Jose Rizal

(La Solidaridad, Amor Patrio)

* Laong Laan ("Kept in reserve for a purpose for a long time.")

(La Solidaridad)

* May Pagasa ("There is Hope")

## Professional Information

### Occupation

Author, Poet, Revolutionary, Polymath, Scientist, Ophthalmologist, Novelist, Journalist, Visual artist,

### Position

Pambasang Bayani ng Pilipinas (National Hero of the Philippines)

**José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda,** more commonly known as **"Dr. José Rizal"**, is the novelist who wrote Noli Me Tángere and El filibusterismo in the TV drama, Maria Clara At Ibarra.

## Appearance

José Rizal was a native of the island of Luzon, of which Manila is the capital. He was therefore a Malay, with the brown complexion, black eyes and straight, black hair which are the physical characteristics of his race.

## Personality

Some qualities that would describe José Rizal are being open-minded, intelligent, and hardworking. José really wanted to have freedom in the Philippines from Spain, so that the Filipinos did not have to be controlled by another country. He did not care about himself. He cared more about helping his country.

## Biography

### About

José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (Spanish: [xoˈse riˈsal, -ˈθal], Tagalog: [hoˈse ɾiˈsal]; June 19, 1861 – December 30, 1896) was a Filipino nationalist, writer and polymath active at the end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is considered the national hero (*pambansang bayani*) of the Philippines. An ophthalmologist by profession, Rizal became a writer and a key member of the Filipino Propaganda Movement, which advocated political reforms for the colony under Spain.

He was executed by the Spanish colonial government for the crime of rebellion after the Philippine Revolution broke out; it was inspired by his writings. Though he was not actively involved in its planning or conduct, he ultimately approved of its goals which eventually resulted in Philippine independence.

Rizal is widely considered one of the greatest heroes of the Philippines and has been recommended to be so honored by an officially empaneled National Heroes Committee. However, no law, executive order or proclamation has been enacted or issued officially proclaiming any Filipino historical figure as a national hero. He wrote the novels *Noli Me Tángere* (1887) and *El filibusterismo* (1891), which together are taken as a national epic, in addition to numerous poems and essays.

### Early Life

José Rizal was born on June 19, 1861, to Francisco Rizal Mercado y Alejandro and Teodora Alonso Realonda y Quintos in the town of Calamba in Laguna province. He had nine sisters and one brother. His parents were leaseholders of a *hacienda* and an accompanying rice farm held by the Dominicans. Both their families had adopted the additional surnames of *Rizal* and *Realonda* in 1849, after Governor General Narciso Clavería y Zaldúa decreed the adoption of Spanish surnames among the Filipinos for census purposes (though they already had Spanish names).

Like many families in the Philippines, the Rizals were of mestizo origin. José's patrilineal lineage could be traced to Fujian in China through his father's ancestor Lam-Co, a Hokkien Chinese merchant who immigrated to the Philippines in the late 17th century. Lam-Co traveled to Manila from Xiamen, China, possibly to avoid the famine or plague in his home district, and more probably to escape the Manchu invasion during the Transition from Ming to Qing. He decided to stay in the islands as a farmer. In 1697, to escape the bitter anti-Chinese prejudice that existed in the Philippines, he converted to Catholicism, changed his name to Domingo Mercado and married the daughter of Chinese friend Augustin Chin-co.

On his mother's side, Rizal's ancestry included Chinese and Tagalog. His mother's lineage can be traced to the affluent Florentina family of Chinese mestizo families originating in Baliuag, Bulacan. He also had Spanish ancestry. Regina Ochoa, a grandmother of his mother, Teodora, had mixed Spanish, Chinese and Tagalog blood. His maternal grandfather was a half Spanish engineer named Lorenzo Alberto Alonzo.

From an early age, José showed a precocious intellect. He learned the alphabet from his mother at 3, and could read and write at age 5. Upon enrolling at the Ateneo Municipal de Manila, he dropped the last three names that made up his full name, on the advice of his brother, Paciano and the Mercado family, thus rendering his name as "José Protasio Rizal". Of this, he later wrote: "My family never paid much attention [to our second surname Rizal], but now I had to use it, thus giving me the appearance of an illegitimate child!" This was to enable him to travel freely and disassociate him from his brother, who had gained notoriety with earlier links to Filipino priests Mariano Gomez, Jose Burgos, and Jacinto Zamora (popularly known as Gomburza), who had been accused and executed for treason.
Rizal's house in Calamba, Laguna
José, as "Rizal", soon distinguished himself in poetry writing contests, impressing his professors with his facility with Castilian and other foreign languages, and later, in writing essays that were critical of the Spanish historical accounts of the pre-colonial Philippine societies. By 1891, the year he finished his second novel *El filibusterismo*, his second surname had become so well known that, as he writes to another friend, "All my family now carry the name Rizal instead of Mercado because the name Rizal means persecution! Good! I too want to join them and be worthy of this family name..."

### Education

Rizal first studied under Justiniano Aquino Cruz in Biñan, Laguna, before he was sent to Manila. He took the entrance examination to Colegio de San Juan de Letran, as his father requested, but he enrolled at the Ateneo Municipal de Manila. He graduated as one of the nine students in his class declared *sobresaliente* or outstanding. He continued his education at the Ateneo Municipal de Manila to obtain a land surveyor and assessor's degree, and at the same time at the University of Santo Tomas, where he studied a preparatory course in law and finished with a mark of *excelente* or excellent. He finished the course of Philosophy as a pre-law.

Upon learning that his mother was going blind, he decided to switch to medicine at the medical school of Santo Tomas, specializing later in ophthalmology. He received his four-year practical training in medicine at *Ospital de San Juan de Dios* in Intramuros. In his last year at medical school, he received a mark of *sobresaliente* in courses of *Patologia Medica* (Medical Pathology), *Patología Quirúrgica* (Surgical Pathology) and Obstretics.

Although known as a bright student, Rizal had some difficulty in some science subjects in medical school such as *Física* (Physics) and *Patología General* (General Pathology).
Rizal as a student at the University of Santo Tomas
Without his parents' knowledge and consent, but secretly supported by his brother Paciano, he traveled alone to Madrid in May 1882 and studied medicine at the Universidad Central de Madrid. There he earned the degree, *Licentiate in Medicine*. He also attended medical lectures at the University of Paris and the University of Heidelberg. In Berlin, he was inducted as a member of the Berlin Ethnological Society and the Berlin Anthropological Society under the patronage of the famous pathologist Rudolf Virchow. Following custom, he delivered an address in German in April 1887 before the Anthropological Society on the orthography and structure of the Tagalog language. He wrote a poem to the city, "A las flores del Heidelberg", which was both an evocation and a prayer for the welfare of his native land and the unification of common values between East and West.

At Heidelberg, the 25-year-old Rizal completed his eye specialization in 1887 under the renowned professor, Otto Becker. There he used the newly invented ophthalmoscope (invented by Hermann von Helmholtz) to later operate on his mother's eye. From Heidelberg, Rizal wrote his parents: "I spend half of the day in the study of German and the other half, in the diseases of the eye. Twice a week, I go to the bierbrauerie, or beerhall, to speak German with my student friends." He lived in a Karlstraße boarding house then moved to Ludwigsplatz. There, he met Reverend Karl Ullmer and stayed with them in Wilhelmsfeld. There he wrote the last few chapters of *Noli Me Tángere*, his first novel, published in Spanish later that year.

Rizal was a polymath, skilled in both science and the arts. He painted, sketched, and made sculptures and woodcarving. He was a prolific poet, essayist, and novelist whose most famous works were his two novels, *Noli Me Tángere* (1887) and its sequel, *El filibusterismo* (1891). These social commentaries during the Spanish colonial period of the country formed the nucleus of literature that inspired peaceful reformists and armed revolutionaries alike.

Rizal was also a polyglot, conversant in twenty-two languages.

Rizal's numerous skills and abilities was described by his German friend, Dr. Adolf Bernhard Meyer, as "stupendous." Documented studies show Rizal to be a polymath with the ability to master various skills and subjects. He was an ophthalmologist, sculptor, painter, educator, farmer, historian, playwright and journalist. Besides poetry and creative writing, he dabbled, with varying degrees of expertise, in architecture, cartography, economics, ethnology, anthropology, sociology, dramatics, martial arts, fencing and pistol shooting. Skilled in social settings, he became a Freemason, joining Acacia Lodge No. 9 during his time in Spain; he became a Master Mason in 1884.

## Relationships

### Francisco Rizal Mercado

Francisco Engracio Rizal Mercado y Alejandro (May 11, 1818 – January 5, 1898) was the father of the Philippines' national hero Jose Rizal. He was born in Biñan, Laguna. He had a wife named Teodora Realonda y Quintos and had 11 children altogether.

### Teodora Alonso Realonda

Teodora Alonso Realonda y Quintos (November 9, 1827 – August 16, 1911) was a wealthy woman in the Spanish colonial Philippines. She was best known as the mother of the Philippines' national hero Jose Rizal. Realonda was born in Santa Cruz, Manila. She was also known for being a disciplinarian and hard-working mother. Her medical condition inspired Rizal to take up medicine.

### Saturnina Hidalgo

Saturnina Rizal Mercado de Hidalgo (June 4, 1850 – September 14, 1913; née Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda), or simply ), or simply Saturnina Hidalgo**,** was the eldest sister of Philippine national hero José Rizal. She was married to Manuel T. Hidalgo, a native and one of the richest persons in Tanauan, Batangas. She was known as Neneng.

### Paciano Rizal

Paciano Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (March 9, 1851 – April 13, 1930) was a Filipino general and revolutionary, and the older brother of José Rizal, the national hero of the Philippines.

### Narcisa Mercado

Narcisa Lopez-Rizal (Mercado) (1852-1939), was the third eldest sibling of Jose Rizal. She was a teacher and a musician by profession. It was Narcisa who looked for and found the unmarked grave of Dr. Jose Rizal at the Paco cemetery after his martyrdom.

### Olympia Mercado

Olympia Rizal Mercado (1855-1887), was Jose Rizal Mercado's sister. She was the fourth child in the Rizal Mercado family. She was married to Silvestre Ubaldo, and died of childbirth in 1887.

### Lucia Mercado

Lucia Mercado Rizal – Herbosa (1857-1919) was the 5th child of Don Francisco Mercado and Doña Teodora Alonso and elder sister of the Philippine national hero, Dr. Jose Rizal.

### Maria Rizal

Maria Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (1859-1945) is the sixth child in the family. It was to her whom Jose talked about wanting to marry Josephine Bracken when the majority of the Rizal family was apparently not amenable to the idea.

### Concepción Mercado

Concepción Alonso Mercado Rizal (1862-1865), also called ‘Concha’ by her siblings, was the eight child of the Rizal family. She died at the age of three.

### Josefa Mercado

Josefa Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda, (1865-1945) or Panggoy, was the ninth child in the family who died a spinster. In Jose Rizal's letter to his sister, Jose praised her for nearly mastering the English language.

### Trinidad Rizal

Trinidad Rizal y Alonso (June 6, 1868 – May 9, 1951), commonly known as Trinidad Rizal, was a Filipina feminist leader and co-founder of the Philippines' first feminist organization, the *Asociación Femenista Filipina*. She was the younger sister of the national hero, physician and writer, Dr. José Rizal.

### Soledad Mercado

Soledad Alonso Quintero (1870-1929), youngest of Jose Rizal's sisters, was educated as a teacher. Jose's letters scolded her for marrying without the blessing of their parents.

1. ↑  *(in English)*.