Harrowing events

• Had it not been for the events of 1872, Rizal would have been a Jesuit
• The execution of Jose Burgos, Mariano Gomes and Jacinto Zamora had a profound impact on Rizal's worldview and nationalism
• The GomBurza


  • They were a thorn on the sides of both the regular priests and the Spanish seculars
  • They took on the mantle left by Padre Pedro Pablo Pelaez
• Padre Pedro Pablo Pelaez was a full-blooded Spaniard but his sympathy in the conflict between the Spanish and the native seculars was with the latter
• Secularization controversy

  1. Archbishop of Manila decided to uphold and enforce the juridical right of the local ordinary over the parishes

  2. Friars who ran most of these parishes resigned in protest

  3. Archbishop decided to ordain native clergies
• Padre Mariano Gomes de los Angeles


  • He was Pelaez's co-leader in the seculars' protest against the order from Spain mandating secular priests to handover their parishes to the regulars
  • They wrote a petition in the name of the Cavite seculars to the Queen to abolish the order and affirmed the seculars' loyalty
  • He was a Chinese mestizo priest working with a creole one, seen as a more widespread and comprehensive action of the seculars
• Padre Jose Apolonio Burgos


  • He was a protégé of Padre Pelaez
  • He was an intellectual whose loyalty to the Church and the Crown was noticed and commended
  • He was a leader in the secularization movement after the death of Pelaez
• Padre Jacinto Zamora


  • He was a "mestizo español" and considered a follower of Burgos
  • His case was a classic example of being in the wrong place (or with the wrong people or having the wrong name) at the wrong time
• The Cavite Mutiny of 1872 was a product of the proverbial changing of fortunes
• Changing of fortunes

  1. Last Habsburg King of Spain Charles II died without an issue, crown fell to the Bourbons of France

  2. Bourbons introduced reforms to centralize government and develop colonies for crown's benefit

  3. Costly war against England resulted in Spain going bankrupt and people extremely dissatisfied

  4. Spanish liberals waged guerilla warfare, won through Duke of Wellington and established Cadiz Constitution

  5. Ferdinand VII resumed aborted reign, treated liberalism with respect only as a matter of contingency

  6. Isabella II came into power, defeated his pretender uncle, later deposed by the same liberals

  7. Francisco Serrano became president of provisional government, sent Carlos Maria de la Torre y Nava Cerrada as Governor General of the Philippines
• Governor General de la Torre

  • He was a rich man, military man, deputy to the Spanish Cortes, and a liberal to the core
  • He came to the Philippines with the intent of implementing the desires of the monarchical democracy he helped install
  • He tried to eradicate corruption, gave reprieve to freedom of expression, pardoned "rebels" of Cavite's agrarian revolt
• The liberal atmosphere created by Governor General de la Torre did not last long as Spain was still in political turmoil
• Rafael Geronimo Cayetano Izquierdo y Gutierrez was one of the liberals who effectively ended the reign of Isabella
• In the Philippines, contrary to popular belief, Izquierdo showed his liberal side
• Izquierdo's actions in the Philippines

  1. Attempted to implement the old order of secularizing the schools and forbidding friars to teach

  2. Wanted to raise the salaries of teachers

  3. Insisted on opening industrial and technical schools
• The situation in the Philippines turned Izquierdo less liberal - a "conservative liberal" as he himself said
• The national government coffers were empty, corruption was rampant and the threat of rebellion from unpacified territories loomed in the background
• The shadow of Pedro Pelaez was also still palpable
• Measures taken by Izquierdo that were seen as stifling

  1. Suspended the opening of a school for arts and trade

  2. Stripped mestizos de Español and Españoles Filipinos who held high positions both in the civil government and the military of their positions

  3. Abolished the exemption to give tribute and render forced labor enjoyed particularly by the workers in the navy-yard
• When the Cavite Mutiny broke out, Izquierdo had to take drastic steps
• The "evidence" Izquierdo obtained were really pointing to an organized revolution aimed at bringing down the Spanish colonial government and not merely a mutiny of disgruntled dockyard employees
• Izquierdo's actions, like trying civilians in a military court, were condemned in Spain
• Gomes was Pelaez' co-champion for secularization, Burgos was a protégé of Pelaez, and the ill-fated Zamora was caught with that incriminating note on his drawer
• The three (Gomes, Burgos, Zamora) were not masons, unlike their co-suspects who were incidentally masons and ended up being exiled
• The Bagumbayan executions of Gomes, Burgos and Zamora in 1872 and the more celebrated one 24 years later would not have happened if they were masons
• Rizal's mother, Doña Teodora, was incarcerated for two and a half years on false charges
• Doña Teodora's accusation was a contempt of court, thus she was given a longer sentence
• The Spanish judicial injustice suffered by Doña Teodora was "the greatest influence" on the young Rizal
• Rizal might have dedicated the El Filibusterismo to the memory of the GomBurZa
• Rizal's statement revealed that he credited the unjust execution of the three priests (GomBurZa) to his chosen path: "Had it not been for the events of 1872, Rizal would have been a Jesuit"
• The injustice suffered by Doña Teodora made a profound impact in Rizal's life
• Rizal lost both his confidence in friendship and trust in his fellowmen because of the ill-fate suffered by his mother
• Sisa's walk of shame in Rizal's novel is a fictional representation of his mother's suffering
• Doña Teodora's suffering was more intimate and personal to Rizal than the widely renowned and brutal suffering of the GomBurZa
• Rizal could not bear to talk about his mother's suffering except in a diary written by an adolescent and in a fiction work written by an adult
• Rizal's frustration and pain over his mother's suffering might have been the last straws drawn before he took the path he had taken
• Orden de arresto- was supposed to be for a certain Jose Maria Zamora
• Casimiro Camerino -the captain of the corps