam left us is the highly developed
governmental organization. This was originally
cast in forms whose inspiration derives from
American free and democratic ways of life and
polity, which we have appropriated since the
end of World War II, after living through an
initial and per force rudimentary experience
of such ways of life. The third and last man in
the life of Maria Clara is the "piloto" of the
"banca" during the fishing picnic on tjie river.
The encounter between Maria Clara and Elias
during the fishing expedition shows subdued
but definitively Eros-inspired symptoms. Is it
too far-fetched a conclusion to interpret Maria
Clara's concern for Elias as the image of the
zeal, increasingly being shown today by the
middle classes living in the towns, for helping
the masses living in the barrios? The rural folk
are burdened with dire poverty and are ham?
pered by their minimal, and hence nominal,
literacy in sharing the democratically available
cultural benefits being enjoyed in the Philip
 6 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY
pines today. This concern extends to our non
Christian minority groups as well.
On the whole, this new interpretation of
Maria Clara and the three men in her life hews
closely to the avowed intention of Rizal, when
he wrote the Noli. He expressly tells his coun?
trymen then that with the Noli he has begun
the search for the actual conditions of the
country, because he was convinced of . . la
necesidad de dar primero a conocer el pasado a
fin de poder juzgar mejor el presente . . ."
(Rizal 1905:18). At the time of Rizal, the
Filipino national consciousness was just begin?
ning to emerge. Today, however, just as Maria
Clara has matured to young womanhood when
the first chapters of the Noli introduce the
three men in her fife, so, too, has that same
Filipino national consciousness matured into
our present-day culture, a culture heavily im?
bued with Americanized secularization but
blended with Catholic-inspired hispanization,
both of which importations are firmly im?
planted in the soil of our Oriental temperament
and genius. Our culture today reveals itself as
basically identical with the mestizo culture,
which Rizal from his ilustrado mentality first
sought in the hispanization of the indio in order
to be able at all to have him transformed into
the true Filipino. Our present culture exhibits
the Filipino as one who de facto had become
conversant with the Christian culture of Europe
and then was introduced to the free, democratic
ways of American culture. Only after assi?
milating these Western cultural strains and
blending them with our East-Asiatic, relatively
recently decolonized mentality, can we Filipinos
of today present our distinctively Filipino
identity as a curious but solidly resistant inter?
weaving, blending and mating of East and West.
This new interpretation readily admits that the
original, Rizalian Filipino culture, impregnated
with hispanicli/tts^rdiio-mentality, has apparent?
ly been negated by our present-day Filipino
culture, imbued as it is with Western Catholicity
combined with the American capitalistic eco?
nomy and democratic freedom. However, this
negation cannot possibly mean the destruction
of the earlier culture, since it is readily seen by
all that there exist strong family resemblances
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between the earlier and the later Filipino cul?
tures. This negation can only mean the
elevation of the earlier culture into the his?
torically productive Filipino national conscious?
ness, which goes on assimilating succeeding
valid cultures according to its spirit and con?
tinually incorporating these supervening cul?
tural accretions into the critically all-encom?
passing embracement of its present-day culture.
G. The Three Men in the Life of Maria Clara
1. Padre Damaso - Catholicism
In proposing that Padre Damaso be seen as
the symbol of the continuing prevalent in?
fluence of Catholicism on our culture of today,
I do not, of course, imply that Rizal ever ex?
plicitly expressed such a thought. I do, how?
ever, assert that Rizal implicitly had his gaze
directed towards the retention of the influence
of the Catholic religion on his countrymen.
But he hoped that this religion would be purified
of those abusive practicesi wreaked on the simple
indio, emanating from the civil power which
the imperial Spanish colonial administration
utilized in backing up the missionary objectives
of Spain's state religion. In addition, Rizal
expected the correction of the misplaced stress
on accidentals of piety, which resulted in what
he critically diagnosed as blatant commer?
cialization of devotional objects and practices.
The indio's animistic tendency to accept the
abundant proliferation of spirits lay open to
abuse, if it was systematically and institutional?
ly overlaid by the mantle of the veneration of
saints, which itself though legitimate is vul?
nerable to illegitimate overemphasis, which can
go to grossly superstitious lengths.
In Chapter LXIX of the Noli, the last item
for discussion between Ibarra and Elias is the
desire of the indios to have the Religious Orders
reformed. Elias calls them the oppressors of
the people, but Ibarra reminds him of the debt
of gratitude which the indios owe to the friars,
for driving away error by their introduction of
the true faith and for helping the natives against
the tyranny of Spanish civil authorities. Elias,
in turn, gives due recognition to the zeal of the
first missionaries. He is aware that in their era,
 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 7
Spain still abounded with heroes on all levels ?
religious, political, civil and military. Speaking
on behalf of the indios, and more earnestly on
behalf of Pablo, the fugitive from the Law, and
his band of bandidos, Elias asks for the re?
formation but not for the suppression of the
Religious Orders (2:106-107). Earlier in the
book, Rizal lets Crisostomo Ibarra say of the
people and of the priest who were Don Rafael
Ibarra's enemies: ". . . perdono al primero por
su ignorancia, y respeto al segundo por su
car?cter y porque quiero que se respete la
Religion que educ? a la sociedad (1:101)."
Concerning his not taking revenge on Padre
Damaso, Ibarra tells Filosofo Tasio: "... pero yo
que soy el hijo no lo olvido, y si no le vengo, es
porque miro por el prestigio de la Religion."
(1:158).
Rizal also wrote a poem entitled: "Alianza
Intim a entre la Religion y la Educacion," on
April 19, 1876 (Escritos hi, Book 1:12-13).
The influence of Catholicism on Filipino cul?
ture in succeeding epochs is left unthematized
by Rizal, when he explicitly discusses these
and related topics. Nevertheless, Rizal implicit?
ly surmised Catholicism's continuing influence
on the indiosy who to all appearances have
absorbed into their blood that fiesta-and
santos devotionality, which they practiced
through long centuries and which persists in
undiminished vigor before our own eyes today.
2. Ibarra - i) Education
The fact that Rizal was obsessed by the idea
of the necessity of a solid education for the
unlettered and non-understanding indios who
could only parrot Spanish catechisms and
novenas, comes out loud and clear in the Noli.
He earnestly discusses the lineaments of a solid
education by contrasting his vision of a true
education with its caricature then in vogue. The
latter was given under the guise of religious
instruction, which the Spanish colonial govern?
ment decreed as it went through the motions
of uplifting the indios and which was grudging?
ly given in an outrageously supercilious and
and self-defeating inadequacy, for fear that even
such minimal literacy might breed subversion
and heresy among the natives. When reading
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Chapter XIX, the reader of the Noli can almost
hear Rizal describing the travails of the barrio
schoolteachers of today facing the same prob?
lems and similar frustrations as those poignant?
ly experienced and wryly described by the
schoolmaster of San Diego. However, the oppor?
tunity of obtaining at least minimal literacy is
now within the reach of almost all barrio
children, an opportunity which was beyond
the reach of most indio children even in the
bigger towns in Rizal's time.
Rizal clearly has hispanization in mind, but
it is not clear whether it is because he himself
was an ilustrado who had caught up with cul?
ture by that route, or whether it is because he
became convinced that the learning of Spanish
was worthwhile in itself, independently of the
fact that the government-prescribed "text?
books" were religious primers in Spanish, which
were unintelligible to the school children, who
merely parroted what the minimally literate
catechists prompted them to learn. The serious
minded and progress-motivated schoolmaster in
the Noliy who wanted to salvage what little was
left of his pride and efforts, confesses candidly:
"... tr?te de ensenar el espafiol a los ninos porque
ademas de que el Gobierno lo ordenaba, juzgue
que seria tambien una ventaja para todos."
(1:102) . English is today and for the fore?
seeable future the lingua franca of the Filipinos,
since we apparently intend to persevere in the
praiseworthy ambition of letting our native land
take a prominent place among the nations of
the world. This widespread use of a foreign
language for communication between different
language groups as well as its use as the neces?
sary medium of instruction in that educational
system, which has reached passably worthy and
at times excellent feats of achievement, even
when judged according to criteria obtaining in
Western traditions of culture, appears to be a
pledge that the Philippines, guided by enlight?
ened leaders, who were themselves brought up
in that educational tradition, while it allows it?
self to be numbered among the nations of the
Third World, does not intend to be left trailing
at its hindmost edges. English, which the
Americans through their educational system
quickly introduced when they came to the
 8 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY
Philippines, has become the language of com?
munication among people living in diverse
language regions in the archipelago as well as
the language used automatically when Filipinos,
even of the same native language, discuss
topics of cultural interest and value, because,
up to now, their native tongue is unable to
handle specialized, scientific topics. The Ame?
ricans aimed at mass education and that in a
hurry; perforce they had to settle on their own
language to achieve this altruistic end, because
Spanish had never been used widely in the
Philippines, while the native languages were
too many and too ill equipped to handle the
transmission of Western civilization, which the
Americans decided to share with those they
considered their charges. Whatever motivation
the Americans may have had in their other
actuations, the American system of public edu?
cation cannot be faulted with ignoble motives.
History shows that the toddling steps of that
Filipino national consciousness which Rizal
initiated according to his ilustrado ideology of
hispanization soon became firm strides through
the efforts of the Thomasites and their dedicated
tribesmen. They erected that imposing monu?
ment of American ingenuity, the public school
system of the Philippines. Whatever deficiencies
it may have possessed, it embodied Rizal's con?
ception of true education for progress. Since
the end of the Second World War the system
has continued along the lines of development
which its beginnings had promised. The gra?
duates of our Philippine school system soon
changed the Filipinos' image abroad, not only
in the U.S.A. and in Europe but also in other,
developing nations where our Philippine-trained
nurses, doctors and engineers work. That Rizal
saw not only the possibility but also the pro?
bability of the coming of America to our
shores is clear from his prophetic essay: "The
Philippines a Century Hence." (Craig 1961:
119).
In Chapter LIII of the Noli, Filosofo Tasio
views the arrival of the new immigrants from
Europe at the turn of the last century, the
introduction of new books and the march of
young Filipinos to Europe, as events which held
for the indios the promise of greater progress in
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education. In those times, the few young
people who attended school were enthusiastical?
ly seeing horizons broader than those in which
the subtleties of scholasticism were taught in an
archaic, nay archaeological fashion. The new
subjects, history, mathematics, geography,
literature, physical sciences, and languages had
till then been regarded with horror as heresies.
Tasio says that it was the Jesuits who intro?
duced this progress and who were instrumental
in letting the Philippines emerge from the
Middle Ages, where they were kept three hun?
dred years behind the march of progress by the
Dominicans (2:124). Naturally, this last state?
ment must be taken with many grains of salt, be?
cause as everybody knows, Tasio is reputedly
teetering on the borderline between being a
filosofo and a loco.
Ibarra, the student who had travelled not
only in Spain but throughout Europe is the
figure which stands for Education, which Rizal
envisioned as the means of bringing cultural
progress to his fellow Filipinos. One may dub
this mental attitude the ilustrado-ideology, but
in his epoch ? just as in ours ? education cost
money. Only the urbanized merchant indios,
the mestizos-espanoles and the sangley-mestizos
had enough money to take advantage of the
meagre opportunities for exposing their child?
ren to education. The common run of the
indios ? then as now ? simply did not have the
necessary monetary wherewithal to pay for
any schooling beyond the most rudimentary
form of literacy. The schoolmaster in the Noli
uses the brick blocks of the floor for teaching
local geography (1:107). The poor fellow
undertakes to teach his pupils Spanish, but
Padre Damaso, the cura parroco, gross and
uneducated boor that he here betrays himself
to be, humiliatingly tells him to remain con?
tent with his native idiom and to forbear spoil?
ing Spanish. This insult sets the schoolmaster
to mastering Spanish himself, and this gives him
access to new ideas and fuller views of things
as he understands what he reads in the books
which Filosofo Tasio lends him (1:104).
Finally, mention must be made of that
pathetically ridiculous figure of Don Primitivo,
who can parrot snatches of his memory-im
 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 9
printed Latin tenets of scholasticism's lore
with which the university burdened his pate.
When his phenomenally loaded memory fails,
his ingenuity succeeds in extending itself to
producing marvelous accretions of Latinized
Spanish words to his patently and extremely
limited vocabulary. All that amount of memory
work apparently deprives him of using what
little common sense he may have been originally
endowed with. He generously strews about pre?
sumably learned pieces of advice, which call
for Capitan Tinong to burn his documents
forthwith, and to anticipate Christmas by two
months, by giving extra-expensive presents to
government officials as preemptive weapons to
forestall charges of heresy and subversion,
immediately after the tempest-in-the-teapot
indio insurrection in San Diego uncovered by
Padre Salvi. Alas! such university-trained fore?
sight is all in vain! These counsels, when acted
upon, become accusing fingers bluntly point?
ing towards Capitan Tinong. These direction
markers would not be pointing towards
him, had Don Primitivo sagely kept his
mouth shut, thereby safeguarding whatever
reputation for wisdom is allowed him by his
university-premises-attendance. The natural and
foreseeable result in following the supposedly
learned man's clever instructions is the in?
vitation tendered to Capitan Tinong to spend
the night within the precincts of Fort Santiago,
where he and other ?ustrados can be securely
protected by solicitous government troops from
injury momentarily expected from bands of
marauding heretics and subversives, exposed
by that silent but obviously efficient Padre
Salvi (2:156-158). In contrast to this memory
wonder and joker, spouting his ill-understood
Latin sentences, Rizal presents Don Anastasio,
who understands the books he sedulously reads.
Unfortunately, his immersion in abstruse ideas
causes him to neglect his possessions and there?
by to dissipate his fortune. Nevertheless, he has
a solid foundation of truly scientific learning
and he shows the vigor and originality of his
thinking when discussing the historical progress
of the doctrine on Purgatory, which he must
have painstakingly followed with the help of his
books. But Tasio would still be unborn cul
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rurally, did he not take care to master Spanish
and Latin, and thus be in a position to imbibe
the inspiration of great books, which his wealth
and kind Fortune provided him with to read
in the solitude of his home. Don Tasio is
the living vindication of Rizal's ideology of his
panization (Chapter XIV).
In spite of the fact that Rizal shares his
ideas on education with his readers through
several characters in the novel, Crisostomo
Ibarra remains the symbol of Europeanized
education, which Rizal hoped and worked for,
and through which he expected his downtrodden
countrymen to achieve cultural progress.
ii) Democratic Freedom
Rizal reveals his thoughts on freedom in the
dialogue between Ibarra and Elias in the boat
on the lake (Chapter XLIX). Elias speaks for
Pablo and his band of bandidos hiding in the
mountains. Ibarra discusses the whole question
of civil reforms the ilustrado way. Both men
earnestly desire freedom for their countrymen:
Elias with passion seeks immediate solutions;
Ibarra with reason looks forward to slow but
more enduring reforms. The whole approach of
Elias to the problem of freedom is couched in
terms of passionate urgency. The decision
which he is expected to make in the near future,
nay, immediately after this conversation, con?
cerns the dilemma of whether to remain in the
towns, at every moment running the risk of
being arrested by the Guardia Civil, who are on
the lookout for him, or to run to the mountains
and, in the company of Pablo and his nondes?
cript friends, to take the law into his own hands
and run the risk of being gunned down by the
Guardia Civil. Elias fully realizes that it is the
innocent populace who will be caught between
these two warring groups. It is the hapless
civilians in the settlement who must bear the
brunt of war in terms of sufferings and damage,
if armed conflict takes place between govern?
ment forces and the bands of desperate outlaws.
Elias appeals to Ibarra to help them remedy the
abuses of the Guardia Civil, who subjugate the
indios through pure terrorism. The people obey
as slaves from fear, but they are willing to co?
operate with the government to work for peace
 10 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY

and security as free men, if the Guardia Civil is tures Don Filipo on the maxim: In unity there
controlled by discipline. Elias wants the power is strength. He reminds Don Filipo that it is his
of the Guardia Civil to be curbed by command duty as a public official to give a good example,
responsibility, which rests on the power by sticking to his post in time of war between
wielded by the non-military government a tyrannous government and a desperately
officials. The civil officials should give more oppressed populace. Ibarra, in Tasio's estimate,
power to the lowly town policeman. When is accommodating himself to the crowd, be
given more power, the town policemen would cause they are the soil in which he must sow his
be able to scare away the outlaws from the ideas of progress (2:122). Ibarra stands for
towns, without permitting them to abuse the progress in education, which alone can give
people in the name of the Law which they freedom to the Filipinos, who are sunk in
represent. This abuse is continually perpetrated ignorance and in a narrow provincial outlook,
by the more numerous and better equipped the two greatest obstacles to unity for progress.
Guardia Civil, marauding over the countryside, In Tasio's words, Rizal tells his readers of the
and spreading "peace and order" as represen? future ". . . Cuyo canto de triunfo se oye ? lo
tatives of the constituted government. Rizal lejos ? los resplandores de una naciente aurora
laments the conditions in which law enforce? ..."(2:124).
ment agencies of the government oppress the In his prophetic vision of "The Philippines a
people in more destructive ways than the out? Century Hence," Rizal expresses his belief that
laws who occasionally sally forth from their the U.S.A. may come to the Philippines, if it
forest lairs to grab the little they needed for ever gets a taste of that heady stuff called im?
their subsistence way of life. Ibarra bats for a perialism, whose driving powers are covetous
strong government which can provide peace and ness and ambition. In that case, Rizal writes,
order, but does not use its power to oppress the "very likely the Philippines will defend with in?
people. He will never countenance a mob to expressible valor the liberty secured at the
take over the reins of government, for only price of so much blood and sacrifice. With the
anarchy can result from such a situation. new men who will spring from the soil and with
Revenge becomes the principal motive for the recollection of their past, they will perhaps
exerting force, and when provided with such a strive to enter freely upon the wide road of
motive, every man will want to rule. Even if progress, and all will labor together to strengthen
their actuations are rationalized as meting out their fatherland, both internally and externally,
punishment to those who have oppressed them with the same enthusiasm with which a youth
in the past, the leaders of mob rule cannot falls again to tilling the land of his ancestors so
justify their doing two wrongs to right one. long wasted and abandoned through the neglect
To the appeal of Elias that as an ilustrado, of those who withheld it from him." (Craig
with an education obtained abroad, Ibarra 1961:119).
should provide the people with the idea of a Palma says: "Without Rizal and other heroes
fatherland, Ibarra replies that he will never con? who have embodied difficult ideals and as?
sent to lead a disorganized mob. Until the pirations in our history, our nation would sim?
people have been educated enough to discipline ply be a mere conglomeration of individuals
themselves, they will not be able too use theirwithout oneness of feeling, without community
freedom for progress. Anarchy provides the of interest, without soul. Without these links
climate for the misuse of power for selfish that unite the past with the present, no people
ends, especially for revenge (2:101-105; 2:112 can have nationality, for nationalism is born of
114). the travails of a country's past, and inseparably
The thoughts of Rizal on freedom are in? linked with the birth pangs of a nation are
extricably connected with his thinking on those who sacrificed and laid down their
democracy. In Chapter LIII, entitled "II buon lives for it" (Palma 1956:74). One must keep
di si conosce da mattina," Filosofo Tasio lec in mind, though, that Rizal was convinced that

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 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 11
only when the indio had come to the cultural
level of the peninsular could they both be
truly Filipinos of a new and free nation.
Here again it must be remarked that in spite
of his distributing his views on freedom among
several characters in the Noli, Rizal lets Ibarra
be seen unmistakably as the outstanding symbol
of the ilustrado, who has imbibed European
wisdom and love of freedom, whence progress
can come to his oppressed countrymen.
3. Elias ? The Rural Masses and Non-Christian
Minorities.
The whole tragedy of Elias is summed up in
his own words: . . si bien he tenido alguna
education, soy un indio, mi existencia para vos
es dudosa, y mis palabras os parecer?n siempre
sospechosas" (2:107). In viewing the personal
tragedy of Elias and the other members of his
family (grandparents, parents and twin sister),
the reader cannot help feeling compassion for
the luckless man. Elias must be seen as the
symbol of today's rural masses and our non
Christian minority groups, whose talents are
depicted in the talents of Elias. Unfortunately,
these modern Eliases for the most part cannot
be brought up to the cultural level of modern
Ibarras, simply because their education lacks
the solidity which that of their fellow Filipinos
living in towns and cities possesses. The intel?
lectual horizon of Elias is necessarily a limited
one, due to the spotty and barely elementary
education he has been exposed to. Elias is cons?
cious of his limitations even while revealing
himself as a clever fellow, but his outlook on
life and on the world is warped by his lack of
higher, solid education and his being deprived
of the wide horizons which alone will enable a
man to accept and develop new ideas and
scientific knowledge. Elias'is a passionate man
of action; at the mere wi$ii of Maria Clara he
essays to catch the crocodile alive (1:136). He
is prudent in a natural sort of way: just hear
him deliberate with Pablo in the heart of the
mountain forests, and listen how he postpones
accepting the invitation of the outlaw to join
his band. He is full of ingenuity in thought and
suppleness in action: witness how he meets the
treachery of Lucas with cunning moves, and
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how he successfully traces this poor stooge's
hangman to the sleeping figure of the perspiring
Cyclops of a sacristan-mayor (Chapter LVI).
Elias has great presence of mind and ready
fleetness of foot; he manages to set the house
of the Ibarras on fire even as the Guardia Civil
are knocking at the gates and he escapes with
the money as the soldiers break into the inner
room where the money was kept. He has a lot
of initiative, he helps Ibarra escape from prison,
and he brings him to Maria Clara for a last fare?
well. One can only admire his astute moves on
the Pasig and its tributary canals, as they both
leave Manila by banca. One thrills to the account
of his desperate measures during the chase on
the lake (Chapters LX and LXI).
Elias is the representative of the indio school?
boys in Chapter XIX. Don Rafael Ibarra helps
them by buying them clothes, for in their
extreme poverty they have only rags to wear
and they are ashamed to go to school that way.
These young indios have no inducement to
study at all, and because of that they are des?
pised and considered lazy and stupid by nature.
Even today, the Spanish word "Torpe! "
(Stupid! ) in Philippine usage stresses a se?
condary sense of the word with the nuance that
the object of the epithet is "obscenely thick?
headed." The indio schoolboy in Spanish times,
so at least the Noli tells us, is made to memorize
Spanish religious primers without understanding
the words at all. When the schoolmaster tries
to teach them in Tagalog, which is the native
language spoken in the area near Manila, the
scene of the Noli, he has no material available
for this project. He finds the map of the pro?
vince only in the capital town. He makes a
copy of it but he must use the bricks of the
classroom floor to delineate the outlines of
the provinces. Even if he uses the native
language as the medium of instruction, the
official textbook remains the Spanish cate?
chism, which must be memorized verbatim,
even if the pupils cannot distinguish which is
the question and which is the answer in the
format peculiar to this "literary" genre. The
innovations of the earnestminded schoolmaster
are resisted by the parish priest, the parents of
the pupils and the boys themselves who get
 12 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY
confused by all these quick changes of scholas?
tic methods. The schoolmaster, defeated and
pessimistic of any progress at all sadly con?
cludes: "Y asi moriremos y asi har?n los que
han de nacer, y en Europa se hablara del
Progreso" (1:107). What irony to boast in
Europa, i.e., in Spain, that the Spanish colonial
government possesses an enlightened policy of
education geared to the progress of the natives!
Elias appeals to Ibarra, the European-edu?
cated ilustrado, to supply the indios with the
leadership which they sorely lack: "Solos, en
verdad, somos nada; pero tomad la causa del
pueblo, unios al pueblo, no desorgais sus voces,
dad ejemplo a los dem?s, dad la idea de lo que
se llama una patria" (2:113). This dialogue bet?
ween Elias and Ibarra shows their different
approaches to nationalism, and these approaches
correspond to the different attitudes towards
Filipinism between Bonifacio and Rizal. Ibarra
does not like ever to see his country ruled by
an anarchistic mob. He wants the good of the
country and its progress, which he expects
from solid education. Elias counters that with?
out a fight there can be no freedom. But Ibarra
simply replies: "Es que yo no quiero esa
libertad." (2:113). Elias decides to join Pablo,
but before he can do so, he loses his life after
getting wounded at the end of the chase on the
lake, but by attracting attention to himself he
gives Ibarra the chance to get the banca ashore
while the government boat goes after Elias.
Someone might object that since Maria
Clara's pity was directed towards the leper, the
latter and not Elias is meant to be the symbol
of the rural masses of today. In reply, it must
be pointed out that Maria Clara gave the ex?
pensive reliquary to the leper out of that pity
which is motivated by religious piety. She
entertains that same feeling for the poor,
crazed Sisa. This pity erupts from her sudden
realization that the world, after all, is not filled
with happiness as it had seemed to her while
she trod on Cloud Nine upon the return of
Crisostomo from his wanderings in Europe.
Her remark shows why her feelings of joy
suddenly turn into sadness: "Tambien hay
gentes que no son felices! " (1:174). In brief,
the concern and pity of Maria Clara for the
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leper and for Sisa have no admixture of the
Eros instinct.
What needs symbolizing here is an ingrained
drive, an instinctive zeal, for helping the poor
barrio people, which only Elias can personify.
Rizal suggests an Eros-inspired sympathy, ex?
perienced by middle-class townsfolk, symbol?
ized by Maria Clara, for the rural masses and
non-Christian minorities, symbolized by Elias.
Let us recall how, during the fishing expedition,
Maria Clara surprises him more than once ob?
serving her, closely. He quickly turns his eyes in
another direction, gazing into the distance, to?
wards the mountain, to the shore (1:131). Maria
Clara's reaction to this is best described in
Rizal's own words: "Compadeciose la joven
de su soledad y cogiendo unas galletas se las
ofreci?. El piloto la mir? con cierta surpresa,
pero esta mirada solo dur? un segundo; torno
una galleta y di? las gracias brevemente y en
voz apenas perceptible" (1:132). At the mere
wish of Maria Clara to see a live crocodile,
Elias promptly dives to grab the crocodile
caught in the fish trap alive (1:136). He succeeds
and yet . . El piloto le izaba solo: nadie se
acordaba de ayudarle" (1:137) when he brings
the creature into the banca. And when in a last,
desperate heave, the crocodile manages to es?
cape from the banca, Elias goes after it and it is
only by Ibarra's efforts that he escapes from
getting maimed for life or even killed. Elias and
Ibarra bring the fatally wounded crocodile to
the banca, and there is joy all around among the
people in the banca. All except Maria, who re?
mains speechless, even though Ibarra luckily is
unhurt and Elias escapes with only a scratch on
his arm (1:137-138).
III. General Proof and Main Objection
A. General Proof
1. Catholicism's Influence on Filipino Culture
Today
The interpretative hypothesis outlined above
proposes that as Padre Damaso is inextricably
related to Maria Clara by the blood ties of real
fatherhood, so, too, is Catholicism, practiced in
terms of Spanish devotionality, inseparable
 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 13

from Filipino Culture today. The fact that
Catholicism remains the religion to which most
Filipinos are affiliated is not disputed by any?
one. That the Roman Catholic Church exerts
a deep influence on modern life in the Philip?
pines is most eloquently attested to by repre?
sentatives of Protestant denominations. Gowing,
for instance, when describing the revitalization
of the Catholic Church since World War II,
says: "The Roman Catholic Church in the
Philippines is responding to her many problems
with imagination and enthusiasm. Her priests
are being better educated and, in turn, in?
creasing numbers of her people are being better
instructed. She is learning to accept what she
cannot change, and at the same time, she is
discovering new ways to witness in a land and a
society greatly different from what it was when
Fr. Valderrama celebrated the First Mass in the
Archipelago on March 31, 1521 (Gowing
1967:184; cf. also 177-179; 181-184).
However, the question must be faced
courageously as to whether or not in the pas?
torate of the faithful, the successors of the
Padre Damasos of earlier centuries have been
followed by Padre Salvis of our times. In the
Epilogue, Rizal unmistakably hints that Padre
Salvi rapes Maria Clara within the cloistered
walls of the Poor Clares' convent in Intramuros
and, as a result, the poor mestiza girl becomes
so desperate as to go almost out of her mind
(2:182-186). Is the body of the Filipino
Catholic community being raped by Salvis, or
are there no longer any pastors of souls who
are cut of the same cloth as the Damasos and
Salvis of earlier eras? Rephrasing the question:
Does the commercialisation of Religion, of
which both Tasio (Chapter XXX; 1:186) and
Elias (Chapter XLIX; 2: 106-107) complain in
the Noli remain unabated to our own days, or
has it been reduced to minimal, exceptional and
individual aberrations? When pressed by the
tension between official statutes and practical
reality, one feels that the answer cannot be a
clear-cut "yes" or "no". Faith in the Philip
pines today is practiced on two levels. A small
core, drawn from the graduates of Catholic
institutions of higher learning, lives on a higher
level of sophisticated, theoretical religious
understanding and a correspondingly elaborate,
modernized practical piety. From this upper
level come the many vocations to the priest?
hood and the religious life, many of whom have
gone to foreign missions, where they are doing
very creditable missionary work.* Then there
is a lower level of religious instruction and a cor?
responding more popular form of piety, which
appears not so much as a venerable relic than
as the fossilized remains of Hispanic devotion
ality of former epochs. Gowing writes: "In the
shepherdless rural areas, and to some extent
even in the cities and towns, folk Catholicism,
deviant and dangerous, can still be seen. Linger
ing elements of pre-Christian animism and
spiritism are covered over by a superficial
veneer of Catholic belief and devotion" (1967:
183). These words perhaps refer to the bottom
fringes of this lower stratum of Catholic in?
struction and practice.
The interpretation just given, however, con?
cerns itself not only with the assertion that the
influence of Catholicism remains strong today
and that it is predominantly practiced in terms
of Spanish devotionality. These two points are
not disputed at all. The more significant ele?
ment implicit in our hypothesis is its insistence
that this influence of Catholicism is intimately
interwined with westernized education and
democratic freedom as well as with the solici?
tude for helping the rural masses and non
Christian minorities (Montemayor 1965:214
220). Gowing gives due recognition to the
educational, social, and especially the mis?
sionary concern of the Catholic Church in the
Philippines (1967:178-179). Similarly, Steven?
son strongly recommends the actualization of
the promise of the potent force latent in the
blending of Christianity and Western culture,
as found among the Filipinos, for the uplift of
the common people as well as for the Christian

* Jaime Bulatao, S.J. gives a good description of such an upper level Catholicism, which he proposes
for more energetic and enlightened implementation in his article entitled "A Social-Psychological View of
the Philippine Church," see Appendix I in Jose Vicente Braganza, SVD, The Encounter (Cebu City: San
Carlos Publications, 1965), pp. 201-213.

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14 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY

ization of Southeast Asia in partnership with

school system presents Philippine history as a
Western Christian bodies (1956:43-45). What continuous struggle of our people for freedom.
all this adds up to is the need of in-depth Fourthly, by teaching love of our own things,
studies of present-day trends along these lines
the public school destroys the people's "in?
of thought. When reliable researches on these feriority complex," which breeds mental and
topics are available, one can then acquire added
moral slavery. The public school fosters love
support for the contention that Rizal is rele?of our own culture and pride in our own way of
vant to the Filipino citizen of today, according
life. This training of the Filipinos to cultivate
to the understanding of him and of the Noli national self-expression is one of the bases of
proposed in this interpretation; namely, that national freedom. The public school gives this
Catholicism as typified by Padre Damaso can? training and is helping the cause of liberty and
not be divorced from the present-day Filipino democracy in the Philippines (Bocobo 1941:71
culture as symbolized by Maria Clara. -72).
That this progress in the democratic ways of
free life through education is necessarily
2. Westernized Philippine Education for Democ?
dependent on westernization is to some degree
ratic Freedom
explained by the earlier need of Spanish and
This hypothesis proposes Ibarra as the the later convenience of English, due to their
embodiment of our present culture's commit? status as world languages. The more influential
ment to a westernized, yet for that matter
world languages are needed by developing
fully Filipino, educational system, whichnations
is in our times, and we Filipinos have the
geared to securing democratic freedom andgood luck of being a long way along the road
genuine progress for Rizal's countrymen. This to the mastery of English, which we should
is but the adjusted restatement of the ideology achieve more fully, if we wish our nation to
of hispanization with which Rizal approached take a place of dignity in the family of nations.
the question of education, progress and democ? This is hinted at by Yabes, even when he {s
ratic freedom. The words of Osias are pertinentspeaking of English as the medium of literary
here: . . we may say that the general aim ofexpression in our times! "When at the turn of
education is to secure for the individual, for the
the last century the Philippines passed from
Spanish to American sovereignty, it became
nation and for humanity the highest and fullest
measure of efficiency, freedom and happiness. inevitable that English would gradually super?
Among the specific objectives are those enjoinedsede Spanish, not only as the language of
by the Constitution of the Philippines, namely,Government, education and commerce, but as
moral character, personal discipline, civic the dominant literary language of the country
conscience, vocational efficiency, and good .... Notwithstanding the benefits which the
citizenship. The educational work in a prog?Spanish language has brought to the Filipinos
ressive democratic state is to train boys and(and there are many) English has united the
girls to become citizens, efficient, free and Philippines/has taught them the principles and
happy" (1941:66). Bocobo outlines what the
practices of democracy, and has drawn the
public schools were doing to foster democratic PhiHppines closer to other countries of the
freedom just before World War II reached the world, more than Spanish was able to do so,
Philippines. In the first place, he sees the publicbecause Spanish never became a popular lan?
school giving equal opportunity for education guage of the people, had no democratic heri?
to the rich and poor alike, thereby helping tage, and is not as widespread a world language
achieve democracy's highest aim, namely, the asEnglish"(1941:186).
destruction of caste and privilege. Secondly, It is of vital importance that we do not
the public school system reaches millions of ignore but face up to the inevitable question:
Filipino children, thus widening the baseCan
on we Filipinos of today supplant English
which active citizenship rests. Thirdly, the
with one of our native languages without

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 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 15
gravely endangering the achievements of our
westernized culture of today? Rizal, for one,
looked towards hispanization as the source of
progress for our people in his time. He saw the
importance of a world language for an enlight?
ened educational program, through which he
hoped that his native land would one day be
able to take its stand with pride within the
family of nations in the world. The No Zi could
not have exerted the influence it did,had it been
written in Tagalog. That Rizal wrote it in
Spanish is witness to his relevance today. We
see our nation geared for Western-style in?
dustrialization, and thus English has become
an indispensable instrument for our progress,
if we are to alleviate the poverty of our people.
In addition, Filipinos have made their mark in
world literary circles only because they have
had a long tradition in the widespread use of
Spanish and, more deeply, of English. Rizal, at
least, was no chauvinist. It appears, then, that
in order to become relevant, Filipino jingoism
must first banish Rizal from the Filipino
national consciousness, to the peril of our
hard-earned democratic freedom and our in?
creasingly recognized educational progress.
3. Our Present Concern for the Rural Poor and
our Non-Christian Minorities
This interpretation has proposed that Elias
be seen as the symbol of the last constitutive
note of our Filipino culture of today, namely,
the concern of the middle class for our rural
masses and our non-Christian minorities. The
most concrete proof for such a concern may
be found in the touching life story of former
President Macapagal. Gagelonia briefly sketches
these striking facts: "Diosdado's family belongs
to one of the poorest and most wretched
families in Pampanga .. . .T remember when I
was a boy,' he said, T used to play by myself
along the rugged road of our barrio, wearing
torn and shabby clothes. I did not even dare to
approach the fences of the tall and big houses.'
. . . Dadong used to go to school barefooted at
the Lubao Elementary School. He graduated as
valedictorian in 1925. Dadong almost failed to
attend the graduation exercises because he had
nothing to wear. He had no shoes nor a white
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shirt and pants to put on. Luckily, a kind
neighbor, Don Valentin Arrastia, bought him
a pair of canvas rubber shoes and a new white
shirt and pants . . . Dadong was forced to quit
school a second time. This time it was due to
financial difficulties. Luckily, a Pampango
philanthropist, Honorio Ventura, offered to
help the poor but talented boy from Lubao . . .
Dadong's first try at politics was a big success
when he won a seat in Congress in 1949. Again
he won in 1953. In 1957, he became Vice
President of the Philippines. Four years later,
Dadong became President" (1957:87-89). We
do have many modern Don Rafael Ibarras, but
most of them are unknown and unsung; but
they should not remain unhonored.
The social work of the Churches and various
charitable organizations is too well known to be
re-chronicled here. Various Christian deno?
minations and an invigorated Catholicism have
been busy helping our rural poor and our non
Christian minorities, offering them oppor?
tunities of solid education and of expressing
themselves with respect to their inborn need of
religious experience.
B. Main Objection
The greatest objection to this new inter?
pretation of the Noli and of Rizal is directed
against its presupposition that our Filipino
culture of today is a well-knit and strongly
welded blending of East and West. What comes
to mind at once is Kipling's famous line: "East
is East and West is West, and never the twain
shall meet." The only way to answer this ob?
jection is to determine the conditions for the
possibility of such a mating of Eastern and
Western cultures, and to establish the fact that
such conditions are fulfilled within the context
of our present Filipino culture. This may appear
a herculean task and obviously beyond the
scope of this introductory paper. Even so it
might be of interest to mention some of the
questions which must be asked in the attempt
to find the needed answer to the main ob?
jection. Which characteristics are essential and
which are non-essential in such a "mestizo"
culture, symbolized by the racially mixed-bred
Maria Clara? Can cultural miscegenation bring
16 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY

about a distinct improvement of an inferior tains its lustre in our times, but with the added
culture? Is not such a mixture, on principle, significance that he is now the ever-present
of dubious quality, since it entails the mongre guide of that same consciousness. This is the
lization of the superior culture? case, if the interpretation presented in this
It must be noted that questions such as thesepaper is a valid one. Let me now recapitulate
are heavily loaded on the side of the supposed? the main points of this new approach to Rizal
ly superior culture. Unless valid criteria are and the Noli.
established for designating which culture is Maria Clara of tne Noli is the primal and
superior and which is inferior, the discussion the originary symbol of the Filipino culture of
will go nowhere, seeing that bias is as abundanttoday. The symbolism of the three men who
in the East as it is in the West. In suchenter a into her Eros-life to a greater or lesser
situation, therefore, it will be best to describe
degree, and Maria Clara's response in each case
the characteristics of the blending and inter? is presented as secondary symbols, to underline
weaving cultures, and there will be time and the blending of the East and the West already
leisure enough to adjudge whether this or that typified by Maria Clara's racially mixed blood?
trait is superior or inferior in the resulting stream. Padre Damaso, her real father, typifies
combination. One may facetiously insist that Rizal's implicit hope of the Philippines remain?
such a mixture of different cultural strains caning Catholic, after the abuses wreaked on the
only produce the equivalent of the mule in the people at the hands of degenerate individuals,
zoological kingdom. It can be retorted just wielding
as spiritual power backed by secular
lightly that this mulish culture will surelypower,
be have been reformed, although they may
useful, although in all probability it willnot be have disappeared completely. Rizal professes
sterile, incapable of both improvement and his loyalty to the Catholic Religion, which he
degeneration. But in the interest of a pre hopes will continue to influence the dawning
suppositionless research, it is prematureera to of his beloved native land, and he does this
reject from the outset a mestizo culture and in Ibarra's words: ". .. soy cat?lico, conservo
too dogmatic to predict a resulting mestizo pura la fe de mis padres y no veo por que habia
bangus phenomenon. For it is just as probable de bajar la cabeza cuando la puedo levantar,
entregarla a mis enemigos cuando los puedo
that in the wear and tear of contrary tendencies
a harmonious blending of opposites will result,hollar? "(1:158).
enhancing the good qualities while the badIbarra typifies Rizal's faith in hispanization,
qualities will be found to the regressive. If this
which became reality in different but equivalent
is the picture which will come out of the des? terms of democratic freedom and progress,
achieved through education in the broadened
cription of what is actually seen in the blending
of East and West, then this new interpretation ideology of westernization. "Arno a mi patria,
will have a fighting chance to survive all its ? Filipinas, porque ? ellas le debo mi vida y
opponents playing in the arena of the Noli. mi felicidad, y porque todo hombre debe amar
This is because Maria Clara, as this inter? ? su patria .. ." (1:158). Tasio compares Ibarra
pretation contends, manifests herself as unitingto the gigantic "kupang" tree, which he had
in her personality, both in her stock and in hertransplanted as a weak sapling from the woods
character, the best traits of the indio and the to his garden. Its roots succeeded in taking
peninsular, and thus reveals herself as the truehold of the soil, which it could not have
Filipina of today. done and would have been downed by the
strong winds, had it been transplanted as a
IV. Recapitulation and Conclusion grownnip tree, unable to take proper root.
All along what I have been saying or "Asi terminaria V., planta transplantada de
Europa ? este suelo pedregoso, si no busca
trying to say is this: Jose Rizal, as the first
awakener of our national consciousness, had apoyo y se empequenese" (1:159). The ilus
this relevance for his times. This relevance trado
re Rizal in the person of Ibarra lets his his

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 Terrenal / MARIA CLARA 17
panization, conceived as the proper method to
get the Philippines to move forward, be praised
by the Capitan General: ". . . hoy he visto por
primera vez como se puede ser buen espanol
sin dejar de ser bueno f?ipino y amar a su
pais ..." (2:43).
Finally, there is Elias who embodies the best
of the silent masses, the poor indio in dire need
of a champion and a spokesman. Sunk in des?
perate poverty and, because of the limitations
of the human situation, unable to enjoy the
solid benefits which the existing educational
system is ready to bestow on them, the rural
masses need again the passionate words of
Jose Rizal, who fought for the reformation of
ecclesiastical and secular leadership. How he
longed to give his countrymen the blessings of
democratic freedom and of solid education for
progress in culture, while enjoying the human?
izing influence of the Religion of Jesus. His
words are as eloquent today as they were then:
". .. mi mayor deseo es la felicidad de mi pais,
felicidad que se debiese ? la Madre Patria y al
esfuerzo de mis conciudadanos, unidos una y
otros con eternos lazos de comunes miras y
comunes intereses" (2:42). When the Capitan
General speaks of Ibarra as the first man
who talked to him as a man, the latter explains:
"V. E. solo ha visto a los que se arratran en la
ciudad, no ha visitado las cahimniadas cabanas
de nuestros pueblos:;V. E. habria podido ver
verdaderos hombres si para ser hombre basta
tener un generoso corazon y costumbres sen
cillas" (2:42). All this must have been pon?
dered well by Rizal, and he is vocal about
his expectations that his countrymen receive
his message in the words of Filosofo Tasio:
". . . no escribo para esta generation, escribo
para otras edades" (1:152).
By means of this interpretation, one can
grasp in understanding our ability to go on call?
ing Rizal our foremost hero and "The Pride of
the Malay Race." It is because Rizal's relevance
is just as great today as, or even greater than,
his relevance to his contemporaries and to the
era immediately following his untimely exe?
cution. This interpretation, which is presented
for the purpose of initiating a dialogue about
our Filipino culture of today, is grounded in
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the presupposition that our nation's literary
heritage needs a valid interpretation in every
epoch of our history. Our national history
searches for interpreters, who can be given the
sacred duty of searching and discovering that
valid horizon of meaning proper to their age
and which fits completely into the over?
arching horizon of meaning, which any text of
its literary heritage possesses. When, for instance,
the seekers arising in every age have discovered
the genuine meaning of the Noli "presencing"
itself from the interplay of proposed inter?
pretations, each of them sees that overarching
horizon of its meaning, from the time the Noli
originally appeared up to their respective age.
Each, in his turn, hands down his insights to the
succeeding generation, thereby insuring the
continuity of our Filipino culture, which Rizal
initiated by awakening the Filipino national
consciousness through the Noli. Those inter?
pretations of the Noli which lack genuineness
will fall by the wayside of history; the valid
ones form an encompassing horizon of meaning
which ensures the unbroken historical con?
tinuity of our nationhood. New approaches to
the Noli are always needed to help illumine
Rizal's relevance to his countrymen in every
age. To me, at least, and I hope to my con?
temporaries, Rizal lives still as a bright beacon
illuminating our Filipino national conscious?
ness, by our understanding his message to our
generation. This message has been "laid out"
for our grasp in the "presencing" of the mean?
ing hidden under the disguise of Maria Clara
and the three men in her Eros-life, thanks to
the gift of the Muses, which is that Homeric,
romantic novel of Philippine History, the in?
credibly inspiring Noli Me Tangere.
REFERENCES
Bocobo, Jorge C.
1941 "The Public School and Democracy," FiU
piniana Reference Shelf 1:71-72.
1956 "Rizal's Writings and Example," In Jose
Rizal, pp. 43-49, edited by Sixto Y. Orosa.
Manila: Manor Press.
18 PHILIPPINE QUARTERLY OF CULTURE AND SOCIETY

Bulatao, Jaime, S.J. Retana, Wenceslao E.

1965 "A Social-Psychological View of the Philip? 1961 "Rizal-An Appraisal," Prologue to the El
pine Church." Appendix I in Jose Vicente F?ibusterismo.InRizaJ, pp. 122-154. Manila:
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Cebu City: San Carlos Publications. Rizal, Jose
Carrion, Carmita Legarda 1905 "A Los Filipinos." Revista Hist?rica de
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Constantino, Ren at o Manila: Comision National del Centenario
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23. Manila: National Historical Commission,
Department of Education, Republic of the 1960 The Women Characters in Rizal's Novels.
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1961 "The Philippine a Century Hence." In Rizal, 1956 Christianity in the Philippines. Kentucky:
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Daroy, Petronilo B.
1966 The Ideas of European Liberalism in the
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1941 "Trends in Education," Filipiniana Reference
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