The greatest contribution that Rizal had given to the Philippines was his passionate

dissemination of his idea of a nation to the Filipino people. His writings, most especially the
novels Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo, were designed to open the eyes of the Filipinos
to the abuse they have been receiving from the Spaniards in their own homeland. These
writings sparked the nationalist in many Filipinos. Their love for the country reawakened after
centuries of being dormant because of oppression by the Spaniards.

For three centuries, the Filipinos have suffered under the Spanish colonization: forced to
work long and heavy shifts without pay, sent to different faraway places to fight in the name of
Spain, taxed higher than how much they were actually paid. Rizal, after studying abroad for
some time, compared the life of the colonies of other European countries to the life of the
Filipinos under Spanish rule. He had observed that other European colonies had a better life
and condition than the Filipinos, which he thought was unfair. This, along with the nationalistic
teachings of his brother Paciano when he was younger, may have contributed to his aspiration
to build a nation out of the Filipinos.

Being one of the elite ilustrados, Rizal tried his hardest to reach out to the common
people through his writings. He wrote numerous poems, essays, plays, and novels. He poured
his heart out every time he wrote, which made each work a personal one that effectively tugged
on the heartstrings of the Filipinos.

El Amor Patrio (Love of Country) was Rizals first literary piece to be published. He
wanted to awaken the Filipinos love for the country and desire for freedom from the Spaniards
through a deeply emotional approach. He compared the love of the people for their homeland
to the love of children for their mother, great in the best and even in the worst of times. That the
people would feel greatly privileged to suffer for the sake of their homeland:

Must it not be some magic spell which ties our heart to the native soil, beautifies and embellishes
all the land, as it presents to us all objects as full of poetry and feeling and captures our
affections? For whatever be the visage of the beloved country we always love her as children
even in hunger and poverty.

And how strange it is! The poorer and more miserable we are and the more we suffer for our
country, so much more do we venerate and adore her even to the point of finding joy in our
suffering.
 In Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not), Rizal showed the maltreatment the Filipinos
received from the Spanish colonizers. He also exposed how corrupt the Spanish government
and Catholic Church were in taking over the country, and the injustices that the natives
received. He revealed just how cruel the Spaniards can be, even to children. In chapter 15,
entitled The Sacristans, Crispin was accused of stealing two gold pieces, and was punished
terribly:

The senior sacristan struck his hand away and jerked at Crispin, who began to weep as he fell to
the floor, crying out to his brother, Dont leave me, theyre going to kill me!

The sacristan gave no heed to this and dragged him on to the stairway. As they disappeared
among the shadows below Basilio stood speechless, listening to the sounds of his brothers body
striking against the steps. Then followed the sound of a blow and heartrending cries that died
away in the distance.

Rizal had also explained why the Filipinos have been silent for centuries, and that they will
one day stand up to a great extent to their oppressors when they have had enough. In Noli Me
Tangere, chapter 25 entitled In the House of the Sage, in the character of Pilosopo Tasyo:

This people does not complain because it has no voice, it does not move because it is lethargic,
and you say that it does not suffer because you havent seen how its heart bleeds. But some day
you will see this, you will hear its complaints, and then woe unto those who found their strength
on ignorance and fanaticism! Woe unto those who rejoice in deceit and labor during the night,
believing that all are asleep! When the light of day shows up the monsters of darkness, the
frightful reaction will come. So many sighs suppressed, so much poison distilled drop by drop, so
much force repressed for centuries, will come to light and burst!

To the contemporary Philippine society, Rizals works are still relevant. His proposed
reforms for each aspects of the state are what the Philippines should continue to strive for. The
Philippine government, for example, has the primary function of promoting the welfare of its
citizens and constituents. In El Filibusterismo, Rizal wrote, in the character of Isagani:

Governments are established for the welfare of the peoples, and in order to accomplish this
purpose properly they have to follow the suggestions of the citizens, who are the ones best
qualified to understand their own needs.

Rizal believed that for a nation to be progressive and in harmony, the government and
the people should be in cooperation. A stupid government is an anomaly among
righteous people, just as a corrupt people cannot exist under rules and wise laws. Like people,
like government. A government that needs the support of the people must continue to have an
open and free dialogue with the people. (Quintal, 2014). Rizal, being a true reformer, believed
that force is not needed to change governments.

Rizal also emphasized the importance of education, not just of the youth, but of all
Filipinos. In The Indolence of the Filipinos, Rizal wrote:

Finally, passing over many other more or less insignificant reasons, the enumeration of which
would be interminable, let us close this dreary list with the principal and most terrible of all: the
education of the native.

From his birth until he sinks into his grave, the training of the native is brutalizing, depressive and
antihuman (the word 'inhuman' is not sufficiently explanatory: whether or not the Academy admit
it, let it go). There is no doubt that the government, some priests like the Jesuits and some
Dominicans like Padre Benavides, have done a great deal by founding colleges, schools of
primary instruction, and the like. But this is not enough; their effect is neutralized. They amount to
five or ten years (years of a hundred and fifty days at most) during which the youth comes in
contact with books selected by those very priests who boldly proclaim that it is an evil for the
natives to know Castilian, that the native should not be separated from his carabao, that he
should not have any further aspirations, and so on; five to ten years during which the majority of
the students have grasped nothing more than that no one understands what the books say, not
even the professors themselves perhaps; and these five to ten years have to offset the daily
preachment of the whole life, that preachment which lowers the dignity of man, which by degrees
brutally deprives him of the sentiment of self-esteem, that eternal, stubborn, constant labor to bow
the native's neck, to make him accept the yoke, to place him on a level with the beast--a labor
aided by some persons, with or without the ability to write, which if it does not produce in some
individuals the desired effect, in others it has the opposite effect, like the breaking of a cord that is
stretched too tightly.

Without education and liberty, that soil and that sun of mankind, no reform is possible, no
measure can give the result desired.

Rizals ideas on education was relevant to the Philippines then and now, as it is relevant in
any other country where people desire to improve the quality of their lives. It will be to their
benefit if Filipinos and everyone else, particularly those who are still young, to listen and heed
Rizals advice on education: read, read, and learn. Education will elevate them to new heights
and become not only active, but also recognized partners, in the art of government and
every community activity (Quintal, 2014).
References:

Quintel, M.B. (2014) The Universality of Rizals Ideas and Its Relevance to Filipinos Today.
Retrieved from http://www.taukappaphi.com/articles/the-universality-of-rizals-ideas-and-its-
relevance-to-filipinos-today/

Rizal, J.P. (1996, English) El Amor Patrio [Love of country]. Philippine Studies. Original work
published 1882.

Rizal, J.P. (1912, English) El Filibusterismo [The reign of greed]. (C. Debyshire, Trans.) Project
Gutenberg. Original work published 1891.

Rizal, J.P. (2004, English) Sobre la indolencia de los Filipinos [The indolence of the Filipino].
Project Gutenberg. Original work published 1890.

Rizal, J.P. (2007, English) Noli Me Tangere [The social cancer] (C. Debyshire, Trans.). Project
Gutenberg. Original work published 1887.
 Three authors, namely: Floro Quibuyen, John Schumacher, and Renato Constantino,
each has their own opinion and views on Rizals idea of a nation. Among these three,
Constantino was the least accurate. Quibuyen and Schumacher both have perspectives that
were in line with Rizals works.

According to Constantino, Rizal was an anti-revolutionary. Constantinos claims at the

start of Veneration were deceiving to those who have heard and read this lecture. He had
offered a choice between a national hero and a revolutionary leader. In the histories of many
nations, the national revolution represents a peak of achievement, Constantino writes, It is not
to be wondered at, therefore, that almost always the leader of that revolution becomes the
principal hero of his people. He then offers mostly martial examples: Washington, Lenin
(writing in 2010, I am tempted to ask, of the Soviet what?), Bolivar, Sun Yat-sen, Mao, Ho Chi
Minh. In his writing, he had said almost always, meaning there are exceptions. Moreover, he
had the assumption that a nations principal hero is the leader that had scaled the peak of the
revolutionary achievement. In other words, if there are exceptions, then why not count Rizal as
one (Nery, 2010)?

In Veneration without Understanding, he had cited Rizals manifesto from December

15, 1896, in which Rizal declared:

From the very beginning, when I first had notice of what was being planned, I opposed it, fought
it, and demonstrated its absolute impossibility.

I did even more. When later, against my advice, the movement materialized, of my own accord I
offered my good offices, but my very life, and even my name, to be used whatever way might
seem best, toward stifling the rebellion; for convinced of the ills which it would bring, I considered
myself fortunate if, at any sacrifice, I could prevent such misfortune I have written also (and I
repeat my words) that reforms, to be beneficial, must come from above, and those which comes
from below are irregularly gained and uncertain.

Holding these ideas, I cannot do less than condemn, and I do condemn this uprising-which
dishonors us Filipinos and discredits those that could plead our cause. I abhor this criminal
methods and disclaim all part in it, pitying from the bottom of my heart the unwary that have been
deceived into taking part in it.

According to Constantino, Rizal repudiated the one act that really synthesized our
nationalist aspiration, and yet we consider him a nationalist leader. That one act is the
revolution of 1896. Constantino seemed to infer that the Philippines is not fully a nation by
choosing Rizal as the principal hero.

While it is unarguable that Rizal was against Bonifacios revolutionary movement,

however, Constantino had offered false choices, that either Rizal supported the revolution or
that the said movement is a disgrace for the Filipinos fight against Spain, when in fact Rizal was
for the revolution but it was not the right time yet. A prematurely acquired independence will not
result to good, but its complete opposite. The people should first be educated, and then only
fight when they had a clear idea of they were fighting for, when they know what the implications
and responsibilities of freedom and independence will bring, and when they are ready to accept
these responsibilities. Rizal had given emphasis on this in the final chapter of El Filibusterismo,
in the character of Father Florentino:

Our ills we owe to ourselves alone, so let us blame no one. If Spain should see that we were
less complaisant with tyranny and more disposed to struggle and suffer for our rights, Spain
would be the first to grant us liberty, because when the fruit of the womb reaches maturity woe
unto the mother who would stifle it! So, while the Filipino people has not sufficient energy to
proclaim, with head erect and bosom bared, its rights to social life, and to guarantee it with its
sacrifices, with its own blood; while we see our countrymen in private life ashamed within
themselves, hear the voice of conscience roar in rebellion and protest, yet in public life keep
silence or even echo the words of him who abuses them in order to mock the abused; while we
see them wrap themselves up in their egotism and with a forced smile praise the most iniquitous
actions, begging with their eyes a portion of the bootywhy grant them liberty? With Spain or
without Spain they would always be the same, and perhaps worse! Why independence, if the
slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow? And that they will be such is not to be doubted,
for he who submits to tyranny loves it.

Seor Simoun, when our people is unprepared, when it enters the fight through fraud and force,
without a clear understanding of what it is doing, the wisest attempts will fail, and better that they
do fail, since why commit the wife to the husband if he does not sufficiently love her, if he is not
ready to die for her?

On one hand, according to Schumacher, Rizal strived for a gradually acquired

independence through assimilation, reform, and education for the Filipinos. In his text, Rizal
and Filipino Nationalism: A New Approach, Schumacher stated:
 Selective, even dishonest, use of Rizals writings has enabled the vulgar Marxists to present
reformism, which Rizal at times saw as a possible partial means to his overall vision of an
independent, fully formed nation, as if it was his true goal, which it never was.

I would add, however, as I have argued in my books, that I would not classify Del Pilar as as a
mere reformist or assimilationist. For him too, the goal was eventual independence, but, unlike
Rizal, he believed that the effective strategy was to aim first at assimilation.

Rizal, and also Bonifacio within the narrower limits of his vision, sought to prepare the Filipino
people for a true national community. Then, the rest would follow. As Rizal has Padre Florentino
put it in the end of the Fili, when a people reaches that height, God provides the weapon, and the
idols fall like a house of cards and liberty shines with the dawn. Del Pilar thought to work through
Spaniards; Rizal and Bonifacio, only through Filipinos there is the difference.

These statements, with Father Florentinos words in El Filibusterismo, support that Rizal
did support the revolution, he just did not think that the Philippines was not ready for it yet.

On the other hand, according to Quibuyen (as cited in Schumacher, 2000), Rizals nation
is one of a nonracial, of one language and culture, and an ethical community, whose members
are bound by a common good:

It is not hard for Quibuyen to show that such was not the case for Rizal, who did not make
distinctions based on the varying ethnic percentage of his fellow-Filipinos, and rather than erasing
the past, embraced all who loved the country of their birth.

In El Filibusterismo, it was mentioned that a nation must speak a single native tongue, and
it must not be Castilian. In chapter 7, which was entitled Simoun, Basilio had said to Simoun
that the knowledge of Castilian may bind them to the government; in exchange it may also unite
the islands among themselves. Simoun disagreed and said:

A gross error! You are letting yourselves be deceived by big words and never go to the
bottom of things to examine the results in their final analysis. Spanish will never be the general
language of the country, the people will never talk it, because the conceptions of their brains and
the feelings of their hearts cannot be expressed in that languageeach people has its own
tongue, as it has its own way of thinking! What are you going to do with Castilian, the few of you
who will speak it? Kill off your own originality, subordinate your thoughts to other brains, and
instead of freeing yourselves, make yourselves slaves indeed! Nine-tenths of those of you who
pretend to be enlightened are renegades to your country! He among you who talks that language
 neglects his own in such a way that he neither writes nor understands it, and how many have I
not seen who pretended not to know a single word of it!

But fortunately, you have an imbecile government! While Russia enslaves Poland by forcing the
Russian language upon it, while Germany prohibits French in the conquered provinces, your
government strives to preserve yours and you in return, a remarkable people under an incredible
government, you are trying to despoil yourselves of your own nationality! One and all you forget
that while a people preserves its language, it preserves the marks of its liberty, as a man
preserves his independence while he holds to his own way of thinking. Language is the thought
of the peoples. Luckily, your independence is assured; human passions are looking out for that!

What Rizal was pointing out in the dialogue was that the Spanish gave the Filipinos an
opportunity to preserve their language, and along with this was their culture, and they still
wanted to learn Castilian and just set their own language aside. According to Rizal, the people
who preserve their language and culture have already secured their independence from their
oppressors.

In El Amor Patrio, Rizal had written the common good that would bind the Filipinos
together: for the good of the country. He wanted the Filipinos to love the country dearly,
because it deserves that much. Rizal wrote:

Whatever be then our situation, let us love her and wish her nothing but her good. Thus we will
work for the end which God has wished for all humankind, universal harmony and peace in all
creation.

You who have lost father or mother or brother or spouse or child, or a beloved on whom you
were building your dreams, and find them within yourselves nothing but a vast and terrifying
emptiness: here is your own country, love her as she deserves.

Love her, yes, not in the ways of old through rough deeds rejected and condemned by genuine
morality and mother nature, but rather by doing away with all display of fanaticism,
destructiveness, and cruelty. The rosy dawn rises in the horizon, scattering sweet and quiet rays
of light, harbinger of life and peace the true dawn of Christianity announcing happy and tranquil
days. It is our duty to tread the hard but peaceful and productive paths of science which lead to
progress and ultimately to the union which Jesus Christ wished and prayed for in the night of his
passion.
References:

Constantino, R. (1969) Veneration without understanding. Retrieved from

http://www.academia.edu/7560817/Veneration_without_Understanding_Does_Rizal_deserv
e_to_be_our_national_hero

Nery, J. (2010) Column: Renato Constantinos false choices. Newsstand. Retrieved from
https://johnnery.wordpress.com/2010/12/30/column-renato-constantinos-false-choices/

Rizal, J.P. (1996, English) El Amor Patrio [Love of country]. Philippine Studies. Original work
published 1882.

Rizal, J.P. (1912, English) El Filibusterismo [The reign of greed]. (C. Debyshire, Trans.) Project
Gutenberg. Original work published 1891.

Schumacher, J.N. (2000), Rizal and Filipino Nationalism: A New Approach. Philippine Studies
vol. 48, no. 4: 549-571