Back when our National Hero Jose Rizal was studying in Ateneo Municipal, the Jesuits – their teachers – made it a point to inculcate in their students’ minds a sense of humanism in their subjects.
Through the humanistic form of education, Rizal and his classmates were able to learn the tenets of justice, dignity, and equality of all men.
The students, however, were disappointed to see that the tenets taught to them in class were not entirely applied outside the classroom by the Spanish colonial authorities. Rampant graft and corruption, racism, and widening gap between the rich and the poor, let alone between the Spaniards and the Filipinos, seemed too obvious.
With that situation, Rizal vowed to help change things – and this started with his viewpoint on the importance of education, wherein he averred that “it is through education that the fatherland can acquire its glory.”
For Jose Rizal, people must go through adequate education to be able to improve themselves, and then be able to help the fatherland.
This is the story that we usually hear in school from our teachers and professors. Well, at least I hope it has been discussed, since these lessons must be given much emphasis to show the students how Rizal continues to be relevant in this day and age.
However, when we teach about Rizal, we must always remember that he is – just like you and me – a human being. That being said, we must try to humanize him, and not venerate him to the point that he could not have made errors of judgment, or that he could not have had any flaws in character as a human being.
One of the many things that makes Rizal human is his intolerance to criticism.
Rizal was a very sensitive man; he was someone you would not want to criticize since he would oft-times find it unacceptable, and would take the criticism personally.
As the anecdote goes, there was a conflict between Jose Rizal and Marcelo H. del Pilar in the Propaganda Movement, and ultimately, “Rizal left the group”. When Del Pilar noticed how Rizal’s absence in the movement led to financial difficulties, as most of Rizal’s supporters followed suit and also left the group, del Pilar then wrote a letter to Rizal asking for forgiveness, and cajoling him to return to Spain.
By that time, Rizal was already in Hong Kong, and was ready to return to the Philippines. In his reply, Rizal told Del Pilar that he could not return to the Propaganda Movement since he believed that it was better to “bring the medicine nearer to sick man” – clearly referring to the Philippines.
Moreover, Rizal said that even if he had forgiven del Pilar, he could not really forget what del Pilar did, stating in the most sensitive manner that “scratches from a friend hurt more than wounds from an enemy”. That statement evinces Rizal’s sensitivity and intolerance to criticism.
More often than not, we tend to show some “hints of Rizal” in our daily lives when we easily get hurt by criticisms, or when we learn of people speaking ill of us.
We cannot, however, control what other people say about us. That is what makes us human. The moment we control them, that’s the time we become less human.
Personally, I was more or less a sensitive person before – easily hurt and offended especially when people speak ill of me.
However, I’ve learned that people are people, and they will always speak ill of anyone as much as they want. We can’t force them to stop, but we can learn to simply ignore and move on. Why bother?
That’s what I told myself last year and early this year: you can’t force people to love you or be nice to you anyway, but you can choose to love yourself, surround yourself with people you trust, and move on with your life.
Let us continue to be inspired by Rizal’s legacy on education. But human as Rizal was, we can also learn from some of his shortcomings. Welcome criticisms, especially constructive criticisms. We are not perfect, and we can always learn from other people.
We need to realize as well that there’s no way we can please everyone. Even when all we have are good intentions, people will always find fault in whatever we do. Those are not worth our attention; they are simply hindrances/obstacles to our peace of mind and path to success.
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Author’s email: JJAbulado@norsu.edu.ph
