Jose Rizal was born and grew up in a very devout Catholic family. His education, from elementary to college, was from the prestigious Catholic schools of the period. It was expected therefore, that he should have been also, a devout Catholic. Although he was for a while, however, in later life he developed a religious philosophy not totally in accord with the Catholic religion. Why the transformation? It all started when Rizal first went abroad in 1882. At the age of 21, he enrolled at the Universidad Central de Madrid, working for degrees in medicine, philosophy and literature. In Spain he found the boisterous atmosphere of freedom: where conservatives and liberals, socialists and anarchists, protestants and Catholics, atheists and agnostics, debated and discussed at meetings, in cafes, on street corners, in the taverns and more especially in the press, - without the fear of being apprehended. Rizal was amazed and pondered an obvious question: Why did Spain forbid such freedom in the Philippines?
Rizal’s contacts with the great thinkers, leaders, scholars, scientists and philosophers of the progressive libertarian movement in Spain and other European countries revolutionized his religious philosophy. He met with Austrian Ferdinand Blumentritt who was one of the European specialists on the Philippines. He read the radical theological writings of Felicite R. de Lamennals, who advocated that Christian must serve the poor and fight injustices including those perpetuated by the Catholic Church. Men like Rafael Labra, Manuel Luis Zorilla and Francisco Pi y Margall, who struggled to reform Spain’ antiquated feudal system, were close friends of Rizal.
Rizal’s religious perspective was humanistic blended with some forms of existentialism. These he articulated very clearly in his February 22. 1889 letter to the Women of Malolos as follows: “You know that the will of God is different from that of the priest; that religiousness does not consist of long periods spent on your knees, nor in endless prayers, big rosarios, and grimy scapularies [religious garment showing devotion], but in a spotless conduct, firm intention and upright judgment. You also know that prudence does not consist in blindly obeying any whim of the little tin god, but in obeying only that which is reasonable and just, because blind obedience is itself the cause and origin of those whims, and those guilty of it are really to be blamed…. God gave each individual reason and a will of his or her own to distinguish the just from the unjust; all were born without shackles and free, and nobody has a right to subjugate the will and the spirit of another thoughts, seeing that thought is noble and free. “In the same letter, he tried to influence the attitudes, habits and beliefs of the Filipino women who tended to believe and rely on superstitions, myths and miracles. The letter was written originally in Tagalog. I would like to quote a portion of it verbatim as follows: “Ano kaya ang magiging supling ng babaing walang kabanalan kundi ang mag bubulong ng dasal, walang karunungan kundi awit, novena at milagrong pang ulol sa tao.” (“What offspring will be that of a woman whose kindness of character is expressed by mumbled prayers; novenas, and the alleged miracles used to fool the people?)”
GOD: Rizal believed in God, he pounded this belief in his letters to Fr. Pablo Pastells which goes: “I believe firmly in the existence of God the Creator…I firmly believe in His wisdom, His infinite power (my idea of the infinite is so limited), His goodness manifested in the marvelous creation of the universe; in the order that reigns in His creation; His magnificence that overwhelms my understanding; His greatness that enlightens and nourishes all. His wisdom is so great that it humiliates human reason and makes me dizzy with vertigo for my own reasoning is imperfect and confused. Many times my reasoning leads me to raise my eyes to Him. I believe Him to be in the immense system of planets, in all the aggregation of nebulae, that bewilders and stretches my imagination beyond my comprehension that I am filled with dread, awe and bewilderment and leaves me dumb with wonder”
“How can I doubt God when I am convince of my own existence? Who recognizes the effect recognizes the cause. To doubt God would be to doubt one’s conscience and consequently, to doubt everything; and then, what is life for?
JESUS CHRIST:
Rizal did not believe that Jesus Christ was God, during his exile in Dapitan in his letter to Fr. Pastells, he wrote: "Who died on the cross? Was it God or man? If it was God, I do not understand how God could die: how a God conscious of his mission could cry out in his bitter agony: 'My God, my God why has Thou My forsaken Me’ This cry is absolutely human; it is the cry of a man who was banking on the justice of God and worthiness of his cause, and then found himself surrounded by every type of injustice without any hope of salvation.., all the words of Christ on the cross reveal to us, true enough, a man in torment and agony. But what a man!'
RELIGION: Rizal believed in religion, in his letter to his mother in 1885, he articulated this very eloquently when he wrote: “For me religion is the holiest of things, the purest, the most intangible, which escapes all human adulterations, and I think I would be recreant to my duty as a rational being if I were to prostitute my reason and admit what is absurd. I do not believe that God would punish me if I were to try to approach Him using reason and understanding, -his most precious gift”. Rizal opposed the perversions, abuses and hypocrisy of the Catholic hierarchy and the colonial government that he manifested in his two novels.
He did not intend to destroy the Catholic Church but desired its practices more consistent with the fundamental tenets of Christianity.
REVELATION: Rizal’s fourth letter dated April 4, 1893 to Fr. Pablo Pastells, he wrote: “I believed in the revelation but in that living revelation of Nature that surrounds us everywhere, in that voice, potent, eternal, incessant, incorruptible, clear, distinct, universal as the Being from whom it proceeds; in that revelation that speaks to and penetrates us from the moment we are born until we die
CATHOLICISM: Rizal espoused Christianity but rejected the Catholic Church claims of infallibility. In the same letter to Fr. Pablo Pastells, Rizal wrote: “All the brilliant and subtle arguments of Your Reverence, which I shall not attempt to refute because I would have to write a treatise, cannot convince me that the Catholic Church is endowed with infallibility. It also carries the human thumbprint… with all the defects, errors and vicissitudes proper to the work of men.” Dr. Maximo Viola in his “Mis Viajes con el Dr. Rizal” (My Travels with Dr. Rizal), he mentioned that “the religion of Christ was the most perfect, but due to the modifications introduced into it, by malice or religious fanaticism, it has become like an edifice, which because of so many modifications has been so disfigured and threatens to fall apart."
HEAVEN: Rizal wrote in his “Mi Ultimo Adios” his last poem. "For I go where no slave before the oppressor bends, where faith can never kill, and God reigns everywhere."
HELL AND PURGATORY: Rizal believed that these were invented for exploitation of the people, by means of the sale of ribbons, scapulars, rosaries and religious articles to the ignorant, this was also written in Dr. Viola’s “Mis Viajes con el Dr. Rizal” (My Travels with Dr. Rizal). Purgatory was not even written in the Bible. As regards to hell, Rizal wrote to Fr. Pastells. ”God cannot have created me for my harm: for what harm had I done Him before being created that He should will my damnation?”
MASONRY: Rizal was a Mason; he was attracted to Masonry precisely because the fraternity accepted all persons of good will who believed in a Supreme Being. Masonry believed in the equality of all people. It was democratic which was not in accord with the teachings of the Catholic Church.
Rizal gave the greatest importance to human capacity to reason. His Christianity did not rely on friar orders; neither did he follow mandatory performance of religious rituals, sacraments and ceremonies. He said, “God does not require candles, He has more candles than the light of the sun”. He fought the Catholic Church’s clergy. However, it was Christian morality that formed the very core of his social and political reforms.
ALLEGED RETRACTION: He was condemned to death for treason and sedition in 1896. The evidence brought against him would not have stood in the present day court of law. He was executed on December 30, 1896. Adding insult to an injury, the Spanish friars then libeled Rizal’s good name, immediately after he was killed, by circulating copies of a forged document entitled “Retraction of Errors”. It was alleged that Rizal, a few hours before his death, to have retracted his affiliation with Masonry, “abominated Masonry”, and admitted his errors in all his writings. I just wonder what was there in Masonry that Rizal had to abominate? Rizal with his keen intelligence predicted, more or less, his execution and this alleged retraction. In 1882, in his letter to Gregorio Aglipay he wrote: “In all parts of the world where an honest man tries to achieve reform he is crucified on Golgotha…. It is probable that I will be executed. Then they will try to bring about my moral death by covering my memory with slander.”
THE GREATEST FILIPINO: Dr. Jose Rizal, the greatest Filipino of all times, pride of the Malay race, whose writings attacking the Catholic Church and the friars, gave spirit to the propaganda movement and paved the way to the revolution against Spain. Rizal was the first modern Asian rational humanist, whose participation in the liberation of the Philippines from the grip of oppression, equaled that of Thomas Paine whose writings inspired the 1776 revolution in the United States against the British.
LOVER OF FREEDOM: Dr.Jose Rizal, “a fervent lover of freedom, a patriot in deeds, a thinker unslaved”, is worthy of emulation. Emphasis must be given not much of the personal sides of the hero, but more to his ideas, teachings, and his philosophy as a whole, -what he died for. On the eve of his execution, Rizal finished his poem popularly known as “Ultimo Adios” or “Last Farewell” which is now considered even by Spanish literary critics as one of the most poignant poems ever written in Spanish. In closing, and as a tribute to this great man, please allow me to quote the last stanza of the poem, which goes:
“Farewell to you all, from my soul torn away,
Friends of my childhood in the home dispossessed!
Give thanks that I rest from the wearisome day!
Farewell to thee, too, sweet friend that lightened my way;
Beloved creatures all, farewell! In death there is rest.