LESSON 6:
RIZAL'S LIFE:
EXILE, TRIAL, AND DEATH
LET’S START:
Exile in Dapitan
Upon his return to Manila in 1892, he formed a civic movement called La Liga
Filipina. The league advocated these moderate social reforms through legal means,
but was disbanded by the governor. At that time, he had already been declared an
enemy of the state by the Spanish authorities because of the publication of his novel.
Rizal was implicated in the activities of the nascent rebellion and in July 1892, was
deported to Dapitan in the province of Zamboanga, a peninsula of Mindanao. There
he built a school, a hospital and a water supply system, and taught and engaged in
farming and horticulture. Abaca, then the vital raw material for cordage and which
Rizal and his students planted in the thousands, was a memorial.
The boys' school, which taught in Spanish, and included English as a foreign
language (considered a prescient if unusual option then) was conceived by Rizal and
antedated Gordonstoun with its aims of inculcating resourcefulness and self-
sufficiency in young men. They would later enjoy successful lives as farmers and
honest government officials. One, a Muslim, became a datu, and another, José
Aseniero, who was with Rizal throughout the life of the school, became Governor of
Zamboanga.
In Dapitan, the Jesuits mounted a great effort to secure his return to the fold led by
Fray Francisco de Paula Sánchez, his former professor, who failed in his mission.
The task was resumed by Fray Pastells, a prominent member of the Order. In a letter
to Pastells, Rizal sails close to the deism familiar to us today.
We are entirely in accord in admitting the existence of God. How can I doubt His
when I am convinced of mine? Who so recognizes the effect recognizes the cause.
To doubt God is to doubt one's own conscience, and in consequence, it would be to
doubt everything; and then what is life for? Now then, my faith in God, if the result of
ratiocination may be called faith, is blind, blind in the sense of knowing nothing. I
neither believe nor disbelieve the qualities which many attribute to Him; before
theologians' and philosophers' definitions and lucubration of this ineffable and
inscrutable being I find myself smiling. Faced with the conviction of seeing myself
confronting the supreme Problem, which confused voices seek to explain to me, I
cannot but reply: ‘It could be’; but the God that I foreknow is far more grand, far more
good: Plus Supra!...I believe in (revelation); but not in revelation or revelations which
each religion or religions claim to possess. Examining them impartially, comparing
them and scrutinizing them, one cannot avoid discerning the human 'fingernail' and
the stamp of the time in which they were written... No, let us not make God in our
image, poor inhabitants that we are of a distant planet lost in infinite space. However,
brilliant and sublime our intelligence may be, it is scarcely more than a small spark
which shines and in an instant is extinguished, and it alone can give us no idea of
that blaze, that conflagration, that ocean of light. I believe in revelation, but in that
living revelation which surrounds us on
every side, in that voice, mighty, eternal, unceasing, incorruptible, clear, distinct,
universal as is the being from whom it proceeds, in that revelation which speaks to
us and penetrates us from the moment we are born until we die. What books can
better reveal to us the goodness of God, His love, His providence, His eternity, His
glory, His wisdom? ‘The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament
showed his handiwork.
His best friend, professor Ferdinand Blumentritt, kept him in touch with European
friends and fellow-scientists who wrote a stream of letters which arrived in Dutch,
French, German and English and which baffled the censors, delaying their
transmittal. Those four years of his exile coincided with the development of the
Philippine Revolution from inception and toits final breakout, which, from the
viewpoint of the court which was to try him, suggested his complicity in it. He
condemned the uprising, although all the members of the Katipunan had made him
their honorary president and had used his name as a cry for war, unity, and liberty.
He is known to making the resolution of bearing personal sacrifice instead of the
incoming revolution, believing that a peaceful stand is the best way to avoid further
suffering in the country and loss of Filipino lives. In Rizal's own words, "I consider
myself happy for being able to suffer a little for a cause which I believe to be sacred
[...]. I believe further that in any undertaking, the more one suffers for it, the surer its
success. If this be fanaticism may God pardon me, but my poor judgment does not
see it as such.
In Dapitan, Rizal wrote "Haec Est Sibylla Cumana", a parlor-game for his students,
with questions and answers for which a wooden top was used. In 2004, Jean Paul
Verstraeten traced this book and the wooden top, as well as Rizal's personal watch,
spoon and salter.
Rizal Arrested and Trial
By 1896, the rebellion fomented by the Katipunan, a militant secret society, had
become a full-blown revolution, proving to be a nationwide uprising. Rizal had earlier
volunteered his services as a doctor in Cuba and was given leave by Governor-
General Ramón Blanco to serve in Cuba to minister to victims of yellow fever. Rizal
and Josephine left Dapitan on August 1, 1896, with letter of recommendation from
Blanco.
Rizal was arrested en route to Cuba via Spain and was imprisoned in Barcelona on
October 6, 1896. He was sent back the same day to Manila to stand trial as he was
implicated in the revolution through his association with members of the Katipunan.
During the entire passage, he was unchained; no Spaniard laid a hand on him, and
had many opportunities to escape but refused to do so.
While imprisoned in Fort Santiago, he issued a manifesto disavowing the current
revolution in its present state and declaring that the education of Filipinos and their
achievement of a national identity were prerequisites to freedom. Rizal was tried
before a court-martial for rebellion, sedition and conspiracy, and was convicted on all
three charges and sentenced to death. Blanco, who was sympathetic to Rizal, had
been forced out of office. The friars, led by then-Archbishop of Manila Bernardino
Nozaleda had 'intercalated' Camilo de Polavieja in his stead as the new Spanish
GovernorGeneral of the Philippines after pressuring Queen-Regent Maria Cristina of
Spain, thus sealing Rizal's fate.
Rizal’s Execution
Moments before his execution on December 30, 1896 by a squad of Filipino soldiers
of the Spanish Army, a backup force of regular Spanish Army troops stood ready to
shoot the executioners should they fail to obey orders. The Spanish Army Surgeon
General requested to take his pulse: it was normal. Aware of this the sergeant
commanding the backup force hushed his men to silence when they began raising
"vivas" with the highly partisan crowd of Peninsular and Mestizo Spaniards. His last
words were those of Jesus Christ: "consummatum est" – "it is finished.”
He was secretly buried in Pacò Cemetery in Manila with no identification on his
grave. His sister Narcisa toured all possible gravesites and found freshly turned
earth at the cemetery with guards posted at the gate. Assuming this could be the
most likely spot, there neverhaving been any ground burials, she made a gift to the
caretaker to mark the site "RPJ", Rizal's initials in reverse.
His undated poem Mi último adiós, believed to have been written a few days before
his execution, was hidden in an alcohol stove, which was later handed to his family
with his few remaining possessions, including the final letters and his last bequests.
During their visit, Rizal reminded his sisters in English, "There is something inside it",
referring to the alcohol stove given by the Pardo de Taveras which was to be
returned after his execution, thereby emphasizing the importance of the poem. This
instruction was followed by another, "Look in my shoes", in which another item was
secreted. Exhumation of his remains in August 1898, under American rule, revealed
that he had been uncoffined, his burial was not on sanctified ground granted to the
'confessed' faithful, and whatever was in his shoes had disintegrated. He is now
buried in the Rizal Monument in Manila.
In his letter to his family he wrote: "Treat our aged parents as you would wish to be
treated...Love them greatly in memory of me...December 30, 1896." He gave his
family instructions for his burial: "Bury me in the ground. Place a stone and a cross
over it. My name, the date of my birth and of my death. Nothing more. If later you
wish to surround my grave with a fence, you can do it. No anniversaries."
In his final letter, to Blumentritt – Tomorrow at 7, I shall be shot; but I am innocent of
the crime of rebellion. I am going to die with a tranquil conscience. Rizal is believed
to be the first Filipino revolutionary whose death is attributed entirely to his work as a
writer; and through dissent and civil disobedience enabled him to successfully
destroy Spain's moral primacy to rule. He also bequeathed a book personally bound
by him in Dapitan to his 'best and dearest friend'. When Blumentritt received it in his
hometownof Litoměřice (Leitmeritz), he broke down and wept.
There are hidden blessings in every struggle.
- Unknown
CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR EXCELLENCE IN
THIS LESSON!
REFERENCES:
Couse Syllabus
Tabotabo, C.V. and R.D. Leano (2009) Jose P. Rizal: A Hero’s Life. Manila.
Mindshapers Co., Inc.
Ariola, Mariano M. (2013). Life, works, and writings of Dr. Jose P. Rizal. Manila:
Purely Books
Trading and Publishing Corp.Atienza, Glecy C., Bernales, Rolando A., Celebre,
Roberto Baltazar S., Lacsamana, Liodevico C.,
and Talegon, Vivencio M. Jr. (2008).Jose Rizal: ang pambansang bayani.
Malabon City: Mutya Publishing House, Inc.
Pasigui, Ronnie E. & Cabalu, Danilo H. (2014). Jose Rizal: The Man and the
Hero (Chronicles, Legacies, and Controversies). [2nd Ed].Quezon City: C & E
Publishing Inc.
Valenzuela, Edwin E. (2014). Rizal and other heroes: their relevance in modern
Filipino nationalism. Manila: Unlimited Books Library Services and Publishing
Inc.
