{"status":true,"msg":{"data":{"id":59831,"auction_id":186,"set_id":220,"lot_number":"116","artist":"Dimas Alang (José Rizal)<br/>\nLos Filipinos y Los Frailes (The Filipinos and the Friars)","title":"José Rizal (1861 - 1896)<br/> The Friars and The Filipinos","starting_price":100000,"signed_dated":"a.) Dated Hong Kong 1888<br>\n4 1/4\" x 3 1/4\" (11 cm x 8 cm)","medium":"b.) Ramon Martinez Press, 1959<br>\n6 1/4\" x 4 1/2\" (16 cm x 11 cm)","size":null,"property":null,"coa":null,"provenance":null,"exhibited":null,"literature":null,"write_up":"This small pamphlet, written in Spanish, features a design that would have been very familiar to readers in the late 19th-century Philippines—and, moreover, bears the immortal byline of Dimas Aláng!\n\nOf course, Dimas Aláng was the pen name of none other than our National Hero, José Rizal. At first glance, this design closely resembles known published satirical pamphlets by Rizal under that alias, such as “La Visión de Fray Rodriguez,” an imagined conversation between Father José Rodriguez, an Augustinian who criticized Rizal's novel “Noli me Tangere,” and their founder, St. Augustine of Hippo. Another is “Por Telefono,” written in 1889, which presents a fictional phone call between Manila and Madrid to mock the Spanish friars, particularly Father Salvador Font, for banning the novel.\n\nThe title of the pamphlet in hand is “Los Filipinos y Los Frailes.” This is not to be confused with another pamphlet by the journalist Joaquin Pellicena y Camacho, a contemporary of the propagandists, entitled “Filipinos y los Frailes,” which is about that campaign against the friars during the late Spanish regime and early American occupation, published in 1901.\n\nSearching the internet for the specific title “The Filipinos and the Friars” mainly yields books summarizing the Noli Me Tangere and a pamphlet in both English and Tagalog. These, along with other short essays by Rizal published in 1959 by R. Martinez and Sons, were intended to meet the demand for Rizal publications after Republic Act 1425, or the “Rizal Law,” and in anticipation of the Rizal Birth Centenary in 1961. (Incidentally, this is the companion piece in this collection.) Unlike other well-known Rizal essays, this one seems to have little visibility. The José Rizal National Centennial Commission (JRNCC) volumes on the complete works of José Rizal do not list this particular title, and upon checking the works of Rizal specialists, Zaide, Guerrero, Baron-Fernandez, and others, it is also pretty absent. One may even start to think that this is just another hoax.\n\nUpon reading the text, however, a Rizal enthusiast with an interest in history may begin to find the story familiar. Further investigation reveals that it is indeed listed in the JRNCC volume Prosa por José Rizal (Rizal’s Prose), though under a different title— “Una Visita del Señor a las Filipinas” or “The Lord Gazes at the Philippine Islands.” I first encountered this story in Ambeth Ocampo’s Makamisa: The Search for Rizal’s Third Novel, in which he summarizes the plot as follows:\n\n“The story opens with God the Father turning his attention to the Philippines, from where he has received many complaints. He consults the people in heaven and is told that certain beings, called friars, and a Pope, claim to speak in His name on earth. God traces all this to the Christian church, so he summons both Jesus Christ and St. Peter to explain how and why this state of affairs has come about. Not satisfied with their answers, God the Father commands Jesus and Peter to return to earth and make a report on the Philippines. He assures the anxious Jesus that this trip will not entail another round of suffering on the cross.\n\n“Jesus and Peter arrive in Hong Kong, where they are surprised to discover that a passport and visa are required to visit the Philippines. When they arrive in Manila, the boat is placed under quarantine, adding to their impatience. Jesus notes all these in a notebook, which is later opened by Spanish customs and immigration authorities in Manila, leading to renewed detention. When Jesus and Peter complain about the shabby treatment, they are branded as subversives by the authorities. Peter escapes and searches for the Manila Cathedral, which he heard was \"his,\" to get help. Along the way, Peter hears Jesus being interrogated, and is relieved that it is daytime; thus, he would not have to hear the cock crow again. The novel ends abruptly just when the action is supposed to begin. By leaving this unfinished, Rizal dealt a great blow to Philippine comic or satirical literature.” So, if the work was unfinished, why is there a pamphlet with the same design as the other known Rizal pamphlets? The last page of the pamphlet reads “Hong Kong, 1888.” Rizal, however, was not in Hong Kong in 1888; he would arrive in 1891. The pamphlet ends with this paragraph, which, when translated from the Spanish, reads, “Note: This is the first complete publication of this satirical tale by Dr. Rizal, whose original manuscript was stolen from the Biblioteca Nacional (National Library), perhaps by the religious orders. The reduction in size of this edition has been made so that it forms a triptych with ‘The Vision of Father Rodriguez’ and ‘By Telephone,’ two other stories made by the same author that were published in Spain and Germany in the year 1889.”\n\nAlthough there was a deliberate attempt to make this particular printed pamphlet match the appearance of the actual Rizal pamphlets, it mentions ‘the Biblioteca Nacional’ or National Library. In truth, there was still no Biblioteca Nacional in 1888, so this printed material is not from 1888 but from the early American period.\n\nAnd now the plot thickens. If the manuscript was stolen by the friars, how was it ever published? Was there a copy made before the theft? Was the original ever found? The footnote in Prosa por Jose Rizal indicates that the manuscript is in the Biblioteca Nacional (National Library of the Philippines, NLP), but it is unclear whether it is indeed the original. Encarnacion Alzona finished translating from Spanish to English in 1957 using a photostat copy in the NLP. The guide to the Rizal manuscripts collection does not list the story. Did the war destroy the original? Or did it fall into someone else’s hands?\n\nFinally, Prof. Ambeth Ocampo sheds light on the matter: The original manuscript is indeed still at the National Library of the Philippines, in two notebooks, and is untitled, but was archived under the title “Principios de una novela satirica.” This explains why the work is known by many names, which, aside from the two already mentioned, also include “The Divine Wrath.” Apparently, the manuscript was acquired from the heirs of Rizal’s friend Mariano Ponce. If there is a case for lost in translation, this is more like lost among the titles.\n\nThe importance of this work was underscored by Dolores Feria when she compared the satire of this unfinished novel to the posthumous writings of Mark Twain in Letters of the Earth. Satire is the weapon of the weak against the powerful. Rizal yielded this weapon to what his generation believed were the most formidable enemies of the Filipino people—the friars! He was not against the religion per se, as seen in his sympathetic portrayal of Jesus, but the friars, even if not all of them are bad, had become even more powerful than the civil government, just for their length of stay in a parish—30 to 50 years, as opposed to a Spanish civil official that only stayed three years. They should also ideally have trained the secular priests to administer the parishes, because their real mission is to stay in the convent, but they clung to this position as the go-between the people and the government, and in some cases, they had become the government themselves. Thus, there is a tendency to be corrupted by power. While the Catholic Church has changed in many ways, the new Padre Damasos in our society have become the political dynasties who overstay in power and use their institution to enrich themselves.\n\nThis Rizal essay is consistent with his career and style as a satirist, but it also reflects Rizal’s personal tendency to be a bit of a ningas cogon, starting projects and never finishing them. Even so, this particularly rare piece is an indicator of Rizal’s continuing relevance amid the enduring hypocrisy and problems in Philippine society, still very similar to when Rizal imagined the Lord Jesus Christ coming to the Philippines to investigate them.\n\nAcknowledging the help of Mr. Eruel Olvina, Archivist I, Filipiniana Division of the National Library of the Philippines, for finding clues on the provenance of the essay.","lot_group":"BOOKS","lot_details_html":"<p><strong>Dimas Alang (Jos&eacute; Rizal) Los Filipinos y Los Frailes (The Filipinos and the Friars)</strong><br />Dated Hong Kong 1888<br />4 1/4\" x 3 1/4\" (11 cm x 8 cm)<br /><br /><strong>Jos&eacute; Rizal (1861 - 1896)</strong><br /><strong>The Friars and The Filipinos</strong><br />Ramon Martinez Press, 1959<br />6 1/4\" x 4 1/2\" (16 cm x 11 cm)</p>","alias":null,"hp":320000,"bp":0.2016,"isWithdrawn":0,"accounting_hp":320000,"userBid":34,"isPaid":0,"userId":22,"lot_status":"SOLD","isDone":1,"bid_history_id":15533,"reserve_price":0,"hammer_price":384512,"fav":0},"image":[{"id":65325,"img_url":"https://leongallery.sgp1.digitaloceanspaces.com/v2/auction/186/220/lot/116.jpg","isFeatured":1}]},"increment":[220000,240000,260000,280000,300000,320000,340000,360000,380000,400000,450000,500000,550000,600000,650000,700000,750000,800000,900000,1000000,1100000,1200000,1300000,1400000,1500000,1600000,1700000,1800000,1900000,2000000,2200000,2400000,2600000,2800000,3000000,3200000,3400000,3600000,3800000,4000000,4200000,4400000,4600000,4800000,5000000,5500000,6000000,6500000,7000000,7500000,8000000,8500000,9000000,9500000,10000000,11000000,12000000,13000000,14000000,15000000,16000000,17000000,18000000,19000000,20000000],"prev":115,"next":117,"count_bid":0,"bid_history":[],"tokenExpired":1}