Jose Protacio Rizal Mercado y Alonzo Realonda

Birthplace: Calamba, Laguna Birthdate: 19 June 1861

Place of Death: Bagumbayan, Manila Date of Death: 30 December 1896

“So short a life but so fully lived.”

The Making of a National Leader: (Sources that prepared Jose Rizal to become a national
leader)

1. The family of Jose Rizal belonged in the clase media, a member of the principalia.
Principalia could vote for town mayors, collected taxes, they had the preference in
town church and town hall, in civic and religious possessions, could wear European
jacket or wield knife and fork properly on occasion.
a. Francisco Rizal Mercado y Alejandra was described to be honest, hard-
working, and thrifty man; “a model of fathers”. A tenant of the Dominican
estate in Calamba.
i. Mercado means Market
ii. He chose to cultivate the lands leased from the Dominicans in Calamba
iii. Juan Mercado, father of Don Francisco, was a mayor of Binang for
three times.
iv. Rizal means a field where wheat, cut while still green, sprouts again.
b. Teodora Alonso Realonda y Quintos was described to be a cultured and
religious, sacrificing, industrious and a disciplinarian woman. She kept a shop
in town.
i. “My mother is not a woman of ordinary culture. She knows literature
and speaks Spanish better than I. She even corrected my poems and
gave me wise advice when I was studying rhetoric. She is a
mathematician and has read many books.”
ii. Lorenzo Alberto Alonzo, father of Dona Teodora, was a deputy for
the Philippines in the Spanish Cortes. He and his father had been
mayors of Binang.
iii. Jose Lorenzo, brother of Dona Teodora, was educated in Europe and
was a knight in the Order of Isabel the Catholic. He spoke German,
English, Spanish, and French.
iv. Manuel de Quintos, maternal grandfather of Dona Teodora, was a
well-known lawyer in Manila
c. Brother and Sisters: Saturnina 1850, Paciano 1851, Narcisa 1852, Olimpia
1855, Lucia 1857, Maria 1859, Jose 1861, Concepcion 1862, Josefa 1865,
Trinidad 1868, and Soledad 1870.
d. Indications of social status
i. House made of stone and wood
ii. Carriages and horses
iii. Agricultural business of rice and sugar
 iv. Library of more than one thousand volumes. Don Francisco had
studied in Colegio de San Jose in Manila and read both in Latin and in
Spanish
v. Abled to send their children to school in Manila
vi. Jose Rizal had an “aya”
vii. Jose Rizal had a tutor named Leon Monroy
e. The education that I received from my earliest infancy was perhaps what has
shaped my habits.
i. The fable of mother moth and the baby moth enabled Jose Rizal to
discover the meaning of the light [the lamp of reason] and the virtue of
obedience. The search for the light is worth dying for and seeing the
light gave Jose Rizal a duty to teach it to his countrymen.

2. Childhood
a. Imaginative, high-spirited and wilful child
b. When he was 9 years old, he was sent to Binang and schooled at a traditional
village school under Justiniano Aquino Cruz. Tales were told about him and
it cost him 3-6 lashes.
c. Self-assertive, dutiful and pious; self-conscious
d. He had fought with Pedro, son of the schoolmaster, and Andres Salandanan
e. Leandro, grandson of his aunt, caused Pepe to be almost drowned in a deep
river.

3. Injustice is the Eye-opener

a. The harsh treatment as well as humiliation of Spanish officials to his
townmates brought questions to Jose Rizal e.g. what have the people done to
deserve such treatment?
i. Failure to bow and doff off hats everytime one passed through Guardia
Civil suffered heavy blows.
b. Dona Teodora was sent to jail in 1871 because of a false accusation of
seeming complicity in an attempted murder. She was only freed in two and a
half years after as a reward from Gov. Gen. Rafael de Izquierdo to the 4-year
old Soledad whose graceful dancing delighted the guest.
c. Cavite uprising of 1872
i. His letter to Mariano Ponce: “… without 1872 Rizal would be a Jesuit
now and instead of writing Noli Me Tangere, would have written the
opposite.”
d. He witnessed racial prejudices among his classmates and professors while a
young student in Manila (unfavourable school atmosphere)
i. “Spare the rod and spoil the child. Children are born bad.”
ii. By dint of spanking they compelled students to learn by heart books in
a language we did not understand, prayers
iii. In college, many times the professor forgot the lessons, would
discourse on our race and our country
4. Preparation for Leadership is through study
a. Ateneo Municipal de Manila 1872-1877
i. Jose Rizal took the entrance exam for Ateneo at the Colegio de San
Juan de Letran (Christian doctrine, arithmetic and reading) and got a
passing rate.
ii. He started at the tail-end of the class but in a month, he headed the
class as emperor (basis was the knowledge of Spanish language). Race
jealousy/comparison between the whites and the browns (indios)
explained the sudden improvement of Rizal’s scholastic record.
Formula: racial pride, monastic discipline and seclusion of boarding
school life. However, he was neither a boy genius nor an unendurable
freak.
iii. Rizal was methodical, observant, careful and frugal.
iv. He was the secretary of the exclusive Marian Congregation; a
promoter of the Apostleship of Prayer
v. He admired History especially about the miseries and suffering of the
conquered in the hands of the colonizers. More so that he was
interested to philosophy, natural sciences, and literature.
vi. The humanistic method of teaching science, literature and philosophy.
It stressed the importance of memory and understanding. Lessons are
explained and recited the other day. The whole school life was
centered to chapel. Classes began and ended with prayers.
vii. He carved statuettes e.g. the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and Our Blessed
Lady. He studied sculpture from Romualdo Teodoro de Jesus and
painting.
viii. He received his degree of Bachiller en Artes (a high school
certificate) on 23 March 1877 with grades rated (all) EXCELLENT,
five prizes and several awards.
ix. He was moulded to the ideas of fairness, justice and equality, reason,
and dignity. Leaving his Alma Mater meant setting out for a bigger
task.
x. “No bullies among us for pre-eminence was won through intelligence.”
xi. Even after he graduated in Ateneo, he maintained relations with it
through his membership in the Academia of Spanish Literature of
which he became president and he was elected as secretary of the
Academy of Philosophical and Natural Sciences
xii. While he was a first year medical student in UST, he took land
tsurveying course and he passed the final examination in 1877. He got
his license when he was 22 on 25 November 1881.
xiii. “I owe a lot to this order [the Society of Jesus] almost, almost all that I
am taken to be.”
b. University of Santo Tomas 1877-1882
i. “Don’t send him to Manila any longer; he knows enough, if he gets to
know any more, they will cut off his head.”
 ii. He was not sure of what course to take. He was thinking of priesthood;
[Jesuits] farming; literature, law or medicine; [Paciano] arts or
medicine; [Don Francisco] Metaphysics.
iii. He took medicine after a year in Metaphysics and received grades of 3
passing, 8 good, 3 very good, 2 excellent. Medicine was not his real
vocation. He was unhappy with the Dominicans way of teaching
because professors played favorites and treated Filipino students with
no respect.
iv. In May 1882, he left for Spain to finish his degree to be able to cure his
mother’s failing eyesight
c. Universidad Central de Madrid
i. He enrolled in the College of Medicine and the College of Philosophy
and Letters
ii. He received his Licenciado en Medicina on 21 June 1884. 5 fair, 12
good, 4 very good, and 4 excellent
iii. He received his Licenciado en Filosofia y Letras on 19 June 1885
with a grade of Sobresaliente (Excellent). 1 good, 1 very good and 9
excellent
iv. He also enrolled in fine arts and sculpture in the Academia de San
Fernando

5. Rizal requests Spain to introduce Reforms

a. Part of the speech of Jose Rizal at the banquet honouring Juan Luna and
Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo on 25 June 1884 was the plea that Spain should
introduce the reforms he had long planned for the Philippines.
b. He wrote his first novel, Noli Me Tangere

6. After graduating in Madrid, Jose Rizal travelled in several countries in Europe for his
specialization in ophthalmology and broadening his knowledge about the life of
people in various parts of the continent.

7. He learned various languages e.g. Spanish, Catalan, Latin, Italian, Greek, Hebrew,
Arabic, French, German and English.

8. He was also acquainted with famous scholars e.g. Dr. Adolph Meyer, Dr. Friedrich
Jagor, Dr. Rudolph Virchow…

9. In July 1887, Rizal returned to the Philippines and in Calamba,

a. He started a gymnasium in which he taught gymnastics and other sports for
free to keep folks from gambling.
b. He had helped the tenant of Dominican estates through his petition to the
government dated 8 January 1888 describing that the material conditions of
 the people had gone from bad to worse. Further, he requested that the lots be
sold to the tenants under reasonable terms.

10. Rizal leaves the Philippines for the Second Time on 3 February 1888
a. Purpose: to give peace to his family and friends and continue his work for his
country.
b. He shortly passed through Hong Kong and Japan, US…

11. Between 24 May 1888 and second week of March 1888, Rizal availed himself of the
rich collection of materials on the Philippines in British Museum in London. Here, he
annotated the work of Dr. Antonio de Morga, the Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas.
This book helped him to draw the pre-colonial civilization of the Filipino and the
ruinous effect of Spanish colonization. It was published in Paris, France in 1890.

12. He wrote the Philippines a Century Hence in September 1889 during the 21st
anniversary of the Spanish Revolution and centennial revolution of the French
Revolution.

13. He initiated the organization of the Kidlat Club to enable the Filipinos to know each
other during the Paris Exposition, the Indios Bravos to defend the honor of the
Filipinos, and the exclusive Rd.L.M. (Redemption of the Malay Race) to diffuse in
the Philippines “all useful knowledge, be it scientific, artistic, literary, neither
religion nor politics has anything to do with it.”

14. Because of the Calamba Incident that resulted to confiscation of the family property,
the exile of his brothers-in-law, untold sufferings of his parents, his people’s
enslavement, his sufferings made a hundredfold heavier

15. 18 October 1891, he left for Hong Kong from Madrid. This ended his participation in
the Propaganda movement in Europe. In the ship, he met W.B. Pryer, the manager of
North Borneo Development Company, and his wife who were bound for Elok,
Pura, Borneo, and this encounter stimulated Jose Rizal interest to put up a colony in
Borneo for the oppressed Filipinos. His friendship with Dr. Marquez in Hong Kong
further spurred Rizal’s interest because he was also planning to set up a colony in
Borneo for the rehabilitation of the convicts. This interest of Jose Rizal was approved
by Juan Luna, Antonio Luna and Ariston Bautista. Jose Rizal requested to
Gov.Gen. Eulogio Despujol for permission to change his nationality and be qualified
to immigrate to North Borneo.
a. Part of his letter of request “I request your Excellency to grant us the
necessary permission to change our nationality, to sell our little property that
has been left to us by the many disturbances that we have had, and to
guarantee the immigration of all those for some reason or other have incurred
 the animadversion of more or less powerful persons who will remain in the
Philippines even after Your Excellency’s administration. No one will stain his
conscience with unjust banishments, no one will be obliged to apply harsh
punishments, the people will have fewer occasions to murmur, and the
government can say to the discontented: the doors of the country are always
open.”
b. Rizal wrote to Blumentritt about this and he said that he would not be a
planter but a leader of the planters. More so, he stressed that “If it is
impossible for me to give freedom to my country, at least I should like to give
it to those noble compatriots in other lands.”
c. The North Borneo project was not approved by the Gov. Gen.

16. While in Hong Kong, he sometimes went to the family of Jose Ma. Basa at
Rednaxela Terrace and he was introduced by the latter to some professionals e.g.
Delfino Noronha, Dr. Wenceslao Cesario de Silva… In this British colony, he
earned a living through practicing ophthalmology. He established an eye clinic.

17. Rizal conceives the La Liga Filipina

a. He drafted the constitution of the organization with the cooperation of Jose
Ma. Basa while in Hong Kong. It aimed to unite the people of the entire
archipelago into a compact body. It would provide mutual protection in every
difficulty and necessity; defend against all violence and injustice, stimulate
instruction, agriculture, and commerce; and carry out the study and application
of reforms. Its motto was “One is worth all.”
b. He founded the organization on 3 July 1892 in the home of Ongjuco in Ilaya
Street, Tondo.

18. Jose Rizal and his sister Lucia arrived in Manila on Sunday, 26 June 1892. Rizal
checked in at Hotel de Oriente. He went to meet Gov. Gen. Despujol to allow his
family return from Hong Kong to Manila.

19. Rizal is exiled and the reason was reflected in his diary: “After some conversation, he
[Gov. Gen Despujol] said that I had some handbills in my luggage. I told him no. He
said who could have been the owner of the pillows and mats. I said my sister [Lucia].
For this reason he said he was sending me to Fort Santiago.”

20. On 7 July 1892, Gov. Gen Despujol ordered the banishment of Rizal to Dapitan
because of the following charges:
(1) Publication and introduction of various books and handbills of anti-
Catholic and anti-monastic;
(2) Travelling through provinces after securing from the Gov. Gen a pardon
for his father from the penalty of deportation;
 (3) Finding in his luggage of a sheaf of leaflets entitled Pobres Frailes (poor
friars) satirizing the patient and limitless meekness of the Filipinos and containing the
usual accusations against the religious orders;
(4) Dedication of El Filibusterismo to three executed priests whom Rizal
exalted as martyrs and declaring that the country’s only salvation was separation;
(5) Rizal’s attempt to de-Catholicize or denationalize the ever-Spanish and
ever-Catholic Philippines by attacking religions and the Mother Church.

21. Rizal was detained in Fort Santiago 7-14 July 1892. On 15 July, he left for Dapitan
where he lived from 17 July 1892 to 31 July 1896.

22. In Dapitan:
a. He bought and cultivated several parcels of land. Part of the money came from
a winning lottery ticket worth 20,000 Php which was equally divided between
Rizal, Captain Ricardo Carcinero and Francisco Equilor.
b. He had partnered with another man o supply the town with fish.
c. With Don Mariano Hamoy, he engaged in buy-and-sell of hemp.
d. He established an association of Dapitan farmers to improve farm production,
obtain better and more markets; they set up a store where they could buy
prime commodities at moderate prices.
e. He treated non-paying patients as well as those who could pay. He gave
medicine to the poor.
f. He opened school where he taught Spanish, English, arithmetic, geometry and
correct behaviour e.g. obedience, self-control and discipline. He emphasized
gardening and held gymnastics.
g. He constructed a water work system, a dam to supply the town with water and
a fountain at the plaza.
h. He improved the lighting system of the town and constructed a map in front of
the church.
i. One of the excerpts from one of the letters of JR to Blumentritt: “ My exile has
lasted so long that I am beginning to lose hope of ever seeing myself free
again someday. Everybody agrees with me that I do not deserve this fate, but
they have kept me! They have their destinies… Where are conscience and
political conviction?”

23. There were many persons who wanted to help Rizal escape from being exiled but he
had promised the authorities that he would not escape. In his letter to Dr. Lourenco
P. Marquez: “Some have proposed to me to escape but as I have nothing to reproach
myself, I do not want to be called a runaway.”

24. Through the suggestion of Dr. Blumentritt, Jose Rizal applied to serve as a volunteer
physician in Cuba where there was a need for medical doctors in a revolution that had
broken between Cuba and Spain. On 30 July 1896, Rizal received an approval of his
application from Gov. Gen Ramon Blanco. On 3 September 1896, he left for Cuba.
 However, he never reached Cuba because he was ordered to return from Barcelona to
ask him if he had anything to do with the outbreak of the Philippine Revolution.

25. Rizal’s Death Is the Crowning Glory of His Leadership

a. Rizal was imprisoned in Fort Santiago on 3 November 1896.
b. The [mocked] trial was held on 26 December 1896 and the accusation was that
he formed secret societies and helped start the revolution. He was immediately
sentenced to death by the Council of War
c. Gen. Camilo G. de Polavieja approved the sentence and ordered Rizal be
shot at 7:00 o’clock on the morning of 30 December at Bagumbayan Field.
d. After he was sentenced, he was transferred from prison cell to chapel cell.
There, he wrote a letter to his parents, brother, and sisters requesting to see
him. In the second letter, he begged them forgiveness and requested them to
love one another.
e. When he was confined in Fort Santiago, he wrote his last farewell and
concealed it in the alcohol cooking stove and lamp; he gave this to Trinidad.
f. His Spanish defender was Luis Taviel de Andrade.
g. He wanted to be shot through the heart but the Captain must shoot him from
the back. He died looking at the morning sky.