Rizal’s Ancestry

Rizal’s Family tree

Francisco Mercado Rizal
 Born in Biñan, Laguna on May 11, 1818
 Studied Latin and Philosophy in the
College of San Jose
 After his parent’s death, he moved to
Calamba and became tenant-farmer of
Dominican-owned hacienda
 Hardy and independent minded, talked
less and worked more, strong in body and
spirit
 Died: Jan. 05, 1898
Jose Rizal called him “A Model of Fathers”

Teodora Alonso
- Born in Manila on November 08, 1926
- Studied in College of Sta. Rosa
- Possessed refine culture, literary talented,
business ability and fortitude, spoke Spanish,
Social class and family business
Mathematician, had read many books
- Died in Manila, August 16, 1911

José Protacio Rizal Mercado Y Alonso Realonda

Birth and Youth
 In Calamba, Laguna
 19 June 1861 – birth
 22 June 1861 – baptized
 Fr. Rufino Collantes - priest
 Fr. Pedro Casanas – Godfather
 1864 - learned the alphabet from his
mother
 - began to take part in family prayers.
 Rizal has Aya (nursemaid), which tells
stories about fairytales every night.
 awakens Rizal’s interest in
folklores and legends.
 1865 - his sister Concepcion (8th child)
died at the age of three while
Rizal was four years old.
 At the age of 5, he learned how to make
sketches with his pencil, mold clay, and
wax objects.
 The scenic beauty of Calamba and the
beautiful garden at Rizal’s house
stimulated his inborn talent.
 1865 – 1867 - his mother taught him how
to read and write
 1869 – “Sa Aking Mga Kababata”
 Uncle Jose – inspired him to develop
his artistic ability
 Uncle Manuel Alberto – encouraged
him to do exercises that helps develop
his body.
 Uncle Gregorio - instilled love for
education.
“The Story of Moth”
 Gave him the moral lesson that if one
must succeed, he must take risks and
prepare for the worst consequences.
Republic Act No. 1425
 An Act to Include in the Curricula of All
Public and Private Schools, Colleges and
Universities courses on the Life Works and
Writings of JOSE RIZAL, particularly his
novels NOLI ME TANGERE and EL
FILIBUSTERISMO, Authorizing the Printing
and Distribution Thereof, and for Other
Purposes.
 Whereas, today, more than other period
of our history, there is a need for a re-
dedication to the ideals of freedom and
nationalism for which our heroes lived
and died.
 Whereas, it is meet that in honoring them,
particularly the national hero and patriot,
Jose Rizal, we remember with special
fondness and devotion their lives and
works that have shaped the national
character;
 Whereas, the life, works and writings of
Jose Rizal particularly his novels Noli Me
Tangere and El Filibusterismo, are a
constant and inspiring source of
patriotism with which the minds of the
youth, especially during their formative
and decisive years in school, should be
suffused.
 Whereas, all educational institutions are
under the supervision of, and subject to
regulation by the State, and all schools are
enjoined to develop moral character,
personal discipline, civic conscience, and
to teach the duties of citizenship; Now
therefore,
 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of
Representatives of the Philippines in
Congress assembled
Controversy and Debate
 “Church spokesmen argued that Catholics
could read selected passages from Rizal’s
work, but to compel Catholics to read
Rizal’s novels in its unexpurgated or
uncensored version was to force heresy
on them and violate their freedom of
conscience.” (Ocampo, 2007)
 “In the campaign to oppose the Rizal bill,
the Catholic Church urged its adherents to
write to their congressmen and senators
showing their opposition to the bill; later,
it organized symposiums.
 In one of these symposiums, Fr. Jesus
Cavanna argued that the novels belonged
to the past and that teaching them would
misrepresent current conditions. Radio
commentator Jesus Paredes also said that
Catholics had the right to refuse to read
them as it would "endanger their
salvation” (Abinales, 2005)
 “Recto did not want an adulterated
reading of the novels, he did not want a
watered-down bill and declared. The
people who would eliminate the books of
Rizal from the schools would blot out from
our minds the memory of the national
 hero. This is not a fight against Recto but  Made up of two haciendas:
a fight against Rizal. Now that Rizal is  (Calamba Nueva and Calamba Vieja)
dead and they can no longer attempt at Territorial extent of the hacienda was
his life, they are attempting to blot out his 16,424 hectares
memory.” (Ocampo,2007) I.3 Discontent Of The Natives
Claro M. Recto  Native tenants challenged the ownership
 The main proponent of R.A. 1425 of the friars over the vast tracts of land
 Nationalist  Alarmed and threatened, the friars
 Foremost statesmen of his generation branded the problem as rebellion and its
 Instituto de Rizal in Batangas players, filibusters.
Ateneo de Manila  Led to the deportation of influential
University of Sto. Tomas Calamba residents to different parts of
 Ran for president in 1957 the archipelago.
 CIA conducted blacked propaganda  The Rizal family was one of those involved
against Recto I.4 Rizal’s Eviction
Recto was a known to express Anti-American • Dominicans successfully fought for their
sentiment rightful ownership over the subject lands
 Question the US ownership of military in the courts.
bases in the Philippines • They were successful in obtaining eviction
 He called his fellow politicians as “yes- decrees.
men’’ for allowing foreign interference in
• Those who defied the decrees were
our political and economic affairs.
forcefully evicted with the help of the
 He wanted to make sure that Philippines’
Governor Generals’ assistance
national interests were not sacrificed and
• Rizal’s family were dragged out of their
give way to the American dream of how
home and their property thrown away
the world should be run.
 against subservience and colonial II. LAND DISPUTE
mentality II.1 History
 mendicancy  Owned by Don Manuel Jauregui
HACIENDA DE CALAMBA  He later entrusted it to the Society of
Land Dispute in Calamba Jesus in 29 January 1759.
I. INTRODUCTION  Condition that he was permitted to live at
I.1 Spanish Dominion in the Philippines the Jesuit monastery for life with a
 Roman Catholic Church had been
pension of 25 pesos per month until his
intimately involved with colonial death.
government  Henceforth, it was known as the
 By late 19th century three religious orders  “Hacienda de San Juan Bautista”
had required about one tenth of all the Church at the Hacienda de Calamba
improved lands in the archipelago.  Eight years later (on 27 February 1767),
-Dominicans King Charles III issued a decree expelling
-Augustinians the Jesuits from the entire Spanish
-Recollects Empire including in the Philippines.
I.2 The Hacienda de Calamba  Jauregui took asylum at the monastery of
the Hospitaller Order of St. John of God
 One of the haciendas acquired by the
Dominicans in 1833  As an act of gratitude transferred the
ownership to his new benefactor but was
 rejected because of the royal policy of
promoting secular ownership of lands in
the Philippines
IV.3 Friar estates today
 Based on government records, the
numerous haciendas, estates and other
tracts of friar lands have a total land area
of 145,636 hectares and at an average of
1,000 square meters per owner, the
decision had the potential
disenfranchising the claim of 1.5 million
Filipinos.
FRIAR LANDS AND AGRICULTURE
 Probably the most persistent complaint
leveled by the Filipino against the church
was its economic role as landowners, in
particular the Dominicans, Augustinians
and the Recollects. It was therefore not
surprising that the Philippine revolution
centered in the areas where the vast
haciendas (friar estates) thrived: Cavite,
Laguna, Bulacan, Morong, and Manila
province.
 For example, one-fourth of the total area
of friar estates in the Philippines was
located in Cavite, and 48% of the total
arable lands in the Tagalog belonged to
the friars. (Agoncillo, 1990)
 The economic position of the orders was
secured by their extensive landholdings,
which generally had been donated to
them for the support of their churches,
schools, and other establishments. Given
the general lack of interest on the part of
Spanish colonials--clustered in Manila
and dependent on the galleon trade--in
developing agriculture, the religious
orders had become by the eighteenth
century the largest landholders in the
islands, with their estates concentrated
in the Central Luzon region
 Land rents--paid often by Chinese
mestizo inquilinos, who planted cash crops
for export--provided them with the sort of
income that enabled many friars to live
like princes in palatial establishments
 The United States negotiated the
purchase of 23 Friar Estates during the
early years of the 20th century. The land
was subdivided and offered for sale to
Filipinos residing on it. In 1938, the
Church still controlled an estimated
41,782 hectares
 Friar estates cover about 400,000 acres.
They cost the Philippine government
$7,000,000, and bonds to that amount
were issued to provide the funds for their
purchase.
 Gov. Gen. William H. Taft believed that the
purchase of these estates and their
reselling in subdivisions to the tenants
would end the serious and oftentimes
bloody agrarian controversies.
Land grabbing during the colonial period
 The Spanish government issued two
Royal Decrees: decreto realenga
(1880) and the Maura Law (1894)
These decrees ordered the caciques
and natives, to secure legal title for
their lands or suffer forfeiture.
 It was estimated that 400,000 Filipino
peasants were left without titles. No
option was left for those dispossessed
because documented titles to the
land prevailed over verbal claims.
Hence, most Filipino landed peasants
became mere tenants in their own
lands.
 The Royal Decree of 1894 (Maura
Law) deprived many Filipino peasants
of their own lands through scheming
and treacherous ways of both
Spaniards and caciques.
Other strategies of dispossessing peasants
of their landholdings were:
1. Outright purchase at a low
price of real estates (realenga) by a
Spaniard or a cacique, from a badly-in-
need peasants.
2. Mortgage system (pacto de
retroventa); this is equivalent of today’s
mortgage system (sangla).
 The mortgage system is equivalent of
today’s mortgage system (sangla), where a
landowner who has loaned a peasant
some money becomes this peasant
 landlord. This happened simply because
the system required the land to be
collateral. While the peasant had not paid
back his loan, he paid the landlord rent for
the use of his own land.
Tenant-landlord system
 About 870,000 hectares of CARP land
throughout the country has not yet been
distributed. Even agrarian reform
advocate and close Aquino ally, Kaka Bag-
ao is disappointed with the pace of land
distribution.
Japan’s Land Reform
 Between 1947 and 1949, approximately
5,800,000 acres (23,000 km2) of land
(approximately 38% of Japan's cultivated
land) was purchased from the landlords
under the reform program and re-sold at
extremely low prices (after inflation) to
the farmers who worked them. By 1950,
three million peasants had acquired land,
dismantling a power structure that the
landlords had long dominated.
1872
GOMBURZA
Execution
 At sunrise of February 17, 1872, the field
of Bagumbayan (now Luneta) was already
overflowing with spectators, Spaniards,
Filipinos and foreigners.
 Shortly before 8:00 am, the death march
from Fort Santiago started
Last moments
 Mariano Gomez
 “I know very well that no leaf on a
tree may stir save at the will of
the Creator, since he asks that I
die in this place. His Holy Will be
done”
 Jacinto Zamora
 “On hearing his name called, Fr.
Zamora went up the scaffold
without saying a word and seated
himself in the place pointed out to the
executioner, because, days before, his
soul had grown used to the death
penalty….He was insane!”
Francisco Zaldua
 4th person to be executed by garrote in
February 17, 1872.
 The Spanish prosecutors bribed a witness
to testify against the three priests who
were charged with sedition and treason,
which led to their death by garrote.
Reasons for the execution of the GomBurZa
Trial
 Accused for having allegedly instigated the
Cavite Mutiny, Zamora, Burgos and Gomez
were tried at Fort Santiago on February
15, by a military tribunal.
 After the mock trial, they were found
“guilty” and sentenced to death by
garrote.
 Governor General Izquierdo approved the
decision of the military court and fixed the
execution on the morning of February 17,
1872.
Cavite Mutiny
 Happened during the payday of January
20, 1872
 Laborers received their wages that was
reduced by the amount paid for tributes.
The mutiny spread to the Fort of San
Felipe, Cavite where it received
sympathetic response among the soldiers
under the leadership of a Filipino soldier,
Sgt. Lamarid.
The Secularization Movement
This movement demanded the handling
over of the parishes from the regular
clergy (Dominicans, Franciscans,
Recollects etc. Who were Spanish friars)
to secular priests, most of whom were
Filipinos.
GOMBURZA
 Mariano Gomes, Jose Burgos and Jacinto
Zamora were all part of the Committee on
Reforms and Seculares group. Wherein
 they saw what the capabilities of the
Filipino priests are.
Mariano Gomez
 Born in Sta. Cruz Manila on August 2,
1799.
 Parents: Francisco Gomez and Martina
Custodio
 Studied at SanJuan de Letran and took up
Theology at the University of Santo
Tomas
 Became a head priest of Bacoor, Cavite
where aside from taking care of the
town’s spiritual needs, also taught the
people agriculture and cottage industry.
Jacinto Zamora
 Born in Pandacan, Manila on August 14,
1835
 Parents: Don Venancion Zamora and
Dona Hilaria del Rosario
 Obtained his early education in Pandacan
and later transferred to the San Juan de
Letran. He continued his studies at the
University of Santo Tomas.
 Headed a student demonstration
demanding the removal of the newly
appointed mayor.
Jose Burgos
 Born at Vigan, Ilocos Sur on February 9,
1837.
 Parents: Jose Burgos and Florencia Garcia
 Also studied at San Juan de Letran and
studied priesthood at the University of
Santo Tomas.
 A vigorous advocate for reforms in the
country and a strong crusader for the
rights and welfare of the secular clergy.
The Role of Jose Burgos
 Manifesto directed to the noble nation of
Spain by the loyal Filipinos in defence of
their honor and fidelity
 “ If in our days we do not see more
Filipinos outstanding in the sciences, let
this not be attributed to their character
nor to their nature nor to the influence of
the climate nor much less that of the race,
but rather to the discouragement which
for many years now has taken possession
of the youth, because of the almost
complete lack of incentive. For as a matter
of fact, what young man will still make
efforts to excel in the science of law and
theology, if he does not see in the future
anything but obscurity and indifference?”
Reign of terror
- “it wipe out an entire generation of the most
intelligent Filipinos, priests, lawyers and
merchants” (Schumacher, 1990)
Joaquin Pardo de Tavera, Antonio Regidor,
Enrique Paraiso, Pio and Jose Basa, Maximo
Paterno, Crisanto Reyes, Ramon Maurente,
and the Parish priest of Santa Cruz
- suppression of the doctorate in theology at
Sto. Tomas
The Propaganda Movement
 The Propaganda Movement would be the
heir of the movement of the Filipino
clergy and would carry the ideas on
national identity articulated by Burgos to
their next step and their logical
conclusion.
 Inspiration for the Katipunan
In Connection with Rizal
 Rizal was still very young when the mutiny
broke out. Although at his tender age,
Rizal was already aware of poor conditions
of the country.
 Originally, his plan was to take up
priesthood and become a Jesuit father.
 When he heard of the martyrdom of the
GomBurZa, he changed his mind and
swore to dedicate his life to vindicate the
victims of Spanish oppression. He was
only 11 years old at that time.
Impacts to the Rise of Philippine Nationalism
 The death of GomBurZa awakened strong
feelings of anger and resentment among
the Filipinos. They questioned Spanish
authorities and demanded reforms. The
martyrdom of the three priests apparently
helped to inspire the organization of the
 Propaganda Movement, which aimed to
seek reforms and inform Spain of the
abuses of its colonial government. This
sparks the beginning of the Propaganda
Movement and later on led to the
Philippine Revolution against Spain.
Rizal in the Context of 19th Century Philippines
 Though the origins and development of
Filipino nationalism cannot be understood
simply by studying Rizal and his nationalist
thought, neither can it be understood
without giving him central attention.
 But like any seminal thinker’s, Rizal’s
evolving nationalist thought must be
studied within the context of his times
 Without an understanding of that milieu
one can scarcely understand Rizal’s
enduring importance to the Filipino
people nor the relevance of his ideas and
ideals today. (Schumacher, 1991)
 Economic development
 Political development
 Cultural development
 Religious development
ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION
Economic Rethinking
 rise of capitalism (free trade)
 discover the possibility of utilizing the
products of the colony and encourage
cash crops
 relaxation of trade restrictions
1789 – removed restrictions on the entry of
European ships
1813 – abolition of the Galleon Trade
- Opened the Philippines to World Trading
Foreign Consulates Before and After 1834
 Russia and the United States 1817
 France and Germany 1835
 Great Britain 1844
 Japan 1888
Provincial Ports were Opened
 Pangasinan, Iloilo, Zamboanga in 1855
 Legaspi and Leyte in 1873
Introduction of Banking
CASH CROPS
Manila Hemp
 produced for export only in 1820
 used by US Navy in marine cordage
 US was the principal importer of abaca
rope
 1842, Sturges and Company and T.N.
Peale and Company monopolized the
export of this fiber
SUGAR
Nicholas Loney
 a Scotchman and employee of British
firm Ker and Company in Manila
 sold machinery on credit to sugar
planters
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT
Carlos Ma. de la Torre (1869-1871)
Liberals vs Conservatives
 Philippine became a dumping ground to
reward party-hangers with jobs
 Deprived Filipinos of positions in the
bureaucracy
Corruption
 Inability of the government to provide
basic needs - public works, schools, peace
and order, and other prerequisites to even
a semimodern economy antiquated
system of taxation, high protective tariffs
Political development
 Filipinos saw the colonial policies of Spain
as not only not the causes of the existing
economic prosperity but increasingly as
positive hindrances preventing further
progress and even threatening what
already have been achieved.
 In the face of the system of that was both
exploitative and incapable of producing
benefits for the economy, liberal
nationalist and even conservative upper-
class Filipinos increasingly no longer found
any compelling motive for maintaining the
Spanish colonial regime, as it became
more and more clear that reforms would
not be forthcoming.
CULTURAL DEVELOPMENT
  Spread of education from 1860
 Ilustrados
 Use of Spanish Language
 Secondary Schools – San Jose, San Juan de
Letran and Sto. Tomas
 Interest in Filipino Past
RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT
 ILUSTRADOS VS FRIARS
o Ilustrados became anti-friar and
anti-clerical
SPANISH COLONIAL SOCIETY (Social System and
Everyday Life)
 Colonial and pastoral acts and policies
emphasized the superior attitude of the
Spaniards. Spanish colonizers imposed on
their subjects, the kastila was superior to
the indio. Spanish society had always been
profoundly conscious of racial and
religious divisions. There was an emphasis
on limpieza de sangre (purity of blood).
Spain extended the rule of color to its
colonies where color determines not only
a person’s racial classification, but also his
position in the social, economic, and
political hierarchy. Purity of blood,
originally invested on the peninsula with
religious values which became a means of
maintaining and preserving the privileges
of the dominant class of Europeans.
1. Peninsulares - a Spanish-born Spaniard or
mainland Spaniard residing in newly colonized
countries and of pure Spanish descent .
2. Insulares or Criollos - person of pure Spanish
descent born in the Philippines during
Spanish colonization.
3. Mestizo - people of mixed European and native
heritage or descent.
i. Mestizo Espanyoles – (Spanish mestizo);
person of mixed Spanish and European ancestry.
ii. Mestizo Sangleyes – (Chinese mestizo);
person of mixed Chinese and European ancestry.
4. Indio or Naturales - without admixture of any
other race; refer to the natives or the Filipinos and
constitutes the majority of the population
Costumes in the Colony
 Clothing is worn not simply for purposes
of modesty. Filipinos dress, or undress, for
roles. This imply that one – whether a
peasant in rough red breeches or a
dignitary in embroidered shirt and velvet
trousers – is dressed up, prepared to play
out another aspect of one’s role in the
world. The country’s economically
stratified society and its culture are
encoded in dress and adornment that
conferred prestige, indicated race, and
confirmed political status. The costumes
of the colonized revealed different
degrees of Hispanization.
Religious Activities
 The introduction of Roman Catholicism
influenced Filipino life in profound ways.
Catholicism enhanced monotheistic
worship among Filipinos. Most of the
natives, because of their conversion, went
to the same church and observed the
same religious ceremonies and rituals.
This brought about increased direct
interaction and facilitated understanding
among them. On the other hand, the
spread of Catholicism widened the gap
between its followers and those that
practiced Islam.
 Religious calendar is punctuated by feasts
of saints and by celebrations keyed to
events in the lives of Jesus Christ and
Mary. The feast of saints after whom
towns are named, or who have been
designated patron saints, are celebrated
in fiestas all over Christian Philippines. The
celebrations have many modes. A novena,
a high mass on the feast day itself, and a
 procession constitutes the climax.
Christmas, for example, is another season
with numerous events.
 The holding of Catholic fiestas and other
religious holidays although provided
amusement and rest for the people, and
provided occasion for getting together,
they were frequently costly affairs. Thus,
many Filipino families spent in a single day
a part or the whole of their savings during
the year.
Leisure Time
 The family, immediate community, and
the Catholic Church played powerful roles
in shaping a person’s sense of well-spent
leisure time. Family-centeredness was the
rule, whether in cities, farmlands, or
fishing environs. In areas under the
Spanish empire’s political jurisdiction,
churches and schools reinforced the
virtues of wholesome family life. Family
events, Catholic holy days, and royal
holidays were occasions calling for a
reunion of the immediate family. Get-
togethers gave the members of a
household opportunities to share talents.
Every eligible man or woman was
expected to excel in the refinements
associated with urbanidad, which is the
quality of being urbane and citified.
Urbanidad was marked by delicacy in
taste, graceful and studied gestures,
extreme politeness, a desire for
knowledge especially through reading,
artistic accomplishment, stylish attire, and
a trendy home.
Past Time for Women
• Culinary arts
• Embroidery, beading, crocheting
• Sign language (handkerchief, fan,
umbrella)
• Musical instruments
• Poetry
• baile
Past time for Men
• Travelling
• Sports
• Hunting
• Bicycle race
• Horseracing and bullfighting
Ways and Languages of Courtship
 The conservative, Hispanized Philippine
aristocracy was primarily concerned with
preserving young women’s virtue before
marriage. Dressing codes shielded her
from prying eyes under layers of clothing,
leaving only her face and hands visible.
Damsels did not look out windows as
passersby, or show their faces in church,
or entertain young men at home
unchaperoned. Communication between
young men and women, verbal or non-
verbal, was discouraged or simply
forbidden. A thousand rules and an army
of chaperons, however, could not contain
human nature. Young lovers discovered
ingenious ways of sending messages
without censorship by hawkeyed relatives.
Thus, were born the alternative languages
of courtship – knowledge of the art of
flirtation.
Other Socio-Cultural Results
• The adoption of the Gregorian calendar
and the Western method of keeping and
counting time.
• The introduction of Spanish music and
dances.
• The advent of religious literature and art.
Jose Rizal and the Reconstruction of the
Philippine past
History was at the heart of Rizal’s nationalism
 The absolute necessary for a thorough
understanding of one’s history and culture
as an integral part of the project of
national emancipation became clearer to
Rizal while he was finishing the Noli.
History writing in pre-colonial Philippines
 No written history of their past
 No evidence of any indigenous account
 their past is transmitted orally; e.g. epics
and legends
  Writing system and literacy but limited
usage of syllabary
Tradition of Chroniclers among the five religious
orders
 Pedro Chirino
 Ribadeneyra – Franciscans
 Alcina - History of the Bisayan People
 Juan Plasencia
 Seventeenth century Spanish missionary
views were strongly coloured by their
views on the unquestioned superiority of
the Hispanic culture and by their
conviction that the pre-Hispanic animistic
religion was a manifestation of the Devil.
19th century
 disadain for pre-Hispanic Filipino culture
reappeared in a much offensive form as
Filipinos began to assert themselves as
equal to the Spaniards
Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas 1609 (Events in the
Philippine Islands)
 perhaps the best account of Spanish
colonialism in the Philippines written
during that period, is based partly on
documentary research, partly on keen
observation, and partly on Morga's
personal involvement and knowledge.
Rizal in a letter to Ferdinand Blumentritt
 The Philippines will be deeply grateful to
you if it sees a history of our country,
complete and purged of legend by the
critical method. You are, I believed, the
only one who can write this history. I have
the boldness to do it, but I don’t know
enough; I have not read so many books
about my homeland; the libraries of Spain
are closed to me; I need time for other
things; and my narrative will always be
suspect of partisan spirit.
Why did Rizal annotate the Sucesos de las Islas
Filipinas?
 It served as a weapon to combat the
pretensions to beneficence of the
colonial power. It provided an
explanation of the contemporary
situation of the Philippines as well as a
picture of the glorious past destroyed by
Spanish intrusion. It offered the key to
national identity and corresponding
orientation s for future national
development, as well as examples to
emulate the nationalist struggle. Finally, it
provided a legitimation of the struggle for
freedom and the destruction of colonial
rule (Schumacher, 1990)
Rizal dedication
a. To awaken in the Filipinos a consciousness
of our past, now erased from memory
b. To correct “what has been distorted and
falsified” concerning the Filipinos
c. To better judge the present and assess our
movement in three centuries
Rizal’s Annotation of Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas
 The Filipinos had exported silk to Japan in
the sixteenth century; today the best silk
comes from there.
 The Filipino Panday Pira had forged
cannon before the coming of the
Spaniards; with his death “there were no
Spaniards who were able to do what he
had done, nor were his sons as skilled as
their father.
 The shipbuilding of the 16th century is
now reduced to insignificance.
 The moral level of the Filipino society
“was for that age very advanced”; indeed,
in many respects it was superior to that
of Christian Europe.
 Thus, what the Spaniards called slavery
had none of the degrading aspects of
Roman or European slavery; rather, it was
basically a familial relationship and even
showed the concern for strict justice
among the early Filipinos by careful way it
was regulated. If nonetheless slavery was
to be deplored, the Spanish conquest had
worsened rather than bettered the
situation.
 Filipino agriculture and industry – the
growing of rice, the mining of gold and
fashioning it into ornaments – had
decayed . The reason for all this
 decadence is that the natives, seeing carried on trade and commerce, and their
that they were molested and exploited industry produced extraordinary fruits. As
by their encomenderos for the sake of a result, everyone lived in fashion of the
the products of their industry,… began to wealthy. Young and old, and even women
break their looms, abandon their gold knew how to read and write in our own
mines, their rice fields , etc., imagining native writing.
that their conquerors would leave them
alone on seeing them poor, wretched,
and unexploitable. White Man’s Burden
 Unlike her counterpart in other cultures  published in the popular magazine in U.S.
and even in modern Europe, the Filipina in 1899
was held in a dignity she has maintained.  reflect the subject of American
If the early chroniclers recorded a lack of colonization of the Philippines
appreciation for virginity before  White Man’s Burden was Rudyard
marriage, in this the Filipinas obeyed an Kipling’s hymn to U.S imperialism
instinct of nature; in any case, the Filipina  Burden of American’s to educate their
of today yields to no other race in her little brown friend to self-govern
chastity, least of all to hypocritical Europe
with its history of cults, prostitution and
other practices.
 In the past, the witnessed word sufficed
for binding will; with Christianity, there is
now need of endless litigation. Theft was
unknown in past days; only with Spanish
Christian civilization has it become a
major evil.
 Colonial discourse deploy two words that
perform an insidious double function: (1)
they mask the violence and irrationality
of colonial practice, and (2) they attribute
such violence to the natives who are
being colonized. In Morga, such words are
“pacify”, “entrust”, “treachery” and
“piracy”. Rizal takes note of these, and
does what could well be late 19th century
version of deconstruction. (Quibiyen,
1999)

From the Propagandists to the revolutionists

 Bonifacio’s perspective in Philippine
history
 In the early times when the Spaniards had
not yet set foot in this land, under the the
government of our true compatriots, the
Filipinos were living in great abundance
and prosperity. They lived in harmony
with neighboring countries, especially
with the Japanese, with whom they