Noli Me Tangere (Latin for ‘touch me not) is the iconic 19th-century novel written by the Philippine national hero Jose Rizal. 

The novel may not win literary awards, but as a social manifesto against Spanish rule in the Philippines, Rizal’s novel touched a  raw chord in both Spanish and Filipino readers.  A required reading in all Philippine schools (and in all levels) Noli’s melodramatic  plot exposes the corruption and hypocrisy of the Philippine Roman Catholic Church and the ruling Spanish elite.

Considered as the most influential political novel authored by a Filipino, Rizal completed Noli Me Tangere in Spanish in 1887 while he was studying in Europe. Banned in the Philippines by the Spanish religious and political authorities, Rizal continued to write and completed a second and follow-up novel, El Filibusterismo, to the Noli, and in the process incurred the wrath of the Spanish rulers. Charged with sedition and heresy (by the Catholic Church), Rizal was later executed by firing squad in 1896 at Bagumbayan (now called the Rizal Park) in Manila.

Long live Philippine literature!

“(T)he struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting” - Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

No other name is more revered in the hearts of Filipinos as Jose Rizal (1861-1896). He was not only a physician and ophthalmologist but also a poet, novelist, linguist, essayist, anthropologist, philologist, painter, sculptor, teacher, and educator, translator, farmer, traveler, and great historian. Dissatisfied with a limiting education at UST, Rizal went to Europe, specifically spending time in Spain and Germany, for his studies.

“Of the social realities through which, and against which, the Filipino novel had to shape itself, colonialism is the most important” -Resil B. Mojares, Origins and Rise of the Filipino Novel

His novels, essays, and letters brought a revolutionary political philosophy to Southeast Asia. Rizal’s two novels Noli Me Tangere (1887) and El Filibusterismo (1891), which Coates puts it as “single-handedly awakened the Philippine people to national and political consciousness,” were instrumental steps towards liberation from Spanish rule and colonial mentality.

Although these are two fiction novels, they are the cornerstone of Filipino nationalism because they laid the foundations for Rizal’s rise as the Father of the revolution and Filipino people.

His brilliance proved to the world that the Philippines are not full of barbarians and savages; Filipinos are capable of having a civilized future  and are entitled to their respect.

The tensions that gripped the Philippines during Rizal’s era and themes in his writing:
Conservatism vs. Liberalism
The reign of the Spanish clerics vs. the emancipation of the Filipinos
Repression vs. reform

But he was a reluctant hero. Ironically, Rizal never wanted a revolution. He wanted to continue the Philippines colonial relationship with Spain in the hopes that Spain will ensure security, freedom, dignity, and education for Filipinos. It’s no wonder why the Americans supported his path to political sainthood over the more radical Bonifacio. Regardless of Rizal’s doubts, he was sentenced to death before a Spanish firing squad.

The execution of the martyr José Rizal, a greater-than-life-sized sculpted diorama at the former Luneta Park, now named in his honor.

After his execution in 1896, Andres Bonifacio led the efforts of the Philippine Revolution. Rizal lived on in the minds and hearts of his fellow countrymen, as he inspired them with the spirit of unity and dignity in their struggle for freedom.

So how does Rizal affect Fil-Ams like us?
“Our people should aim higher… Take the lead in forming your own individuality, try to lay the foundations of a Filipino nation.”
Even today, Filipinos still ponder over their national identity and navigate the overlapping layers of Spanish, American, Southeast Asian, and other imports to find the core of their own individuality.

KU

Although the Propaganda Movement was a movement which Filipino émigrés formed to claim disparity between Spain and colony  in 1872, since 1880s, the movement was intense by Filipino émigrés who had been students in European university and inspired by European education and politics.

The aims of this movement are:

1.Representation of the Philippines in the Cortes Generales, the Spanish parliament,

2.Secularization of the clergy;

3.Legalization of Spanish and Filipino equality;

4.Creation of a public school system independent of the friars;

5.Abolition of the polo (labor service) and vandala (forced sale of local products to the government);

6.Guarantee of basic freedoms of speech and association;

7.Equal opportunity for Filipinos and Spanish to enter government service.

Fathers Mariano Gómez, José Burgos and Fray Jacinto Zamora

Originally, the first advocates of Filipino unfair condition in the Philippine were three Filipino priests, who were the Church–Fathers Jose Burgos, Mariano Gómez and friar Jacinto Zamora. They insisted on the abolition of discrimination to Filipino priests in Catholic Church in the Philippine because the discrimination prevented Filipino priests from promoting to upper positions. The Spanish colonial authorities executed and hanged three priests in 1872 at Bagumbayan in Manila by making false charge as the ringleaders of the 1872 Cavite mutiny, which was the rebel by workers in the Cavite Naval Yard. Their executions, which called the GOMBRUZA, triggered the Propaganda Movement.

Three prominent Ilustrados at the end of 19th century: José P. Rizal, Marcelo H. del Pilar and Graciano López Jaena

José P. Rizal, Marcelo H. del Pilar, and Mariano Ponce led this movement as leaders. In 1882, Del Pilar established the newspaper Diariong Tagalog (Tagalog Diary) in Tagalog and Spanish to criticize the control of local politics by the Spanish monastery and claim the reforms of the Spanish colonial government in Philippine. In 1887, José P. Rizal published two books; Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not, 1887) and El Filibusterismo (The Filibuster, 1891). In particular, in Noli Me Tangere, José P. Rizal severely denounced the corruption of Spanish colonial authorities and exposed the abuses by the Spanish authorities. His publication eventually motivated a number of Filipinos to obtain their own independence. In 1889, La Solidaridad (The Solidarity) was published by Rizal and edited by Del Pilar in Barcelona as a newspaper of the Propaganda Movement. In La Solidaridad, Del Pilar strived to show the nationalism of the enlightened Filipino ilustrados against the Spanish imperialism.

Marcelo H. del Pilar

The purpose of this movement was only to reform the corruption of the Spanish colonial authority through the peaceful enlightening movement. Moreover, Rizal was even negative about the independence of Philippine from Spain in this phase. The Spanish colonial authority, however, did not permit even the existence of the peaceful movement. After Rizal returning from the United States to Philippine and establishing the La Liga Filipina (The Filipino League), which sought the reform of Spanish colonial government, in 1892, Rizal was arrested and deported to Dapitan by the Spanish authority. The Propaganda Movement continued for more than 10 years. After the deportation of Rizal, the Katipunan, more radical group to achieve the independence of the Philippine, emerged to achieve the independence of Philippine.

JO

A 1990 reprinting of the 1891 Ghent (first) edition. A PDF file, also found online

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Jose_Rizal

Thanks to Gibby for the heads up:

The nineteenth century marks the period in which “homogenous empty time” was globalized, signaled by the arrival and rapid spread of the world-telegraph system. One effect was the repositioning of geographically “nearby strangers” as historically “backward” fellow-nationals. Another was to conceptually reorganize the world in terms of an unstable competition along the highway of progress. For the colonial world, this opened the way for shame at being backward, but also the hope of catching up and surpassing. This change made it possible for intellectuals in the peripheries to think about the future in interesting new ways. Rizal is the outstanding example for the Philippines: If imperial Spain is “backward,” what will the Philippines be like in 100 years time? The lecture will concentrate on Rizal’s El Filibusterismo in this general context, focusing especially on his unique “time-machine” methods. The Fili is an outstanding example of manipulations of time across vast geographical spaces which has no parallel in core European literature. Is it/was it possible to write a novel in the future tense? With what consequences?

SPONSORS
UP Third World Studies Center, UP College of Arts and Letters, and the Office of the Chancellor, University of the Philippines- Diliman

DATE
November 19, 2008 (Wednesday), 2:30 – 4:30 PM

I’m dying to go but I don’t know if I can afford to take the afternoon off from work. I just got back from Kuala Lumpur and Siem Reap and a ton of work piled up on my desk in the week that I was gone. If you’re going, could you have him sign my battered copies of Imagined Communities, Under Three Flags and Cacique Democracy for me?

          Dr. Jose P. Rizal was one of the great heroes who fought for our freedom against spaniards. He was best known for his writings and had been a considered also as a novelist. The famous novels that he wrote were the “El Filibusterismo” and “Noli Me Tangere” which were written in spanish language. These novels was Rizal’s weapon in fighting those spaniards. He wrote these novels to let people and the coming generations know the sufferings they have encountered under the hand of spaniards, how spaniards treat filipino’s, the immorality they have done in the government and even in the church. Dr. Jose P. Rizal was the only hero only used a “pen” as his weapon in order to achieve freedom from spaniards.