THE RIZAL RETRACTION - FR. VICENTE BALAGUER’s Account PDF

Preview

Summary

Did he or Didn’t? That’s the questionTHE RIZAL RETRACTIONFR. VICENTE BALAGUER’s Account [first written in 1917 in Spain] (Primary)At about ten o’clock in the morning [December 29, 1896], Father Vilaclara and I went to Fort Santiago, where the chapel cell of the convict was. He received us with great...

Description

Did he or Didn’t? That’s the question THE RIZAL RETRACTION

FR. VICENTE BALAGUER’s Account [first written in 1917 in Spain] (Primary)

At about ten o’clock in the morning [December 29, 1896], Father Vilaclara and I went to Fort Santiago, where the chapel cell of the convict was. He received us with great affection and embraced us. I think it convenient to point out that when the Archbishop sent his commission to the Ateneo, he remarked that, in case of conversion, before ministering the Sacraments to him, Dr. Rizal should make a retraction of errors publicly professed to him in words and writings and a profession of the Catholic faith. To this effect, when the Father Superior of the Mission went to the Archbishop’s Palace, he brought by way of precaution a retraction and profession of faith, concise, but including what he thought out to be extracted from Dr. Rizal. The Prelate read it, and declared it to be sufficient. He said, however, that he would prepare or order to prepare another more extensive one. Before going to the Fort, I went to the Palace in order to receive orders and instructions from the Prelate. The Archbishop gave me the formula of retraction and profession of faith, composed by Reverend Father Pio Pi…. Therefore, when we, the two Fathers, met him in the chapel, after exchanging greetings with him and talking on various matters, I, who knew the history and errors contained in his books, in order to fulfil our delicate mission asked Rizal to give an explanation of his ideas on religion…. He came to say more or less explicitly that his rule of faith was the word of God contained in the Sacred Scripture. I tried to make him see how false and indefensible such a criterion was, inasmuch as without the authority of the Holy Scripture or of the books truly revealed by God; how absolutely impossible it is for the individual reason to interpret at his will the word of God. Then he declared himself openly a rationalist freethinker, unwell to admit any other criterion of truth than individual reason. I then pointed out to him that absurdity of rationalism for the lack of instruction of the immense majority of humankind, and for the absurd monstrous errors professed by the greatest sages of paganism…. When I attacked him with the arguments of Catholic doctrine, he began to expound the objections of the heretics and rationalists, a thousand times refuted already…. When I attacked him with the logic and evidence of Catholic truth, I told him with energy that if he did not yield his mind and his reason for the sake of faith, he would soon appear for judgment before God and would surely be damned. Upon hearing this threat, tears gushed from his eyes, and he said: “No I will not damn myself”. “Yes,”—I replied—“You will go to hell, for, whether you like it or not. Yes; out of the Catholic Church there is no salvation. Truth is and cannot be but one”…. At three o’clock or a little past three, I returned to the Royal Fort where Father Vilaclara had remained, and I resumed the discussion with Dr. Rizal, that lasted until dusk, arriving at the point which I have already indicated. Then I went to the Ateneo and thence I went with Father Viza to the Palace. There I reported on the condition of the convict, who offered some hope for conversion, since he had asked for the formula of retraction. Hence, I requested the Prelate for the formula he had promised, and he told me that it was not yet finished. Soon he would sent it to me.

I was already night when I arrived at the Fort. I found Dr. Rizal impatient. He asked for the formula of the Prelate. This came at last, at about ten o’clock; upon knowing it, the convict asked me for it insistently. Without letting me read it first, he called and asked me to read it to him. Both of us sat at a desk, where there was stationery and I began to read it. Upon hearing the first paragraph, he told me: “Father, do not proceed. That style is different from mine. I cannot sign that, because it should be understood that I am writing it myself”. I brought out then the shorter and more concise formula of Father Pi. I read the first paragraph and he said to me: “That style is simple as mine. Don’t bother, Father, to read it all. Dictate what I ought to profess and express, and I shall write, making in any case some remarks”. And thus it was done. As I suggested the idea, he proceeded to write with steady hand and clear letters, making at times some observation or adding some phrase. Certainly, after the discussion, Dr. Rizal was yielding to the impulse of grace, since he had retired into himself and prayed as he had promised. Thus he appeared to be while writing his retraction…. He finished the writing, and thus it remained. It has half past eleven; it was dated December the twenty-ninth…. This declaration or retraction was signed together with Dr. Rizal by Senor Fresno, Chief of the Picket, and Senor Moure, Adjutant of the Plaza…. After all these acts,… he knelt down of his own accord before the altar of the Virgin, placed in the chapel cell. In the presence of the Fathers, of the Judge Advocate, of the Chief of the Picket, of the Adjutant of the Plaza, of three artillery officers, Rizal asked me for his retraction and profession of faith. He proceeded to read it with pause and devotion…. Of all that has been narrated, I am positive by personal knowledge, I have personally intervened and witnessed it myself; and I subscribe and confirm it with an oath. And lest, perhaps, someone may think that I could not remember it with so many details, after twenty years, I testify that on the very day of Rizal’s death I wrote a very detailed account of everything. The original of this account I have preserved, and from it I have taken all the data of the present narration. Before Rizal reached Bagumbayan, I went to the Ateneo and delivered the aforementioned document to Father Pio Pi, who that very day brought it to the Palace and handed it to Archbishop Nozaleda.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Fr. Pio Pi’s Statement [affidavit issued in 1917] (Secondary)

On the eve of the day when Dr. Rizal was put in the chapel, that is, on December the twentyeight, I received the commission, which Archbishop Nozaleda entrusted to the Jesuit Fathers, for the spiritual care of the convict. We accept it most eagerly, not only because it came from the venerable Prelate, but especially because of its object was to reconcile with God and with the Church, and to save the soul of him who had our very distinguished and dear pupil. Rizal had always preserved for us, the Jesuits, a special esteem and affection even after his estrangement from the Church and had rendered us good service…. Even though I myself, who had not been acquainted personally with Rizal, did not visit him. All the Fathers who remained with him during his stay in the chapel or who accompanied him to Bagumbayan, the place of the execution, went there at my request or with my knowledge, and they kept me informed of all the happenings…. In regard to conversion, at the beginning not a little difficulty was found in convincing and persuading him. A long discussion, to which he maintained principally with Father Balaguer, became necessary in order to revive in that soul the faith of old and his Christian sentiments. At last, he surrendered so willingly and so completely, and the proofs of religiousness and piety were such and so many that, with much less, the most exacting person would have been satisfied. He was right indeed when he said, wondering at the change wrought in himself, that he was the Rizal of some time ago, but another entirely different…. When the retraction was to be subscribed to, he found certain objections in the form of the composition presented by Father Balaguer, the one sent by the Archbishop. The one which I had made was shorter although conclusive, and this pleased him. Nevertheless, to make it appear more of his own and spontaneous, he wished to introduce some little modifications. He wrote it entirely in his own hand and signed in with a steady hand… Beneath Rizal’s signature, the Chief of the Picket, Juan del Fresno, and the Adjutant of the Plaza, Eloy Moure, also signed as witnesses. Not satisfied with signing so explicit an adjuration, Rizal himself, without pressure from anyone, took into his hands his own document and knelt down before the altar of the chapel. Aloud and slowly, and even with a certain solemnity, he read his own retraction… xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Rafael Palma’s Criticisms [from Biografia de Rizal, 1949, chapters 32 and 33]

For the first time in this work, those who should have spoken from the beginning because of their direct intervention in the act of conversion and retraction of Rizal, speak and confirm in all its parts the narrative which appeared in 1897 in Rizal y su Obra. That should be conclusive; but that is not. All the declarations therein cited are those of ecclesiastics and their friends, and it is to be supposed that all of the latter would not contradict the version given by the former. The only testimony that might be considered impartial is that of Taviel de Andrade, the defence counsel of Rizal, but his testimony to the conversion of Rizal is mere hearsay, that is to say, what he heard the priests say, and that diminishes its value very much. We must consider the weight and value of these testimonies which to be partial and interested. We do not ignore the respect that is due to the sacred character of said persons; but as Brutus said, “You are a friend, but truth is a greater friend”. Lastly, we must consider whether the coetaneous acts performed by the ecclesiastical authorities or by the government are in accord with the belief that Rizal had been converted for if they are not, they would not produce the moral evidence that is needed. Well, then, these acts tend to demonstrate that Rizal was not reconciled with the Catholic church, judging from the way they treated him after his death. In the first place, the document of retraction was kept secret so that no one except the authorities was able to see it at that time. Only copies of it were furnished the newspapers, but, with the exception of one person, nobody saw the original. In fact, this original was kept in such a way that it was not found until after thirty years had transpired. In the second place, when the family of Rizal asked for the original of said document or a copy of it as well as a copy of the certificate of canonical marriage with Josephine Bracken, both petitions were denied. In the third place, Rizal’s burial was kept secret, the cadaver having been delivered to the members of a Catholic association friendly to the friars instead of being delivered to the family, who had claimed it. How is Christian charity applied to one who dies within the Church if not even the desire of this family to bury him on their own account is respected? In the fourth place, in spite of what Rizal meant to the Filipinos and of what his conversion meant, no masses were said for his soul or funeral held by the Catholics. In the fifth place, notwithstanding (the claim) that Rizal was reconciled with the Church, he was not buried in the Catholic cemetery of Paco but in the ground without any cross or stone to mark his grave. Only the diligence of the family was able to identify the spot where he was buried. In the sixth place, the entry in the book burials of the internment of Rizal’s body is not made on the page with those buried on December 30, 1896, where there were as many as six entries, but on a special page wherein appear those buried by special orders of the authorities. Thus, Rizal figures on a page between a man who burned to death and who could not be identified and another who died by suicide; in other words, he was considered among persons who died impenitent and did not receive spiritual aid. In the seventh and last place, there was no moral motive for the conversion. The extraordinary or abnormal acts of a person are always to some reason or rational motive. What was the motive that could have induced him; to adjure masonry and reconcile himself to the rites of the religion which he had fought? Did he not realize that to do so was to be a renegade to his own history? Rizal was a man of character and he had demonstrated it in his many circumstances of his life. He was not likely to yield his ideas because his former preceptors and teachers talked to him. They did it in Dapitan and did not obtain any result. Why would he renounce his religious ideas for a few hours more of life?

++++++++ In short, Rizal’s conversion was a pious fraud to make the people belive that that extraordinary man broke down and succumbed before the Church which he had fought. The Archbishop was interested in his conversion for political motives, and the Jesuits lent themselves as his instrument. The example of Rizal would have great resonance in the whole country and it was necessary to bolster the drooping prestige of religion with his abjuration. What if Rizal was a man of valour and convictions and his conversion would be unbelievable? So much the better. The interest of religion was above him. His aureole of glory had to be done away with if necessary. What did it matter? He was only an indio. Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Austin Coates’s Analysis [done in Rizal: Philippine Nationalist and Martyr, 1956]

The morning after the execution the newspapers of Manila and Madrid recorded the event, and announced that on the eve of his death, Rizal had retracted his religious errors, adjured freemasonry, and in the last hours of his life had married Josephine Bracken. In most newspapers the text of a letter of retraction supposedly written by Rizal was printed in full. By the government the announcement was sent to Spanish consulates abroad with the request to obtain for it the widest possible publicity. Those who had read Rizal’s books or who knew him closely, which at that time meant the family and his wide circle of personal friends, most of whom were abroad, took one look at the announcement and dubbed it… an ecclesiastical fraud. While unquestionably a fraud, however, to suggest that the Archbishop’s announcement was issued knowingly, or that there was a plot among the higher ecclesiastical authorities to perpetrate a fraud is going too far. The nature of society within the church, the society of priests, is such as to render it virtually impossible for such things to happen. When frauds occur, they are not the planned work of the church as an organization, though this may be what it looks like to outsiders; they are usually the work of a small man with his own idea; and the Church, if unwittingly it accepts the fraud as genuine, has to protect him. Rizal believed that there was a strong likelihood of fraud, and that the prime mover in this would be the friar archbishop. It was the friars who wanted his retraction. But while in the event Rizal’s intuition did not play him false, there is no evidence to implicate Nozaleda. Along came a small man with what the Archbishop wanted. Balaguer had the intelligence to perceive that everything depended on the speed and audacity with which he declared his success. The Archbishop was waiting for a retraction, hoping for it. When news of it came he would announce it immediately, after which it would be too late for any of Balaguer’s colleagues to gainsay it. Certainly there was no signed letter of retraction. Rizal knew too well the damage such a letter would do him, besides which he believed before God he had nothing to retract…. Finally, there is the minor point that in view of the public disbelief the Archbishop’s statement provoked, had there been a signed retraction letter it would certainly have been produced for inspection, particularly to the Rizal family, who asked to see it, and to many of whom—to Teodora Alonso in particular—it would have been a source of consolation. Once the execution was over, and Vilaclara and March returned to be faced with Balaguer’s claims, the fraud was apparent to the Jesuits, but it was already too late to rectify matters. What appears with complete certainty is that neither Pio Pi y Vidal nor any of the Jesuits of probity believed that Rizal had retracted and died confessed. Had Vilaclara and March, who were with Rizal at his execution, been satisfied that there had been a retraction, it is inconceivable that they would not have given him Christian burial. The Jesuits had been entrusted by the Archbishop with the spiritual care of the condemned man; and it was their responsibility, if they were satisfied that he had died confessed, to see he was decently buried. This the two Jesuits at the execution did not do…. The Rizal family found it difficult to accept either the retraction or the marriage. They knew their brother; they knew that if he had retracted he would certainly have so in his 6 a.m. communication to his mother, knowing the consolation it would have given her.

Difficulties began as disbelief spread, and they were deepened by Balaguer’s urge to elaborate and to see himself publicly praised. As he affirmed on oath in 1909, he settled down that very night, 29 December, to write his account, in which, since he intended it to be published anonymously, he included much praise of himself, an aspect which, since he admitted the authorship, renders him a sorry and rather absurd figure…. Balaguer had in fact damaged the Church’s case. Worse than this, he had unwittingly revealed his own fraud. In his account, he made no mention of the Ultimo Adios. That Rizal on the night of the 29th wished to write verses Balaguer knew; he told a journalist about it. But when the following morning only letters, books and an alcohol burner remained to be disposed of by the authorities, he erroneously concluded that no poem had been written and thus made no mention of it in his account, thereby revealing the truth, which was that he was not within Fort Santiago during the middle of that last night, and had no knowledge of what was then taking place… Not only did Balaguer in his account not mention the poem; he made his account so elaborate that Rizal is allowed no time in which to write; and only a glance at the Ultimo Adios is needed to show that it would have taken several hours to write…. XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Rizal Retraction-Two Sides of the Argument: PRO/AFFIRMATIVE

ANTI/NEGATIVE/CONS

A. Rizal retracted Masonry and returned to Catholicism B. Fr. Vicente Balaguer’s account was true/authentic/trustworthy

a. Rizal remained a Mason till the end b. Fr. Balaguer’s account on convincing Rizal to retract was grossly exaggerated and/or doubtful c. The retraction letter was either forged or fake

C. The retraction letter Rizal wrote and signed is authentic/genuine/real…HIS actual writing. D. The marriage of Rizal and his “dulce estranjera” Josephine Bracken took place by Fr. Balaguer after the retraction. E. Elevated Rizal’s heroism to greater heights.

d. There was no marriage between Rizal and Bracken happened whatsoever e. Why would Rizal turn over his convictions/principles in the last moments of his life? f. If Rizal returned to Catholicism, why he was buried on an unmarked grave in Paco Cemetery and without proper Catholic burial rituals/blessings?

NOTES: a. But still, Rizal was executed just the same; b. 1935, the alleged Rizal retraction letter surfaced in public; c. Despite the content analysis of handwriting experts and even Rizal specialists like Austin Craig, Teodoro M. Kalaw (a Mason himself), and Otley Beyer, doubts/scepticism remained/remain; d. The most controversial Rizal issue in Rizalian scholarship since the American period (1900s-1946) up to the 1960s. Renato Constantino created the debate of who’s the better national hero, Rizal or Andres Bonifacio that still persists now. e. Thus, the controversy remains unresolved…....