THE National Artist and Filipino historian, Resil Mojares, has produced a book, “Brains of the Nation,” that is a history of intellectual thought on the record of this country.
This is not a new book; it was first published in 2006 by the Ateneo de Manila University Press, followed by a second printing in 2016. It is now out of print. Our Reading Club had to scramble to get copies, borrowed or secondhand, found online or from some personal libraries. Definitely, there should be a third printing.
This is a commentary and not a book review, which would go way beyond this column’s designated length, and perhaps, since I am not a trained historian, I might not understand its delineations, facets and nuances. Mojares is an unbelievably thorough researcher, a meticulous writer of detail who offers a balanced view of the subject matter that brings one to appropriate conclusions.
In this case, he selects three Filipino intellectuals of the 19th century to analyze: Pedro Paterno, Trinidad H. Pardo de Tavera and Isabelo de los Reyes. These pioneer 19th-century intellectuals of different origins, educational backgrounds and individual interests are part of our evolution as we come to see ourselves as a nation and a people.
Pedro Paterno was part of the new bourgeoisie, a Filipino of Chinese descent, but who viewed himself as a Tagalog. He came from a rich family and was sent to Spain at age 14, where he assimilated Spanish society, which was then divided into rich and poor. Of course, he chose to be on the rich side. He finished a doctorate in law at the University of Salamanca, talked about Filipino nobility, collected Filipino artifacts and wrote about his country as he saw it from his background of readings and European influences. He came home after 22 years and threw himself into the brewing tensions between the colonial establishment and Filipino rebels ranging from the Filipino secular priests demanding their rights, the Philippine Revolution events and the eventual American Occupation. At the stalemate of the Philippine Revolution against Spain, he offered himself to the Spanish governor to mediate a peace treaty. He was given the task, and the result was the Pact of Biak na Bato, where the rebels agreed to go into exile in Hong Kong. During the American Occupation and the Proclamation of Philippine Independence, which resulted in the Malolos Congress convened to write a Constitution, Paterno was made president of the assembly.
Aside from politics, Paterno wrote about the Philippine past from history to religion and other ethnographic subjects. He had an imagination that went beyond sources and fantasized events that could not have happened for which he has been much criticized then and now. He was a dreamer. Nevertheless, he is credited with having written the first Filipino novel, “Ninay.” He is also recognized as the first Filipino anthropologist despite the errors in his interpretations of Philippine culture. He wrote dozens of books, had a huge library and delved into what this country was about. He had a personality of extreme sociability, loved to host parties and be the center of attention for which he had many critics. Yet he was a pioneer Filipino intellectual who expressed his country’s culture when few were doing it.
Trinidad H. Pardo de Tavera was a creole though he was taken for Spanish from his looks. There were racial divisions in the Philippines at the time — the few Spaniards born in Spain, the peninsulares, and therefor at the top consisting of civil, military and religious people; the creoles, born in the Philippines of Spanish parentage; the Chinese mestizos (Chinese who assimilated with the natives); the indios (natives); and the infieles (tribes like the Aetas).
Coming from a rich family that had to go into exile for suspected anti-Spanish tendencies, Pardo de Tavera was educated in Paris and studied to be a medical doctor at the Sorbonne. But as common in those times, professionals would delve into studies outside their primary professions. He developed an interest in linguistics, which he studied in Paris concentrating on Malay and Sanskrit. He wrote about our native languages from the linguistic point of view, came up with a book on medicinal plants of the Philippines and many other topics discussed in a scientific manner as he was a trained scientist. In time he came back to the Philippines, continuing his studies of history and culture on which he wrote extensively. He had strong views about education, work and progress that he hoped the Philippines would develop. He was not so involved in politics until the American Occupation when he decided the American positivism was best for the Philippines, and he was one of the founders of the Federalista Party that believed in assimilation with the United States. That venture into politics failed as it went against the pro-independence sentiments of more charismatic leaders.
Pardo de Tavera was a towering intellectual who in effect was in an ivory tower for much of his career, and when he stepped down, he was not a success as in the case of the Federalista party. Nevertheless, the rigor and accuracy of his work, the contributions he made like writing the history of the Philippines adopted as the official version during the American Occupation, playing a major role in the new public education set up by the US in the Philippines, serving on medical commissions, the national library, demonstrated that he could be an active, concerned and involved public citizen once out of the ivory tower. He is credited with many major contributions along with his dreams for the country that are worth remembering and appreciating.
Isabelo de los Reyes, the third intellectual, was from the provinces, an Ilocano, who contributed to journalism and Philippine subjects, particularly Filipino folklore. He was educated in Manila and became a newspaperman and founded many publications. He also delved into recording folklore. His forceful views on contemporary Philippine matters were considered subversive enough to bring him to prison and exile in Spain, where he was influenced by Spanish and European anarchists. Curiously, he was also contracted to translate the Old Testament from Spanish to Ilocano by a religious Protestant group. Back in the Philippines, he continued expressing his ideas, this time with more radical influences from his exposure to the political ideas in Spain. He became involved with Gregorio Aglipay, a fellow Ilocano, who was a secular priest agitating for the rights of the Filipino clergy against the discrimination of the Spanish clergy here. When Aglipay founded the Iglesia Filipina Independiente, de los Reyes became so involved in the issue, he virtually wrote (despite all kinds of mistakes, wrong assumptions, etc.) the canonical background for the church.
Of the three intellectuals, Isabelo de los Reyes was the best known for his very active public life and successful involvement in politics (he became a senator), folklore research and eventually the Iglesia Filipina Independiente. Again, like Paterno and Pardo de Tavera, he projected Philippine perspectives in culture, history and journalism that defined the Filipino identity.
Mojares does not stop here. He then defines and depicts the history of the Philippine intellectual movement from its inception in the scribes, printers, secretaries, songwriters, composers, poets who were involved in early Spanish governance to native religious clergy and popular religious movements, culminating in the movement for secular priests and their demand for equal rights. Mojares manages to depict the early teachers and intellectuals as they compose what he terms the Filipino Enlightenment. He traces the opening of the Philippines to the world after the Manila Galleon Trade and the influences that it brought to the Philippines and onward to the 19th century when the Filipino intellectual was more defined, more active and more influential.
“Brains of the Nation” ends with the American Occupation and Mojares’ analysis of how it affected our history of education, intellectual outlook and sense of nationhood which is interesting, detailed and quite true.
“Brains of the Nation” is an impressive book of thorough scholarship that brings to the fore the life of the Filipino mind. It is demanding but rewarding.
