More facts after Rizal's death point retraction as a fraud

The unanswered question is: Was there any retraction? A bitter dispute has been waged from 1896 to the present day over this highly controversial question. Professor Padilla of the University of the Philippines states the position of many and perhaps most educated Filipinos in this succinct way: 

 

"Briefly then the picture presented before us is that of Dr. Rizal, the man, the scientist, and rationalist, who wrote vigorously against the Catholic Church, and who ridiculed the idea of hell. A few hours before his execution, when threatened with eternal damnation, he became suddenly 'distributed' and cried like a child, 'No, no, I would not be condemned.' Assured by Father Balaguer that he would certainly go to hell if he did not retract and return to the Catholic Church, the fear became greater, his reason capitulated to faith, and he exclaimed: 'Well Father, I promise that the remainder of my lifetime I will employ asking God for the grace of faith'. Whereupon he signed a retraction in which he disowned all that he ever said and wrote against the church, and abominated Masonry. . . This picture is too much for one's credulity. Too many of the supposed facts brought out in the way of evidence, when pieced together, do not seem to fit psychologically into the picture."

 

Let us examine the proofs on both sides of the question.

 

As first hand evidence for the retraction we now have four sworn statements: Fathers Balaguer and Visa swore that they saw the retraction signed. Father Pio Pi swore that he received it from Father Balaguer in the Ateneo, and a Colonel if the Infantry, R. Sominguez, swore on May 30, 1918, that he had seen Rizal kneel at the altar of the Fort Chapel and read the retraction "with voice clear and serene." Dominguez then quoted the retraction without a single error, twenty-two years after the event! He certainly copied this retraction, for he could not have remembered it, which fact, as Pascual insists, leaves one in doubt as to how much more he copied. Many of his sentences are exact duplicates of other records.

 

Another affidavit is often presented as circumstantial evidence. The Fiscal, Don Gaspar Castaño, visited Rizal between nine and ten the evening before the execution, and tells us that as he departed, Rizal "with jovial courtesy expressed his regret that he could not ask me to come again. . ." I said, 'Rizal, you passionately love your mother and your country, both of which are Catholic. Do not cause them the great pain of dying outside the true religion.' He answered in a tone of great solemnity, looking toward the altar, using this phrase which I well remember, 'Mr. Fiscal, you may be sure I will not close the doors of eternity.'

 

The most important evidence is the retraction itself, which was found on May 18, 1935, by Father Manuel Garcia. It had been wrapped up with retractions made by other men of the same period. In the same package was a prayer book ending with "Acts of Faith, Hope, and Charity", under which appears the signature of José Rizal. These "Acts" cover the doctrines of the church much more fully than does the retraction. If the retraction and the signature are found to be genuine, then the fact of the retraction will be settled, though Father Balaguer's story will remain incredible.

 

Let us now consider the evidence against the retraction. Several exceedingly stupid blunders were made if the retraction is authentic, so stupid that they seem to point to fraud. Rizal's relatives were promised that the retraction would be read to them in Paco church, but they never heard it. That caused doubt. The newspapers published different versions. That caused doubt.

 

Then came the well-nigh incredible report that it had been lost! Nobody could believe it! After four years of effort to convert Rizal had been crowned with success, after the orders had all prayed with penances and mortification, the retraction, the most precious document the church possessed in the Philippines, ought to have been guarded as nothing else. Yet it had disappeared! Father Balaguer swears under oath (in 1917) that he took it to the Ateneo before Rizal was led out to be shot, and that Father Pio Pi carried it to the Palace of Archbishop Nozaleda, entrusting it to Secretary Gonzalez Feijoo, who deposited it in the chest for reserved papers. There all trace of it was lost. Father Pio Pi said they looked for it and could not find it. That caused doubt.

 

For thirty-nine years, millions of Filipinos, whether Catholic or not, denied that such a paper existed. Then the retraction was found in the very files where it had formerly been sought in vain. That fact caused doubt. Why had it been missing thirty-nine years? Asked the incredulous Filipinos.

 

The Archbishop permitted Ricardo R. Pascual, Ph.D. to examine the retraction, and give him a good photostat of it. Pascual wrote a devastating book called "Rizal Beyond the Grave" in which he seems to show by minute measurements that the retraction diverges from the style of Rizal's other writings of that period, and he concludes that the paper was a forgery. Pascual points out that both signatures of the "witnesses" were signed by the same man, and they do indeed look alike. Pascual's book caused doubt. Until world experts on handwriting give their judgment, suspicion will continue. Perhaps even with such scientific judgment, people would believe or doubt the document according to their prejudices, for it is difficult to be dispassionate.

 

 

Unfortunately for the historian there was more blundering, which has led many writers into uncertainty, concerning the marriage of Rizal. Father Balaguer swears that he married José and Josephine about fifteen minutes before the time for the execution. But the marriage record could not be found in the Manila Cathedral nor in the Registry of Fort Santiago where it ought to have been place. This raised doubt. Rizal's sister Lucia, who went with Josephine to the chapel that morning, saw a priest in vestments, but said she did not see the ceremony. One fact supports the marriage statement. Rizal wrote in a copy of The Imitation of Christ, by Thomas á Kempis, these words: "To my dear and unhappy wife, Dec. 30, 1896."

 

The obvious answer might be that Rizal had regarded Josephine as his wife since they first held hands in Dapitan a year and a half before, -- but in no letter now available did he call her "wife" before this time. Or the writing may be forged.

 

The strongest circumstantial evidence for the wedding comes from Rizal's sister Maria. When she went to say farewell the last night, José said to her:

 

"Maria, I am going to marry Josephine. I know you all oppose it, especially you, yourself. But I want to give Josephine a name. Besides you know the verse in the Bible, 'The sins of the fathers shall be visited upon the children to the third and forth generation.' I do not want them to persecute you or her for what I have done."

 

There were three more blunders, which produced doubts. Rizal was not buried where persons in good ecclesiastical standing are buried in Paco Cemetery, but "in unconsecrated ground" between the outer and inner wall where Father Burgos had been buried after his execution. This raises doubt. Then he was not buried in a coffin or box of any kind. This raises doubt.

 

Burial Record.  Note page number, although with a December date.

 

The record of his ecclesiastical burial is not on the page (147) where persons who died in December, 1896, were recorded, but on page 204, where persons buried ten months later, in September, 1897, were recorded. His name seems to have been written ten months after he was buried. This raised doubt. Pascual's theory is that they buried Rizal as an unrepentant criminal, and then had to frame a case later to fit the retraction.

 

Was there ever such blundering with important circumstantial evidence?

 

Doubt has also been raised by the fact that neither the Archbishop nor the Jesuits asked for pardon or mitigation of the sentence. Only his family begged for mercy.

 

The strongest argument was the character of Rizal. It was but a few months before that he had rejected Father Sanchez' offer of a professorship, a hundred thousand pesos, and an estate if he would retract; and he had declared that he could not be bought for half the Philippines.

 

That sounds like Rizal, as every one of his old friends will testify. He was not only incorruptible, but very angry at the least suggestion that he might be bribed. That character speaks so loud against the retraction that all of Rizal's old friends believe he could not have written it. They look at the writing and say, "Yes, that is his handwriting, but then Mariano Ponce and Antonio Lopez and many others could write exactly like Rizal. A good forgery is meant to deceive."

 

The question, "Did Rizal retract?" rests upon the genuineness, or otherwise, of the supposed retraction. The Archbishop should settle this question, or at least attempt to settle it, by permitting the document to be submitted to the greatest handwriting experts in the world, preferably to several of them working independently. He should permit the paper and ink to be subjected to the best tests of modern science. Since Father Balaguer has told us an incredible story, nothing is certain.

 

The most painstaking analysis which has thus far been made is that of Pascual, and he pronounces the document to be a forgery. Under these circumstances the Church must shoulder the burden of proof that it is not. Everybody, it would seem, would like to have this question settled convincingly.

Rizal's great grandnephew testified that Rizal did not retract his anti Catholicism views

Jose Rizal retraction, Part II

December 29, 2011

(Editor:This is Part II of the lecture delivered at the Chicago’s Newberry Library on June 18, 2011. The author is a great-grand nephew of the Philippine National Hero whose 150th birthday was marked on June 19 of this year. Dr. Rizal was sentenced to die by musketry on Dec. 30, 1896 after a brief mock trial by a Spanish military court in Fort Santiago, Manila.)
By Ramon G. Lopez, M.D.

L-R: Berth Salvador, Cultural Officer, Philippine 

Consulate General, Dr. Reagan F. Romali, President of Truman College, Philippine Consul General Leo M. Herrera-Lim and Dr. Ramon G. Lopez, direct descendant of Dr. Jose Rizal.

“How could this be?” we ask.  It COULD BE, for the circumstances and people had connived.  It COULD BE, for there was no other recourse.  It COULD BE, for the moth had burned its wings!  Twenty-four years after the garroting of the Filipino clerics, Fathers Jose Burgos, Mariano Gomez, and Jacinto Zamora, the pogrom and intimidation had to continue. It had to continue for the dying Empire and frailocracy had now sensed its own death. It had to continue, for it wanted to display its final domination of a reawakened people.  However, it would not be completely so!  The man they had just martyred was a man whose politics and faith were unshakeable and timeless.  As we know, and as History recounts, it also projects.

To paraphrase the words of Dr. Rafael Palma the great Philippine scholar, patriot, and former President of the University of the Philippines regarding the trial of Dr. Jose Rizal, “the document obtained under moral duress and spiritual threats has very little value before the tribunal of history.”  Dr. Rafael Palma, a respected jurist of his time, was an author on the life of our hero and had studied the trial of Dr. Jose Rizal meticulously.  Of this he says in his book The Pride of the Malay Race about Dr. Jose Rizal, “His defense before the court martial is resplendent for its moderation and serenity in spite of the abusive and vexatious manner in which the fiscal had treated him.”  For in man’s own tribunal, the tribunal and trial that condemned Dr. Jose Rizal to die was a sham; his execution, a foregone conclusion.

A portrait of Jose Rizal as a Mason. His membership in the fraternity had caused his excommunication from the Roman Catholic Church. His retraction is a subject of controversy.

It is common historical knowledge that Ms. Josephine Bracken lived with Dr. Jose Rizal for three of the four years he was exiled in Dapitan.  He truly loved her.  They had desired a canonical marriage but were presented with a pre-condition retraction of Rizal’s anti-ecclesiastical writings and beliefs.  As we may know, he was never anti-God or anti-Church.  He was anti-cleric to those who abused their mission and hid behind their pretentious cloak of religiosity.  He knew there were those who practiced religion but did not worship God.  Neither the retraction nor the marriage occurred.  He and Josephine were parents to a son, though he sadly passed.  We know that Dr. Jose Rizal had immortalized Josephine Bracken in his unsigned and untitled poem which we now refer to as his “Ultimo Adios”: “Adios, dulce extranjera mi amiga, mi alegria…”  As Ambeth R. Ocampo, Director of the Philippine Historical Institute quotes, “To accept Rizal as having married Bracken is to accept his alleged retraction of religious error.”  From Austin Coates, British author and historian:  “Before God, he (Dr. Rizal) had nothing to retract.”  And from Dr. Jose Rizal himself, I quote: “I go where there are no slaves, no hangmen, no oppressors… where faith does not slay… where He who reigns is God.”

Fraudulent Premise

From 1892 to 1896, during his period of exile in Dapitan, the Catholic Church attempted to redirect his beliefs regarding religious faith, albeit unsuccessfully.  A succession of visits from Fathers Obach, Vilaclara, and Sanchez did not find his convictions wanting.  He had decided to remain ecclesiastically unwed, rather than recant his alleged “religious errors.”  Now, there seems to be a “disconnect”, or even a divide among historians as to whether Dr. Jose Rizal had abjured his apparent errant religious ways as claimed by the friars and the Jesuits.  Since a retraction of alleged “religious errors” would have begotten a marriage to Ms. Josephine Bracken, let us look for evidence that will prove this premise fraudulent.  Austin Coates’ book entitled Rizal – Philippine Nationalist and Martyr gives many compelling facts as borne out from his own personal investigation, and with numerous interviews of the Rizal family.  To wit:

1.Fr. Vicente Balaguer, S. J., claimed that he performed the canonical marriage between 6:00 – 6:15 AM of December 30, 1896 in the presence of one of the Rizal sisters.  The Rizal family denied that any of the Rizal sisters were there that fateful morning.  Dr. Jose Rizal was martyred at 7:03 AM.
2. Nobody had reported seeing Ms. Josephine Bracken in the vicinity of Fort Santiago in the morning of the execution.

3. Considering the time it would take for the three priests (Fr. Jose Vilaclara, Fr. Estanislao March, and Fr. Vicente Balaguer) to negotiate the expanse of the walk to give spiritual care to the condemned Dr. Jose Rizal, why is it that only Fr. Balaguer could “describe” a wedding?  Furthermore, where were Fr. Vilaclara and Fr. March to corroborate the occurrence of a marriage ceremony?  Or was there really even one at all?

4. In Josephine Bracken’s matrimony to Vicente Abad, the Church Register of Marriages kept at the Roman Catholic Cathedral in Hong Kong made no reference that Josephine was a “Rizal” by marriage, or that she was the widow of Dr. Jose Rizal.

5. In the legal register of Hong Kong, Josephine used the last name “Bracken” instead of “Rizal” to be married to Vicente Abad.

6. In Josephine Bracken’s litigation versus Jose Maria Basa for the possession of Dr. Jose Rizal’s valuable library, a certification from the British Consulate from Manila stating that she was indeed Rizal’s widow would have bolstered her claim.  She did not pursue this.  Why not?
7.  In 1960, inquiry at the Cardinal-Bishopric of Manila for evidentiary proof of a Rizal-Bracken marriage was not fruitful, or possibly, the issue was simply ignored by the religious.  Likewise, we ask the question, “Why?”

“Unconfessed” Martyrdom”

From the dark days of exile in Dapitan, to the even darker days of imprisonment at Fort Santiago, the Catholic Church had demanded from Dr. Jose Rizal a retraction before a canonical marriage could be performed.  In this Inquisition-like setting of the Spanish regime, it was always proclaimed that “the Indio always retracted”, as he walked to his execution.  Austin Coates states in his book: “The Spaniards publish the same thing about everyone who is shot… Besides, nobody has ever seen this written declaration in spite of the fact that a number of people would want to see it…. It is (always) in the hands of the Archbishop.”  I say that if there was no marriage, there could have not been a retraction, and Dr. Jose Rizal met his martyrdom “un-confessed”:

1. Indeed, at the Paco Cemetery, the name of Dr. Jose Rizal was listed among those who died impenitent.  The entry made in the book of burials at the cemetery where Rizal was buried was not made on the page for those buried on December 30, 1896 (where there were as many as six entries), but on a special page, as ordered by the authorities.  Thus, Dr. Jose Rizal was entered on a page between a man who burned to death, and another who died by suicide – persons considered “un-confessed” and without spiritual aid at the time of death.

2.    Father Estanislao March, S.J., and Fr. Jose Vilaclara, S.J. (who had accompanied Dr. Jose Rizal to the execution site) could have ordered a Christian burial, but they did not.  They must have known that no retraction was made.  Dr. Jose Rizal was laid to earth bare, without a sack, without a coffin.  This was the onus of the “un-confessed.”

3.   One must also remember that Dr. Jose Rizal wrote a short and final note to his parents dated December 30, 1896 at 6:00 in the morning, with no mention of an occurred or intended retraction and/or marriage.  A message with that important information would have been of great consolation to Dona Teodora Alonso and to Don Francisco Mercado, whom he loved and respected dearly.
4.   Despite numerous immediate supplications from the Rizal family after the execution, no letter of retraction could be produced.

5.   The Rizal family was informed by the church that approximately nine to eleven days after the execution, a mass for the deceased would be said, after which the letter of retraction would be shown the family.  Though the family was in attendance, the mass was never celebrated and no letter of retraction was shown.  They were told that the letter had been sent to the Archbishop’s palace, and that the family would not be able to see it.

6. The Jesuits themselves (who had a special liking for their former student) did not celebrate any mass for his soul, nor did they hold any funerary rites over his body.  I take this as a repudiation of the Jesuits against the friars, loudly hinting to the Filipino people that their esteemed pupil did not abjure!

7.   The apparent “discovery” of an obviously forged autobiography of Josephine Bracken claiming marriage to Dr. Jose Rizal, showed a  handwriting that bore no resemblance to Josephine’s and had glaring errors in syntax, which revealed that the perpetrating author’s primary language was Spanish (not Josephine’s original language), thus  proving that the document was  manufactured and disingenuous.

8.  Confession in August, 1901 of master forger Roman Roque that earlier in the year, he was employed by the friars to make several copies of a retraction letter.

9.       In 1962, authors Ildefonso T. Runes and Mamerto M. Buenafe in their book Forgery of the Rizal Retraction and Josephine’s Autobiography, made an exposé of six different articles and books that purportedly presented Dr. Jose Rizal’s “document of retraction” as copied from the so-called “original” testament of retraction.  Intriguingly enough, even to this day, the claimed “original” document from which the facsimiles have arisen have not been seen by anybody.  Blatant in these six different presentations were differing dates and notes that had been doctored, traced-over, and altered, when these facsimiles were supposed to have come from the same “original” document!  This book of Runes and Buenafe was published by the Pro-Patria Publishers of Manila. The book is extant but unfortunately, out of print.

Though the issue of “Retraction” remains contentious for some people, it is my personal opinion that there is no controversy; that Dr. Jose Rizal did not make any recantation of his writings and beliefs.  The arguments to the contrary made by his detractors are all smoke screen and “retreads” of the dubious accounts of the sycophantic Father Balaguer and his gullible minions.  Let us not allow for the sands of time to cover the blunder of this ignoble and impious event.  Let not the conspiracy of silence keep us chained to this fraudulent claim.  As had been vigorously proposed then, and again now, let the document of retraction be examined by a panel of the world’s experts in hand-writing, and let a pronouncement be made.  Let this hidden document come to the eyes of the public, for they have the greatest of rights to see, and to judge, and to know what is truthful.

When this comes to pass… in this 21st century, in this age of an “evidence-based” society that demands transparency and full-disclosure, it can be stated that with the now enlightened and reformed Catholicism, and in the spirit of Vatican II, if Pope John Paul II can apologize to the Jewish people for the millennia of misdeeds by the Church, if Pope Benedict XVI can, in Australia at the 2008 World Youth Congress, apologize to the victims of pedophilia and other ecclesiastical sexual abuses, then it should not be beyond the Catholic Church to NOW admit the pious fraud it had committed in saying that Dr. Jose Rizal had abjured his writings and beliefs, when all evidences point to the fact that he did not!