Image Courtesy of the Malacang Tumblr
There is little doubt that Rizal casts a shadow over our understanding of the 19th century and the Philippine Revolution. We often see him less the inheritor, the flowering so to speak, of previous Philippine intellectual thought and movements, and more the Great Creator of Filipinas, never equaled prior or after. From a certain perspective, that of the need for heroes and heroism, its wholly appropriate; even necessary. But from another, that of nation-building and connectivity, Rizal becomes even more…compelling and resonant.
This leads me to wonder: Why should heroes remain historically static? That’s one of the issues that pervades our popular understanding of the past. We have a tendency to enforce artificially constructed dichotomies. This is a trap, one that I readily admit I fall into at times. In the case of Rizal, we argue in binary simplicities: Reformist vs Revolutionary or, perversely, Bonifacio vs Rizal. Even something as inane as Hero vs Villain. We seem to want to (erroneously) compartmentalize our Heroic Pantheon. History operates in the margins, the shades of grey (to use an expression that has unfortunately become salacious). History is not stark, like those old black and white photographs we love to admire. It’s full of shading and mysteries; little possibilities that tease the imagination and make us wonder: What more? What happened? What does it mean?
For students of history, that is the allure of its study. The idea that in the past we can find explanations and answers to the present condition. That is also its inherent trap: This demand to apply the current condition to the past leads us to often times erroneous conclusions. Methodology and evidence are the fundamental foundation of any historical conclusions; unfortunately those are sometimes substitutes for ideology and preconceived notions of right and wrong. One idea worth considering is that every generation must re-engage with the past; it has to look at our shared history with new eyes and draw new conclusions that help retain and maintain relevance.
For me, one of the more compelling, even beautiful, aspects of Rizal’s works is his idea, his fervent belief, that there are connections and relationships between all Filipinos. Even as he satirized our society, he was pointing us towards a future where we worked together, bled and lived together, all to construct something new and hopeful and wonderful. It is an idea that crosses socio-economic boundaries and even nation-states. In a way, I think Rizal was a wide-eyed optimist; underneath the sarcasm and much needed critical nature beat the heart of a man who dreamed of better and brighter tomorrows. He knew he would never live to see them, but I firmly believe he knew one day those who came after would. With all of the intricacies and complexities of the modern world, that relatively untapped resonance in Rizal’s works becomes vitally important. It seems that we are constantly fighting a battle between a perceived need for insularity (driven by pseudo-nationalism) and a desire to connect more deeply with the rest of the world. Within that tension though there exists an intersection between defining the self and nation and connecting to the global community. Rizal was driven by a need to construct a new vision of the Philippines grounded in a reconsideration of our historical past. An intriguing idea still today.
Despite our fascination with Rizal, there is so much of him and his ideas left unengaged. There are a many different interpretations of Rizal, all worthy in their own way: Rizal the Humanist, the Historian, the Social Critic, or the Political Philosopher. That is part of his brilliance, these undiscovered countries hidden within his writings. That is why he and his works, even after over a century and a half after his death, remain so fresh and intriguing. And while he will continue to be important far into the future.
