Rizal’s retraction is authentic

Most of the questions on Philippine history that I receive online from students are so simple that they can be answered quickly if they were taught basic research skills to deploy on the internet. It is clear from my chats with students that their teachers did not direct them to the school library nor encourage them to search through physical books! Their questions are on issues I raised and settled in my books: the rumors of Apolinario Mabini’s syphilis, what really happened in the 1521 Battle of Mactan between Magellan and Lapu-Lapu, was Rizal the father of Adolf Hitler, etc. Worse, the output is a video interview of me answering the assigned question for them. The first assigned question I hate is, “What is the full name of Jose Rizal?” The question is irrelevant for college-level history and does not teach the student anything useful.

The second assigned question I hate is on the authenticity of Rizal’s handwritten retraction from masonry. For me, the retraction is a nonissue and asking undergrad students to debate its authenticity is senseless because available sources on the topic are opinions from people who are not experts on Rizal’s penmanship and have not physically examined the retraction document. A document in Rizal’s hand does exist, and in it, he retracted his religious errors; this does not, in any way, negate the impact of his life and legacy on our history.

Everyone now arguing for or against the authenticity of the document does so from a bias, based on unreliable photostats from an unverified source. Does the document exist? Yes, I have seen it in the Archives of the Arzobispado de Manila. A certified true copy was made in my presence on the day I examined the actual document on Nov. 11, 1996. If I had a smartphone, then we would have high-resolution images to argue about.

While handwriting analysis is best left to experts, my familiarity with Rizal’s writings comes from over 30 years of handling original Rizal manuscripts, and in my opinion, the document is authentic. Rizal’s signature varies depending on the time and place it was made (he used a dip pen, not a ball pen), and it can be forged, but forging 17 lines of text in Rizal’s writing is another matter. In addition, the signatures of the witnesses, Juan del Fresno (El Jefe de Piquete) and Eloy Maure (El Ayudante de la Plaza), would have to be forged as well. I must add that Del Fresno’s signature is very complicated.

I would think that even if the disputed document were made available, it would not convince those who insist on the counterfactual and continue to spin conspiracy theories. It is not well known that many prewar authorities on Rizal, Masons at that, knew the document to be authentic.

In 1911, Austin Craig, Rizal’s American biographer, interviewed Fr. Antonio Obach, the Jesuit parish priest of Dapitan during Rizal’s exile from 1892 to 1896, who said he had seen the retraction formula submitted by Rizal as a prerequisite to marrying Josephine Bracken. Unfortunately, Father Obach refused to execute a signed, notarized affidavit on this. Craig had as a witness to this interview the scholar Jaime C. de Veyra. Craig was introduced to the Jesuits by Jeremias Harty, archbishop of Manila.

In 1937, Manila Archbishop Michael O’Doherty invited Craig to dinner and showed him the retraction found in their archives. Craig said:

“No objection was made when I produced my microscope and spent more than an hour in the closest possible examination. I was convinced of its genuineness and so expressed myself the next day to Grand Secretary Teodoro M. Kalaw, 33rd [degree Mason] Past Grand Master, and Director of the National Library, who also had examined it carefully and agreed with me that it was authentic.

“I know of no one else among the Masons in the Islands who could qualify as a real Rizalist and competent judge of disputed documents who has had opportunity for thorough investigation of this interesting paper. It is no idle boast that I am the only Rizalist who has ever made serious research into Rizal’s life, lineage, and labors, and the things that have cast doubt on this retraction were discovered and published by me.”

Aside from Kalaw, other Masons who agreed with his findings included Manuel Hidalgo, Rizal’s brother-in-law, and Rizal’s friends and contemporaries, Manuel Ponce, Antonio Ma. Regidor, and T.H. Pardo de Tavera. Craig described the doubts on the authenticity of the retraction as a recurring “product of unposted prejudice [and] those in the Philippines who are responsible for its propaganda may, if they have any authority, make it known so that its value may be studied. The truth is the Freemason’s ideal, and Rizal’s reputation needs no falsification to bolster it up.”

Now that we know that the retraction document exists and is authentic, our next question should be: Why did Rizal write it? Did he practice what we know as “mental reservation”? To place the document in context, we have to ask: What did Rizal really mean? Unfortunately, only Rizal can answer that question, and he left no clues except for the papers hidden in the clothes and shoes he wore to his execution, all of which deteriorated when his corpse was exhumed years later.

—————-

Comments are welcome at ambeth.ocampo@inquirer.net