Tazewell Republican. [volume] (Tazewell, Va.) 1892-1919, 1905-05-11
FILIPINO RELIGIOUS DRAMA.
The Moro-Moro Play Has Fallen Into
Disuse Excepting on Smaller
Islands.

AS q distinct class Of literary endeaV'
or, segregated from the writing and use
of either songs Of lyric or epic type
and books of all classes, the Filipino
drama dates back to about the begin
ming Of the seventeenth century, when
the first natives were beginning to write
heir wonderful plays under the super
vision of the friars who had done az
much to conquer the ''Moluoca Islands
for Spain as the recognized soldiers
These ancient braves Of faith and steel
had not been in the islands 4 year, says
the Los Angeles Herald, before they
had analyzed and classified the charac-
ter and traits Of the Moluccans, or Fill
lpinos, as they were later called, to
such an extent that they began the use
of the religious drama as the most
striking and effective means of attract
ing them to the cross.
1t was in the year 1864 that the king
of Spain issued the royal warrant es-
tablishing branch of the Augustinian
order in the Philippines and Legazpi
took Padre Urdaneta and few brother
missionaries with him when he sailed
from Mexico for the conquest OF the
Islands of gold and spice" A year
or so after the little host arrived In
the archipelago, the natives were num-
bling Ave Marias and Paters on their
rosaries, as the education Of the ma
tives progressed, and the first exam
pies were almost entirely made up OF
striking scenes from the life of Christ
followed later by dramas dealing with
the life of Mary and others Of the Cath
Ollie saints.
But some Of the natives were not en-
tirely satisfied to have the friars write
all the plays; they wanted to write as
well as to play them. 1t was not long,
therefore, until ambitious Filipino stu
dents, urged on in their holy zeal by
the Spaniards, working in the monas-
( teries under the watchful eyes OF the
monks themselves, began to turn out
dramas, which, according to Gaspar de
San Agustin and Chirino and others,
were we'll written and skillfully con-
ceived. Rendered into modern thought,
that means that the plays were gaudy
and violent meledramas, crude and
superficial in every respect, and with
small reverence for sacred subjects,
which were treated with the utmost
| familiarity.
In the period which followed the first
religious drama, once 1t was we'll estab-
lished as a permanent feature OF the
conversion of the islanders, there came
a rather lengthy interval when the plays
were not so much written by the
natives as translated and adapted from
the original Latin by the priests them
selves. After that, though the drama
Of religion had lost the first blush OF
its use and attractiveness, 1t was still
much employed by both Spanish friars
and Filipino secular priests, but the
second-of the historic-or really the
third division of the drama, counting
in the prehistoric lyric poems and songs
as the first class was the greatest, and
, in many respects the most notable.
This middle-period drama is known to
the native as the Moro-Moro play,
and deals almost entirely with inter-
tribal wars. Having been taught and
given a chance by Spain to learn OF
what the outside world did and used,
the playwrights wove in with the fabric
of their purely Filipino thought, speech
and action a curious and jumbled
strain of foreign and outlandish non
sense; kings, dukes, counts, princesses
and villains were mixed up in a weird
hodge-podge with rajahs, gats, baran-
gals and cabezas, while through all ran
the thread of the struggle between the
Christian and infidel, or Mohammedan,
factions.
It was because of this religious ele-
ment that the natives call these plays
Moro Moro. The Mohammedans, or
Moros, from Jolo and Mindanao estab-
lished themselves in Luzon and the
other islands early in the history Of
the latter, coming from Borneo orig
inally, and for some time it was
matter of armed discussion whether
Spain or the rajah of Borneo was TO
control the fertile archipelago
Of the seditious drama, the most in
teresting of all, it will be sufficient TO
cite brief examples. Hindi AGO Patay,
which means Il am not dead" refer
ring to the insurrection, Is the best
of them all, from our viewpoint, and
the writer knows many natives Of diff
ferent classes who think the same,
though they have reached the con-
clusion by very different process Of
reasoning. The story the play tells
Is simple. The heroine Is Karangalan,
the wealth and dignity Of the islands,
who is betrothed against her will to
Macamcam (ambitious), the American
government, by her scheming and mis-
erly brother, Ualang-hinayan (piti-
Iess). In the meantime, she has en-
gagged herself to Tangulan (defense),
the native who is loyal, or, in other
words. an insurrecto. Tangulan and
Macamcam fight duel, and the form
err is hard hit and carried away to
die, while Macameam gets ready 10
marry the girl, willy-nilly. BY Sc
ries of ingenious complications, the
funeral procession Of Tangulan is
brought past Karsngalan's house just
before the wedding ceremony. AS the
bier reaches the house, Tangulan, sup
posed to have died, springs up, armed,
shouting "hindi AGO patay," and the
Americans, for Maimbot, Macamcam's
father (covetous), has come to see his
son married to so desirable partie,
desist and decide, in the words Of the