Postage stamps, films, and books have been dedicated to him: José Rizal, Filipino author, doctor and revolutionary. He wrote powerfully against social injustice and Spanish colonial rule and remains a revered national hero to this day.

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José Rizal is widely regarded as the national hero of the Philippines, with his image found on currency, public monuments, and even commemorated in parks and media worldwide. Born to a wealthy family, Rizal was a talented writer, artist, and intellectual who studied philosophy and medicine, mastering several languages. His novel 'Noli Me Tangere,' written in Spanish, criticized social injustices under Spanish colonial rule and the Catholic Church, leading to its ban and his eventual execution by firing squad. 

Rizal’s death made him a symbol of the Philippine struggle for independence, inspiring subsequent freedom fighters. While his legacy has been debated—particularly regarding his selection as a national hero during American colonial rule—his works remain central to Filipino education and identity. Today, translations of his writings into local languages and continued cultural references highlight his enduring influence on questions of national identity and the importance of remembering one’s origins.

José Rizal: Writer, activist and national hero

Have you heard of Jose Rizal? In the Philippines, he's a national hero. His face is on stamps and banknotes. And clothing. There are also action figures. He's the hero of a movie, and there's now a video game starring Jose Rizal as the savior of humanity. Even a warship has been named after him. At a very young age, I really got hooked or, you know, fascinated about Jose Rizal. He's also titled here in my armrest. Around the world, entire parks, statues, street and square names commemorate Jose Rizal. In Seattle, a bridge is named after him. And yes, Jose Rizal was real. Every state guest to Manila visits his grave, even today, more than 100 years after his death. He did a lot for our country, and he used his gift for writing, which emancipated the Philippines. But who was Jose Rizal, whose story is now largely forgotten around the world? Why is he so revered in the Philippines? Jose Rizal is my inspiration because he is our national hero in the Philippines because he fought for the Filipinos, to liberate the Philippines from the Filipinos. To understand who he was, we need to start with his end. It's 7 o'clock in the morning of December 30, 1896. The man in the hat is Jose Rizal, 35 years old. In a few minutes, he will be executed by a Spanish firing squad. There are a lot of videos that depict precisely this scene, the moment Jose Rizal dies for freedom. Why must he die? Because of his rebellion against the Spanish colonial rulers, who had occupied the Philippines for more than 300 years. His death made Rizal a symbol of Philippine struggle for independence. His fate was by no means predestined. Rizal was born as the seventh of 11 children to a wealthy family in Calamba, just 54 kilometers from the capital, Manila. As a child, he showed many talents and great self-confidence. This, according to family legend, which we had confirmed by a direct relative of Jose Rizal. His great-grandniece lives in Barcelona. I don't know how old he was, but he was still very much... He had not yet gone to Manila to study. And he was forming with clay a sort of a head bust, you know. And they were teasing him. Of course, his older siblings were teasing him, what are you doing? And then apparently he replied, one day my effigy will be all over the Philippines. No one could have imagined back then that portraits of Rizal would one day be displayed throughout the country. In the National Museum, you can get an idea of how artistically gifted he was. Jose painted and drew and created sculptures. After his schooling, he studied philosophy and medicine and traveled the world, learning at least nine languages along the way, including English, German, French and Japanese. During his studies and work abroad, Rizal also came into contact with critical voices. In particular, the Philippine propaganda movement of Filipino students in Spain. Rizal did not actually want independence. He just wanted to be at the same level, on par with Spaniards. Because when he transferred to Santo Tomas, the university, he noticed that his intellect was on par or even superior to the other students there. But the other students, they had Spanish blood, were favored. During this time, Rizal began writing his first novel, Noli me Tangere, in Spanish. He completed it during his training as an ophthalmologist in Berlin and had it printed there at his own expense. The book was published in 1887, when Rizal was just 26. Noli me Tangere is a society novel set in the upper echelons of Manila, full of wit and humor. But it was also critical of the Spanish colonial powers and the church, highlighting social injustice. So why did he write it in Spanish, the language of the colonial power he so strongly criticized? Spanish was the language in which everyone was understood. So like, when Rizal went to Manila, his classmates were from Cebu, from Iloilo, from all over. It's the Tower of Babel. You could not have understood each other. And their common language was either Latin or Spanish. And so when he wrote his book, he wrote it in Spanish. Under pressure from the Catholic Church, the authorities immediately banned the book, even though Rizal never called for violence or rebellion. He did, however, come into contact with rebels who planned an armed uprising. That would be his downfall. The Spanish threw him in prison and sentenced him to death by firing squad. In death, Rizal became an unintentional martyr. His execution has made him an icon of freedom. New depictions of the scene continue to be made. By shooting him, they actually made him more powerful than he actually was. It was his life and his death that became the inspiration to fight for freedom, nationhood, and independence. The freedom fighters continued their struggle after Rizal's death, culminating on June 12, 1898, with their Declaration of Independence. The Declaration of Independence was the first Today, the anniversary of Rizal's death is a national holiday, and his novel, Noli me Tangere, is required reading in schools. Jose Rizal is often referred to as the first Filipino. What does that mean? It means that he was born in the Philippines, and he was raised in the Philippines. Rizal is our national hero because he imagined a nation before it was born. Rizal never saw the Philippines as it is, but he imagined it. And it is that imagination that fuels and makes us what we are today. Rizal was born in the Philippines, and he was raised in the Philippines. He was born in the Philippines, and he was raised in the Philippines. Until the 16th century, what is now the territory of the Philippines was a group of more than 7,600 islands on which well over 100 languages were spoken, ruled by tribal leaders and sultans. In 1521, the explorer Ferdinand Magellan was the first European to land on the archipelago in the Western Pacific. The fact that he claimed them for Spain did not sit well with the people there. Magellan was the first European to land on the archipelago Magellan paid for his attempt to conquer the island of Mactan with his life. It was not until 44 years later, in 1565, that Spanish colonization officially began. The Philippines actually got their name from the Spanish king Philip II. It's the Spanish that actually gave us the whole idea of what the Philippines is, what Filipinas is. And I always tell my students that although we are against and we don't look back at the Spanish colonial period with affection, we must accept that the Philippines was born out of a colonial experience. The Spanish conquerors brought something else with them. The Catholic Church came to Southeast Asia. To this day, more than 80% of Filipinos are Catholic. Rizal's criticism of the church hierarchy was a major factor that led to the banning of Nolime Tangiri, a ban that was only lifted at the end of Spanish colonial rule. The Philippines achieved independence and lost it again two months later. At first, the U.S. supported the rebels in their fight against the Spanish, but then they took control of the country and its inhabitants themselves. Not only in the Philippines, but also in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Guam in the Western Pacific. How did the U.S. stop the rebels from continuing their fight for independence? They co-opted Jose Rizal as a national hero, saying that his ideas of a more just world were identical to American ideals. It worked, even if there were some critical voices. In the 1960s, there was a historian who said that Rizal shouldn't be our national hero because he claimed that the Americans made him, declared him our national hero in order to remove from the picture another hero called Andres Bonifacio, who fought the Spaniards and led the Philippine Revolution. So he says that the Americans gave us Rizal so that we would be more accepting of American colonial rule. Many Filipinos still regard him as a model in our being Filipino. Well, they say he's American-sponsored. They say he's pro-colonizers and all. You know, the enigma of Rizal is that we have a lot of things to say about him. Christian Sendon Condero lives in Bicol, where he runs a bookstore and adjoining gallery. He says that most Filipinos today do not read Rizal in the original Spanish, but in English translation. He's translating Nolime Tangere into Bicol, the language of his home region, which is spoken by two to three million people. So my idea in translating these works to a local language is to to push forward the power of our local languages in capturing such a powerful narrative. You see, we've been championing, we've been trying to put regional literature at the front. In 1946, the U.S. finally granted the Philippines independence. What has become of Rizal's ideas, his questions about origin and identity? Does anyone still care about them today? Paulo Heras says yes. He has a comic book publishing company and a bookstore in Manila. He's also an author. Strange Natives, a graphic novel, was his breakthrough. It's a fantastical story about how we remember the past and what that means for the identity of Filipinos. I wrote Strange Natives because it was basically how I felt like. I felt like I was a stranger in my own native land. I started to realize that I had to slowly peel away the colonial trappings of our history, our culture. And that's basically what Strange Natives is all about. These characters are actually either pre-colonial gods and goddesses, and all of them are like strangers in their own native land. Gracia, the heroine of the book, loses herself in memories. Memories not only of her family, but also of her country's history, the end of Spanish colonial rule, and the rise to power of new forces. Strange Natives is a story about the search for identity and about the need to connect the past with the present. A lot of our historical documents were erased by the colonizers. They were burned. We're an oral culture, so sometimes it's not documented in writing. So there is that challenge of remembering our past, our identity, our culture, our own people. That is precisely what Jose Rizal called for, that the people of the Philippines, with their different cultures and languages, should confidently preserve their identity. There is one phrase which was also Rizal's motto. Do not forget your origins. And there is so much more. Rizal's biographer, Ambeth Ocampo, urges us all to discover Rizal. I've been studying him for 40 years, and people keep saying, don't you get tired? I said, because there's always something to find.

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