RIZAL SEMI REV  MORGA WROTE THE PURPOSE FOR

WRITING SUCESOS
CHAPTER 5: Annotation of Antonio Morga’s - he could chronicle "the deeds achieved by our
Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas Spaniards in the discovery, conquest, and
conversion of the Filipinas Islands - as well as
 Annotation- a note of explaination or comment various fortunes that they have from time to time in
added to a text or diagram the great kingdoms and among the pagan peoples
surrounding the islands. "
 Sucesos- events, happenings, or occurences.
 Rizal argued that the conversion and
 Las Islas Filipinas- means “the Philippine conquest were not as widespread as
island” portrayed because the missionaries were only
successful in conquering a portion of the
 Sucesos de las filipinas - It is one of the population of certain Islands.
important works on the early history of the
Spanish colonization of the Philippines WHAT LEADS TO JOSE RIZAL SUCESOS DE
published in Mexico in 1609 by Antonio De LAS ISLAS FILIPINAS?
Morga
-Rizal was an earnest seeker of truth and this
- Annotated by Jose Rizal with a prologue by Dr. marked him as a historian
Ferdinand Blumentritt
He had a burning desire to know exactly the
conditions of Philippines when the Spaniards
 DR. ANTONIO DE MORGA AND HIS came ashore islands.
“SUCESOS”
His theory was that the country was
 ANTONIO DE MORGA SANCHEZ GARAY economically self-sufficient and prosperous,
(1559-1636): entertained the idea that it had a lively and
vigorous community.
-Author of Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas (1609)
He believed the conquest of the Spaniards
✣ Antonio de Morga (1559-1636) - was a Spanish contributed in part to the decline of the
historian and lawyer and a notable colonial official Philippines rich tradition and culture.
for 43 years in the Philippines, New Spain, and
Peru. He then decided to undertake the annotation of
Antonio de Morga’s Sucesos De Las Islas
- He stayed in the Philippines, then a colony of Filipinas.
Spain, from 1594 to 1604.
His. personal friendship with Ferdinand
✣ As Deputy Governor in the Philippines, he re- Bluementritt provided the inspiration for doing a
established the Audiencia and took over the new edition of Morgas Sucesos.
function of judge (“oidor”).
Devoting four months research and writing and
✣ His history is valuable in that Morga had access almost a year to get his manuscript published
to the survivors of the earliest days of the colony in Paris in January 1890.
and he, himself, participated in many of the
accounts that he rendered. Rizal Spent his entire stay in the city of London at
the Bristish Museum’s reading room.
✣ The book (Sucesos) narrates the HISTORY of Having found Morga’s books, he laboriously hand-
WARS, INTRIGUES, DIPLOMACY and copied the whole 351 pages of the Sucesos.
EVANGELAZATION of the PHILIPPINES. Rizal proceeded to annotate every chapter of the
Sucesos.
 Modern historian including RIZAL have noted
that Morga has a definite bias and would RIZAL’S ANNOTATION OF MORGA’S SUCESOS
often distort facts or even rely on invention to - His extensive annotations of Morga's work
fit his defense of the Spanish Conquest. number "no less than 639 items or almost two
annotations for every page."
- Rizal also annotated Morga's typographical
errors.
- He commented on every statement that could be events in the past in the context of contemporary
nuanced in Filipino cultural practices. ideas and mores.

 For example, on page 248 Morga describes  He perceived as the overreach of Rizal's
the culinary art of the ancient Filipinos by denunciations of Catholicism. that Rizal
recording: "... they prefer to eat salt fish which should confine his critique to the religious
begin to decompose and smell." Rizal's orders in the Philippines who spared no effort
footnotes : "This is another preoccupation of the to suppress calls for reform
Spaniards who, like any other nation in that matter
of food, loathe that to which they are not RIZAL PURPOSE OF THE MORGA’s SUCESOS
accustomed or is unknown to them… The fish that
Morga mentions does not taste better when it is  Purpose of the new edition of Morga's Sucesos:
beginning to rot; all on the contrary" it is
bagoong,and all those who have eaten it and "if the book succeeds in awakening in you the
tasted it know it is not or ought not to be rotten" consciousness of our past which has been
obliterated from memory and in rectifying what
• RIZAL’S ANNOTATION OF MORGA’S has been falsified and calumniated, I shall not
SUCESOS have labored in vain, and on such basis, little
though it may be, we can all devote ourselves to
 Rizal attacks on the church were unfair and studying the future"
unjustified because the abuses of the friars
should not be constructed to mean the RIZAL ANNOTATION
Catholicism is bad. - “The Philippines was depopulated,
improverished and retarded, astounded by
FERDINAND BLUMENTRITT metaphor sis, with no confidence in her past, still
without faith in her present and without faltering
Ferdinand Blumentritt also wrote a preface hope in the future.
emphasizing some salient points:
 RIZAL NOTATION OF MORGAS SUCESOS
- The Spaniards have to correct their erroneous - To the Filipinos: "In my "NOLI ME TANGERE" I
conception of the Filipino as children of limited commenced to sketch the present conditions
intelligence obtaining in our country.

 That there existed three kings of Spanish

delusions about the Philippines:  RIZAL’S MORGA AND VIEWS OF SUCESOS
DE LAS ISLASPFHILIIPLINIAPS PINE
1. Filipino were an inferior race HISTORY
2. Filipinos were not ready for parliamentary
representation and other reforms  Antonio De Morga -Author of Sucesos de las
3. Denial of equal rights can be compensated by islas Filipinas. Spanish lawyer and official in
strict dispensation of justice. the Philippines during the 17th century.

FERDINAND BLUMENTRITT’s PROLOGUE  This is one of the first books ever to tackle
Philippine history.
- Writing in Spanish, instead of his native German
language.  Book that describes the events inside and
outside of the country from 1493 to 1603,
- Praised Rizal's work as "scholarly and well- including the history of the Philippines.
thought out"
 Consist of 8 Chapters.
He noted that Morga's Sucesos was so rare that  Discuss the political, social and economical
"the very few libraries that have it guard it with aspects of a colonizer and the colonized
the same solicitude as if it were the treasure of the country.
Incas"
The content of the book is based on documentary
- He criticized Rizal's annotations on two counts: research, observation and personal experience
of Morga.
He first observed that Rizal had committed the
mistake of many modern historians who judged  Rizal is a secondary source of the book due to
his Annotations.
  RIZAL’S 3 PROPOSITIONS

1. The people of the Philippines had a culture on

their own, before the coming of the Spaniards

2. Filipinos were decimated, demoralized,

exploited and ruined by the Spanish colonization

3. The present state of the Philippines was not

necessarily superior to its past.

IMPORTANCE OF RIZAL’S ANNOTATIONS TO

 RIZAL’S OBJECTIVES THE PRESENT GENERATION

1. To awaken the consciousness of the - To awaken in the Filipinos the consciousness of

Filipinos regarding their glorious ways of the past our past
- To devote ourselves to studying the future
2. To correct what has been distorted about the - To first lay bare the past, in order to better judge
Philippines due to Spanish conquest the present and to survey the road trodden during
three centuries
3. To prove that Filipinos are civilized even - To prove Filipinos had a culture of their own, prior
before the coming of the Spaniards to colonization, that the Filipinos were NOT inferior
to the white man
IMPORTANT POINTS
 Sucesos De Las Islas Filipinas - is the first IMPORTANCE OF RIZAL’S ANNOTATIONS TO
book to tackle the Philippine history. THE PRESENT GENERATION

The book discusses the political, social and - To shatter the myth of the so-called “Indolence of
economical aspects of a colonizer and the the Filipinos”
colonized country. - To reduce those Filipinos who denied their native
tongue into rotten fish
The book that describes the events inside and - To seriously study Tagalog and produce a
outside of the country from 1493 to 1603, including comprehensive Tagalog dictionary
the history of the Philippines. - To embrace the generic term “Indio”, or in today’s
case, Filipino, with all its negative connotations,
 The pre-colonial Philippines already possessed and turn it into one of dignity and nobility
a Working judicial and legislative system
 Noli Me Tangere
IMPORTANT POINTS - José Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere played a crucial role
in the political history of the Philippines. Drawing
 Spanish missionaries put an end to the from experience, the conventions of the nineteenth-
baybayin Written system of the Philippines to century novel, and the ideals of European
translate their goals. liberalism, Rizal offered up a devastating critique of
a society under Spanish colonial rule.
 Our ancestors possessed a complex society
and culture filled with arts and literature.  Content
- The book, Noli Me Tangere is a fictional-
 Rizal’s Annotations historical novel. It centers around the era of the
- Philippines was NOT DESERTED and was Spanish regime, which was a hundred years ago, it
actually HABITABLE. was fictional because the main characters are only
made up but the situation, of these sufferings
Spaniards, like any other nation, treat characters and experiences were not false during
food to which they are not accustomed the Spanish colonization.
or is unknown to them with disgust.
This fish that Morga mentions is  Noli Me Tangere - means “Touch Me Not.”
bagoong (salted & fermented fish). Gospel of St. John 20:13-17 in which Jesus
appeared to Mary Magdalene and uttered “ Touch
me not, for I am not yet ascended to my Father

 Maximo Viola - savior of Noli Me

Content  Don Anastacio - commonl known
 Author’s Dedication Philippines( To My - As Filósofo Tacio (Philosopher Tasyo)
Motherland)- where Rizal dedicated the novel. Is one of the most important characters in Noli. On
the one hand, he is referred to as a
 The Social Cancer-a disease that Rizal used philosopher/sage (hence, Pilosopo Tasyo) because
to convey the condition of the Philippines. his ideas were accurate with the minds
of the townspeople.
Chapter XXV (Elias and Salome)-the chapter of the
novel Rizal removed due to financial constraints.  Doña Victorina de los Reyes de Espadaña is
the one who pretended to be a meztisa (a
 63 Chapters and an epilogue-the novel Spaniard born in the Philippines) and always
contains: dreamed of finding a Spanish husband, in
which she married Don Tiburcio.
 Juan Crisostomo Ibarra y Magsalin -
commonly called Ibarra, is Filipino-Spanish - She was feared by everyone in the town because
and the only descendant of the wealthy of her odd appearance, her ruthless personality,
Spaniard Don Rafael Ibarra. He was born and and her fierce rivalry against Donya Consolacion.
grew up in the Philippines, but during his
adolescence, spent seven years studying in  Sisa or Narcisa - is the deranged mother of
Europe. Those years prevented him from knowing Basilio and Crispin. Described as beautiful and
what was happening in his country. young, although she loves her children very
much, she can not protect them from the
 Characters in Noli MeTangere beatings of her husband, Pedro.
 María Clara de Los Santos y Alba -, is the
most dominant yet weakest representation of  Crispin - is Sisa’s 7-year-old son. An altar boy,
women in the setting. he was unjustly accused of stealing money
- She is the daughter of Capitán Tiago and Doña from the church.
Pía Alba. María Clara is known to be Ibarra's lover
since childhood.  Basilio - is Sisa’s 10-year-old son. An acolyte
tasked to ring the church bells for the Angelus,
 Dámaso Verdolagas (commonly known as he faced the dread of losing his young brother
Padre Damaso or Father Damaso), of and the descent of his mother into insanity.
Franciscan order, was the former curate of
the parish church of San Diego.  Noli Me Tangere centers around the
protagonist Juan Crisostomo Magsalin Ibarra.
- He was the curate for almost twenty years before
he was replaced by the much younger Padre Salvi.  Upon his return to the Philippines abroad. He
Padre Damaso was known to be friendly with the is first surrounded by from good friends, a
Ibarra family, so much that Crisóstomo was beautiful fiancée and a supportive Upper class,
surprised by what the former curate had done to But against Ibarra’s a priest with a vendetta late
Don Rafaél. Father torments him.

 Don Santíago de los Santos - commonly - Ibarra learns the tragic circumstances of his
known as Kapitán Tiago, is the only son of a History behind the him by the Friar father’s death
wealthy trader in Malabon. and the animosity held against Dámaso
- He became a servant of a Dominican Vardolagas.
priest. When the priest and his father died, Kapitán
Tiago decided to assist in the family business of
trading before he met his wife Doña Pía Alba, who
came from another wealthy family.

 Eliás - came from the family which the Ibarra

clan had oppressed for generations. He grew
up in a wealthy family until he discovered
something that changed his life forever.

- Despite that Ibarra's is entirely family

Subjugated his family, he indebted towards him.
In the novel’s dedication, Rizal explains that
there was once a type of cancer so terrible that
the sufferer could not bear to be touched,  The Spanish colonization of the Philippines—
and the disease was thus called noli me which began in 1521—is the driving force of Noli
tangere (Latin: “do not touch me”). He believed Me Tangere, a novel that critiques the ways in
that his homeland was similarly afflicted. which colonialism leads to corruption and abuse.

- The novel offers both a panoramic view of - The book itself predates the Philippine Revolution
every level of society in the Philippines of the of 1896 by almost ten years, meaning that its
time and droll satire. Its description of the rejection of Spanish oppression was
cruelty of Spanish rule was a catalyst for the groundbreaking and unprecedented in Filipino
movement for independence in the country. society.

- The novel offers a straightforward analysis of - Unfortunately, Rizal—who had worked for the
Philippine society under Spanish rule. The majority of his adult life to empower his
book indirectly hits the most dirty and unseen countrymen—died in 1896, two years before the
sufferings that most Filipinos experienced Philippines established independence from
during the Spanish regime. Spain.

●Noli Me Tangere gave us power, it was the seed - Meeting in the house of Pedro Paterno in
that gave us the idea to stop being ignorant and Madrid on January 4, 1884, an idea of writing a
it aroused our need for independency and novel was hatched. Rizal proposed to write a book
freedom. project to be done collaboratively with his fellow
writers. It was affirmed and welcomed by
- Rizal’s writing was created to fuel the growing
nationalism that will help the Filipinos break free - Graciano Evaristo Lopez Jaena, Antonio Paterno,
from the shackles of abuse. Aguirre Eduardo de Lete, Julio Llorente and
Valentin Ventura. Unfortunately, the project did not
- book was the catalyst to start the impending materialize. He eventually decided to write a novel
power of the Filipinos to want freedom and on his own.
independence. His work was an instrument that
unified the Filipino national identity and  Rizal finished the first half of the novel in
consciousness. Spain, supposedly the other half in France,
then completed the draft in 1886.
- Rizal depicted nationality by emphasizing the
positive qualities of Filipinos, the devotion of a  The novel was published the following year in
Filipina and her influence on a man’s life, the deep Germany. Lack of funds delayed the book’s
sense of gratitude, and the solid common sense of publication until a fellow ilustado, maximo Viola,
the Filipinos under the Spanishregime. insisted on lending him 300 pesos for the
printing of the first 2,000 copies.
 By 1887, Rizal was already sending out copies
of the Noli to his friends and the book began to
take flight.
  One staunched critic of the
novel was the Spanish academic Vicente
Barrantes who wrote several articles in Spanish
newspaper ridiculing Rizal as a “man of
contradictions.” Barrantes lamented that Rizal’s
lambasting of the friars and the Spaniards was
reflective of the author and telling more about the
Filipinos.
- Arguably the most circulated versions were the
English translation of Charles Derbyshire.

The very controversy that surrounded the

passage of the Rizal Law indicated the
relevance of the text in the 1950’s and even
beyond. As Testa De Ocampo points out, as
much as the novel is elevated in the highest
echelons of Philippine literary history, seldom do
we find Filipinos reading it in the original
Spanish.

A remarkable aspect of Rizal’s Noli lies in its

text which espoused the national hero’s
articulations of a social-scientific view of the
nineteenth century Philippines he was describing.

 Syed Farred Alatas - even went as far as

describing Rizal as
“probably the first systematic social thinker in
Southeast Asia.”

 Noli and the Study of a Colonial Society

- Many scholars interpret the Noli as Rizal’s
diagnosis of the ills of colonial society as he
assessed the role played by the church, the

- Philippine society could emancipated from the

bondage of colonial rule. He underscored the
importance of education as apoerful tool to
achieve progress.
It is thus understandable that Spanish friars
- However, he also exposed the complexities
vehemently prohibited the circulation of the
and constraints wrought by the colonial
novel in 1887 when Fray Salvador Front, chair of
condition not only on foreigners, but also on
the censorship commission, outlawed the reading
and possession of Rizal’s novel. Many other
some misguided Filipinos that contributed to the
friars assessed and judged the book as ills of society. As Rizal exposed the vile realities
pernicious. The enjoined devout Catholics not of the context he wrote about, he also
to read the novel to avoid committing capital emphasized the good qualities of the
sins. Filipinos, which needed to be harnessed in order
to succeed in the struggle for
- Noli was translated after its into emancipation.
several languages. One of the earliest
translations of the novel was done in French.
Many scholars posit that there were early
attempts to translate the novel into German (by
Blumentritt) and even Tagalog ( by Rizal’s
brother, Paciano) but these plans never came to
fruition.