LESSON 9.

1
• Education is part of the historical context that molded Rizal’s nationalism as
well as that of other Filipinos.
• Like any Filipino family education started at home and the mother was
usually the first teacher.
• When Jose Rizal reach Nine (9) he was sent to the school of Maestro
Justiniano Aquino Cruz in Biñan, Laguna. At that time anybody with a
Bachiller en Artes with the approval of the town curate may teach the
equivalent of elementary as long as he passed the examinations given by the
Spanish Authorities. It would be better if the teacher had completed the
course of professor and the course of Segunda Enseñanza.
• In 1865, Queen Isabella II appointed the rector of the
University of Santo Tomas as the supervisor of all
secondary and higher education in the Philippines.
✓ The university holds the entrance and final examinations of all
those who wish to enter secondary and higher education and
those who have completed their courses.
✓The university issued the diplomas of the graduates regardless
where they have taken the courses.
• On May 14, 1872, Don Antonio Estrada, the Secretary
General of the University of Santo Tomas issued an
announcement for the holding of entrance
examination for those who would like to take the
Bachiller in Artes course.
• Rizal was given a choice of enrolling at either the
Jesuit-run Ateneo Municipal de Manila or the
Dominican San Juan de Letran College.
• Rizal studied at the Ateneo for the next five years (1872-1877).
• Rizal classmates in Ateneo were a mixture of Spaniards, mestizos and
natives.
• Rizal wrote down his experiences in the Ateneo in an authobiography
entitled “Memorias de Un Estudiante de Manila” under the
pseudonym P. Jacinto.
• As Educators, the Jesuits professors practice emphasis on strict
discipline, character building and religious instruction.
• At that time, Rizal was a budding poet and playwright.
• The Ateneo also encouraged competition for
academic excellence and they drew from ancient
Roman history by dividing the class into Romans and
Carthaginians.
• Rizal ended his studies in Ateneo as an excellent
student but he was not alone because most of his
classmates were given the same excellent grade or
sobresaliente.
• Educational Institutions under the Church in Spain were secularized but
not the ones in the Philippines.
• The new Spanish government shrewdly recognized the role of the
Spanish religious especially the friars in keeping the status qou (i.e.
Spanish Domination) in the Philippines and allowed the religious
institutions to continue administering the educational institutions.
• When Cavite Mutiny broke out on January 17, 1872 it was portrayed by
Governor General Izquierdo and the Spanish community as part of larger
conspiracy to overthrow colonial rule in the Islands.
• Despite the failure of secularization, some attempts at getting the
Philippines into the modern world were successful. In 1871, the new
college of the Faculty of Pharmacy and Medicine was established in
the University of Santo Tomas. Jose Rizal would later enroll under this
faculty.
• Rizal was still unsure on what to take up in college so the safest course
to take was Philosophy and Letters course which were preparatory
courses to the priesthood and the study of law. When he made up his
mind, he shifted to medicine upon the advice of his former professors
at the Ateneo.
• Why did Rizal choose medicine over law?
✓ At that time, the Philippines was receiving officials from Madrid and
some positions were still reserved for Spaniards.
✓A Filipino with a law degree can aspire and set up a law office.
✓A Filipino can practice Law, but he may come into conflict whenever a
high Spaniards official or a friar gets involved.
• Rizal was an above average student in the University.
• His classmates were a mixture of Spaniards who were either peninsular
Spaniards or Insular Spaniards (Filipinos), and the rest were natives
including the mestizos.
• The culture of the University was different from Ateneo. Classes were held
in the morning, and it was free time in the afternoon.
• Rizal’s years in UST was a tie when he was seeing three women at the same
time. These were Leonor Valenzuela, Leonor Rivera and Vicenta Ybardaloza
whose courtships with Rizal overlapped each other between 1879 and 1882.
• The student culture at the University was very different from that
of Ateneo. Unlike Ateneo where the day starts with a holy mass in
the morning, a student in UST is not required to attend mass.
• In UST, Jose Rizal was able to write his prize-winning and
nationalist poem “A La Juventud Filipina” in which he said that the
youth is the beautiful hope of the motherland. Rizal also wrote an
allegorical drama entitled “Consejo de los Dioses” in honor of
Cervantes, he wrote that the Spanish poet was as good as the
giants of the classics like Homer and Horace.
• Even as it was the only university in the Philippines at that time and
under control of the Dominicans who were portrayed as conservative,
the university was actually a haven of diversity. It had Spaniards,
Insulars and Peninsulars and some mestizos as professors.
• There were both laymen and clergymen as educators.
• In 19th century was a period of change, major changes took place in
the educational system. Schools offering Bachiller En Artes were
established in the provinces such as the School of Fr. Valeriano
Malabanan in Batangas. These schools however were still subject to
the supervision of the University of Santo Tomas.
• Life as a UST student had its great privileges. To be a student of the University means he
was the cream of society.
• A student was exempt from polos y servicios and from taxes like the samboangan or the tax
used to pay for the maintenance of the forts and military installations.
• Students walked around wearing coats and walking sticks.
• Yet Rizal, like many of his contemporaries decided to continue and complete their
education abroad. Even at that time foreign education is very much esteemed. Juan Luna
managed to study abroad through scholarship.
• Rizal was supported by the income from his family’s farms.
• Going therefore to Europe to finish their studies was more of the choice of these Filipino
elites as they were able to afford the expenses.
LESSON 9.2
• Doña Teodora, Jose Rizal’s mother
was his first teacher. Her patience
consciousness and understanding
made Jose Rizal to learn the
alphabet and recite prayers at the
age of three.
• She discovered Jose Rizal’s talent in
poetry and further develop.
• She encouraged him to write
verses. Later on, Rizal’s mother
realized that Rizal already needed a
private tutor who shall teach him at
home.
• Rizal first private tutor was Maestro
Celestino.
• The second private Tutor of Rizal was
Maestro Lucas Padua.
• The third private tutor of Rizal was Leon
Monroy, a former classmates of his father.
He taught Rizal reading, writing, Latin and
Spanish. Unfortunately he died after five (5)
months. After the death of Monroy; Rizal’s
Parents decided to send Jose Rizal to a
private school in BiÑ an.
• Paciano brought him to the school house of his teacher
Maestro Justiniano Aquino Cruz. He was also a teacher of
Paciano before.
• Maestro Justiniano Aquino Cruz is described as tall, thin, long-
necked with sharp nose and body slightly bend forward.
• A strict teacher and his teaching is accomplished by a stick.
• There is no single day, Jose Rizal received a blow from his
teacher he is the brightest in the class.
• Rizal hated the method of his teaching but he considered his
teacher as an expert in Latin and Spanish grammar.
• Jose Rizal also took up lessons in painting and drawing under
old Juancho, the Maestro’s Father-in law.
• The system of education given by the Jesuits in the Ateneo was more
advanced than that of other colleges in that period.
• Students were divided into two groups, namely:
✓The “Roman Empire” consisting of the internos (borders); and the “Carthaginian
Empire” composed of the externos (non-borders).
✓Each of these empires had its ranks.
✓The best student in each empire was the emperor; second best was the tribune; the
third best was the decurion; the fourth best was the centurion; and the fifth best
was the standard-bearer.
✓The two groups, “Roman Empire and Carthaginian Empire” were in constant
competition for supremacy in the class. Red for the Romans and Blue for
Carthaginians.
• During his first days in Ateneo de Manila,
Jose Rizal was dressed like the other boys,
wearing coat and tie.
• He frequently visited the chapel of the Jesuit
Fathers to hear Mass and say his prayers.
• For the first time he saw a great number of
boys dominated by Spaniards, Mestizos and
Filipinos. He also met his Jesuit Professor
Father Jose Bech.
• The Jesuit Educational System during that time used a unique motivation
and stimulation to attain learning from students.
• The class was divided into two groups;
✓ The Roman Emperor and the Carthaginians was the supremacy of the class.
• The student who manifested exceptional talent became the Emperor of the
Class.
• Rizal first professor in Ateneo de Manila was Father Jose Bech.
• In Just one month studying in Ateneo de Manila Jose Rizal became the
Emperor of the Class.
• On his second year in Ateneo, while his mother was still in Jail, he
envisioned in his dream that he would be released in three
months, which on coincidence happened.
• Despite the emotional hurt, which Rizal was able to take home at
the end of the year, a medal and maintained his excellence in
class.
• Rizal’s mother was finally released from jail by the Supreme
Court Order and was happily reunited with her family and
favorite son Jose Rizal.
• At the end of the School year, Rizal received again a medal in
Latin and maintained his excellence in Class.
• Rizal’s most fruitful year was his fourth year of Schooling. He became
Interno of Ateneo, meaning he stay inside the School campus which
enable him to concentrate more on his studies. He met also a
professor who inspired him to study harder and write poetry, his name
was Father Francisco Paula Sanchez, a great educator and scholar.
• Father Francisco Paula Sanchez he was the favorite professor of Rizal.
At the end of the year he brought home five medals and excellent
ratings.
• The last year of Jose Rizal in Ateneo was a mixture of
happiness and sadness. Happiness because he received the
highest honor in their graduation and sadness because he
will be leaving a school which he dearly loved.
• Recuerdo a Mi Pueblo (Memories of my town).
• In this poem, Rizal expressed his appreciation and love for
Calamba, his hometown and birthplace.
• He wrote this peace at the age of 15 in the year 1876.
• Rizal mentioned the lagoons, flowers, forest, rivers and
freshness of the wind in Calamba.
• Rizal composed this poem in 1876, when he was 16. He was
already advocating that education was important in the
country.
• Rizal compared education in the goodness of light, wisdom,
hope, peace and truth.
This was another poem of young Rizal’s manifestation
of his love for history and he wrote this poem on
December 3, 1876.
• Rizal wrote this poem in April of 1876 in this piece he expressed his belief
that in attaining excellent education, a student must give importance to
religion by following Goods teachings, in order to attain the totality of
man.
• Rizal once said in this poem:
“Without religion man’s Education
Is like a ship struck by the wind”.
 1872 - 1873 1874 - 1875
LATIN 1 Excellent LATIN 3 Excellent
SPANISH 1 Excellent SPANISH 3 Excellent 1875 - 1876

GREEK 1 Excellent UNIVERSAL Excellent RHETORIC & Excellent

HISTORY POETRY
1873 - 1874 FRENCH Excellent
HISTORY OF Excellent
SPANISH 2 Excellent SPAIN & THE GEOMETRY & Excellent
GREEK 2 Excellent PHILIPPINES TRIGONOMETRY
UNIVERSAL Excellent ARITHMETIC & Excellent
GEOGRAPHY ALGEBRA
• 1876-1877
• Philosophy 1 ------------------------------ Excellent
 1876 - 1877
PHILOSOPHY 1 Excellent
PHILOSOPHY 2 Excellent
MINERALOGY & Excellent
CHEMISTRY
PHYSICS Excellent
BOTANY & Excellent
ZOOLOGY
• Rizal met his first love when he visited
his maternal grand mother in Trozo,
Manila.
• She was Segunda Katigbak, who was
studying La Concordia College.
• She was a class friend of his sister
Olimpia.
• His first love was a failure because
Segunda is already engaged to be
married.
Rizal Entered UST • After Rizal’s graduation from the Ateneo de
Manila.
• His father Don Francisco, know fully well
that his son Jose Rizal was gifted with the
exceptional intelligence. He decided to send
Rizal to UST for a Higher Education in
Manila.
• Doña Teodora was hesitant because she
had viewed the fate of Jose Rizal as an
intelligent young Filipinos who questioned
the Spanish authorities in the Philippines.
• Doña Teodora was vocal in her opposition to the
decision of Don Francisco. However, the father
of Rizal was convinced of the great future that
awaited his son whose intelligence was among
the best at the time.
• Jose Rizal returned to Manila and enrolled at the University of Santo Tomas, taking
the course of Philosophy and Letters, though that time, Rizal was still confused of
what course to study.
• His freshmen subjects were Cosmology, Metaphysics, Theodicy and History of
Philosophy.
• In the year 1878, Rizal consulted Reverend Father Pablo Ramon, the Director of
Ateneo de Manila, as to what course to take.
• Father Ramon Pablo advised Rizal to take up Medicine, therefore he enrolled in
the Medical Course, with the Hope that he could relieve Doña Teodora’s failing
eye- sight after he finished the course in Ophthalmology.
• While enrolled in Medicine, Jose Rizal spared some time to study Surveying.
He was so interested in the course, that he finished it in one year at the
Ateneo de Manila.
• Jose Rizal excelled in surveying and won medals in subjects covering
Topography and Agriculture.
• In the year, 1878, Jose Rizal passed the final examination of the course at
the age of 17. Unfortunately, he was deprived of the title due to his minor
age.
• On October 28, 1881 with the help of Don Eustaquio Villablanca de
Mendoza, after Jose Rizal presented his credentials in Ateneo, he was
awarded the title of Surveyor and Expert Assessor on September 30, 1881.
• Rizal was accustomed to going home during vacation in Calamba to join
his family and spending time with them after a long arduous study as a
Medical Student at UST.
• One night in 1878, while he was walking alone along a dark street, Jose
Rizal failed to recognized the Spanish Civil Guard who was passing by his
side, thus he did not bow, salute or greet the soldier.
• At a striking distance, the Civil Guard (Guardia Civil) whipped Rizal
mercilessly at the back with a dry stingray tail (buntot ng pagi).
• Jose Rizal suffered from the wounds inflicted on his back that lasted for
two weeks before it completely healed.
• Jose Rizal could not accept such brutal treatment inflicted by the
Civil Guard.
• Jose Rizal went to Captain General Primo de Rivera and file a
complaint, the Captain General even reprimanded him, said that
Jose Rizal should be even thankful for being alive, and spared by
the Guardia Civil.
• Jose Rizal manifested his literary genius while at UST.
• In the year 1879, the Artistic and Literary Lyceum, a society whose members were
composed of artists in literature, sponsored a contest in poetry writing and
composition.
• Jose Rizal joined the contest and wrote a poem entitled: A La Juventud Filipina (To
the Filipino Youth).
• As his entry to this competition. After the expert reading and scrutiny of the Board
of Judges, the entries coming from Spanish, Mestizo and Filipino students, who
submitted their respective pieces to the competition, Rizal’s poem was judged as
Superior and won him the first prize and recognition in University of Santo Tomas,
and from his hometown in Calamba.
• The Artistic & Literary Lyceum society sponsored another artistic
competition in honor of the 264th death anniversary of “Spain’s most
glorified man-of-letter” Don Miguel de Cervantes, the author of the
book, “Don Quixote” a celebrate work produced by a Spanish write.
• In this competition, many writers participated and submitted their
pieces with respective assumed names such as journals, priest, scholars
and professor.
• Jose Rizal, on his part submitted an allegorical drama entitled “El
Consejo de los Dioses” (The Council of the Gods).
• After a critical scrutiny and appraisal by an entirely Spanish Board of
Judges, they awarded the first prize to Jose Rizal’s literary work, due to
its superiority and quality.
• Unfortunately, Rizal was temporarily stripped of the award due to his
identity as an Indio (Native Filipino).
• Despite all objections from the Spaniards in Manila, the board of judges
insisted that the work of Jose Rizal deserved the first place.
• Thus, Jose Rizal was awarded a Gold Ring, where the bust Cervantes
was engraved.
A Spanish writer took the second place.
• The board of Spanish judges was clear in their description of the winning
piece of Rizal and they declared:

“The idea and the plot of the work are of great originality to which
Should be added the circumstances that throughout the same shine
To the outmost a correct style, an admirable richness of details, delicacy of
thought and figures, and lastly a taste of Hellenic that the reader imagines
himself relishing some delicious passage of Homer which with such frequency
the Olympic sessions described to us in their works”.
• While, Jose Rizal was considered a Thomasian, he also considered
an active connection in Ateneo.
• Jose Rizal was the President of the Academy of Spanish
Literature, Secretary of Academy of Natural Sciences and
Member of the Marian Congregation.
• Rizal also composed literary works while an active alumnus of
Ateneo de Manila and a medical student at UST. He wrote the
following artistic pieces.
• These are:
❖Junto al Pasig (Beside the Pasig) – This is a drama staged at the Ateneo
by members of the academy of Spanish Literature.
▪ It is one of Jose Rizal play that came in Zarzuela from which was staged
in Ateneo de Manila on the 8th of December 1880, in celebration of
the yearly feast day of the Immaculate Conception.
❖A Filipinas (To the Philippines) – A sonnet that Jose Rizal dedicated to the
Society of Sculptures in 1880.
❖ Abd-el Azis y Mohamad (ABD-EL-AZIS a Mohammed) – This poem was
claimed by Manuel Fernandez, an Ateneo student whose piece recalls the
struggle between the Spanish people and the Moors in Spain.
❖ Al M.R.P.: Pablo Ramon, Rector del Ateneo en sus Dias,
(Birthday Greetings to the Very Reverend Father Pablo
Ramona, S.J.).
▪ Jose Rizal gave honor to the kind priest who raised his
spirit and intelligence.
▪ Rizal wrote this poem on January 25, 1881.
• Rizal was unhappy in UST so he
decided to continue his studies
abroad.
• The Dominican Professors were
hostile to him.
• This is racial discrimination of the
Filipino Students.
• Jose Rizal dislike the old and
repressive method of teaching in
UST.
• Rizal was the leader of the Filipino Students UST against the
arrogant Spanish Students.
• They were called “Indio Chongo” in return the Filipino students
called them “Kastila, Bangus” Hostility between the two groups
often exploded in angry street rumbles.
• Jose Rizal often participated in these student brawls. One of his
fights he was wounded on the head. His wound was tenderly
washed and dressed by Leonor Rivera his cousin and true love.
All letters sent by Rizal to Leonor Rivera were
hidden by her mother, making Leonor believe
that Rizal has forgotten her, sadly consented
her to marry the Englishman Henry Kipping,
her mother’s choice.
Sources
• De Viana, Agusto (2019). Laon- Laan, A guide for study and
understanding of the life and contributions of Jose Rizal to Philippine
nationhood and society. Books Atbp. Publishing Corp.
• Zaide & Zaide (2011). Rizal: Life, Works and Writings of a Genius,
Writer, Scientist and National Hero. 2nd Ed. All nations Publishing Co.,
Inc. Cubao, Quezon City, Philippines .
• J.A Lopez & A.E Paras.,(2010). Rizal Life Works and Writings of the
Greatest Malayan 3rd Edition. HisGoPhil Publishing House, Inc