Did Jose Rizal writeSa aking mga Kabata

The hearsay: In 1869, the then eight-year-old Jose Rizal wrote his first Tagalog poem. EntitledSa aking mga Kabata(To My Fellow Children), it soon immortalized the lineang hindi marunong magmahal sa sariling wika ay masahol pa sa hayop at malansang isda(he who loves not his own language is worse than a beast and a stinking fish).

Fact check:To this day, no manuscript linking Rizal to the poem has been identified yet. And lets admit it, Rizal was probably too busy playing with his dog and siblings to even thought of making a poem mentioning the wordkalayaan(freedom). In the first place, Rizal was already 21 years old when he first encountered such word.

In addition to that, the poem was only published ten years after Rizals death, leading historians into questioning its authenticity. PoetsHerminigildo Cruz andGabriel Beato Francisco have since been linked to the poem but so far, the case of the lost author remains an open mystery.

(http://www.filipiknow.net/jose-rizal-myths/)

Something shy about Rizal poemDid Jose Rizal really write Sa Aking Mga Kabata?

Every year in August, students in the Philippines celebrate Buwan ng Wika (Language Month) and, after 75 years of thenational language, educators still nd it necessary to invoke thenger-wagging admonition against neglecting ones ownlanguage: Ang hindi magmahal sa sariling wika ay higit sa hayop atmalansang isda [One who does not love his own language isworse than a beast and a stinking sh].

Calling someone a stinking sh might sound a bit childish,but it could be forgiven since it was supposedly a child whowrote this now-famous accusation. The line is a slightlymangled quote from the poem Sa Aking Mga Kabata [To MyFellow Youth], which, as any Filipino schoolteacher will tell you, was written by the national hero, Jose Rizal, when he wasonly eight years old.Even though generations of children have heard this poem hailed as an example of Rizals natural genius, a few academicssuch as Virgilio Almario, Ambeth Ocampo, Nilo Ocampo andothers have expressed doubts that young Pepe really wrote the poem. Well hear what they had to say later.

I rst read this poem many years ago when I was learning the Filipino language. The idea that it might be a hoax never entered my mind, though I doubted that Rizal was so young when he composed it. I thought some zealous biographer might have concocted that part of the story, like George Washingtons cherry tree incident.

Many years later, in 2007, I wanted to use the famous malansang isda line in an article, 1 but I couldnt nd the ofcial version of the poem. There are a few different versions, each with slight variations in some of the lines and even the title is not consistent; sometimes kabata, sometimes kababata. It seems that there is noofcial version or even an original manuscript to consult.

While re-reading the poem, one word struck me like a thunderbolt: it was kalayaan. The word, which means freedom and liberty, reminded me of a letter that Jose Rizal wrote to his brother Paciano in 1886. Rizal had written a Tagalog translation of Friedrich Schillers German play, Wilhelm Tell and he wanted Paciano to review it.

Rizals manuscript

From a historians point of view, documentation for this poem is sadly lacking, wrote Ambeth Ocampo, then-future chair of the National Historical Institute (NHI), in a 1991 newspaper article. The manuscript, he continued, is not, and never seems to have been, extant.

This is quite signicant because Rizal was very meticulous about documenting every facet of his life. From his earliest childhood memories, recorded in his student diaries in Manila, to his Ultimo Adios on the eve of his execution, Rizal wrote about it. While studying in Madrid in 1882, he sent this instruction to his sister Maria in the Philippines:I should like you to keep all my letters in Spanish that begin, Mis queridos padres y hermanos, because in them I relate all that has happened to me. When I get home I shall collect them and clarify them.Ambeth Ocampo said in another article in 1996:It is clear from Rizals letters, diaries, and other writings that he meticulously planned both his life and death down to the last detail. Nothing was left to chance, not even the choreography of his death.

Ocampos point was that Jose Rizal consciously cultivated his legacy as a hero. Certainly this poem should have had a prominent place in that legacy, but, apparently, Rizal was oblivious of it. If the poem was, in fact, his earliest knownrevolutionary utterance, as Austin Coates described it, surely Rizal would have remembered it in 1889 when he described his actual reformist awakening to Mariano Ponce. He remembered the Gomburza martyrdoms of 1872, which happened three years after the poem was allegedly composed.

Since Rizals death, hundreds of his personal letters and other writings have been published, but, apparently, he never saved a copy of this now-famous poem or even bothered to mention it in his entire lifetime of writing. Why not? The reason is inescapable: he knew nothing about the poem and had no connection to it, excep for what others claimed after his death.

Where did the poem come from?

The earliest documented appearance of Sa Aking Mga Kabata was in a book published in 1906, almost ten years after Rizals death. Author Hermenegildo Cruz presented it as an example of modern naturalist Tagalog poetry in Kun Sino ang Kumath ng Florante [The Person who Composed Florante].The poem, like the rest of the book, was rendered using the new Tagalog spelling that Rizal himself had helped to develop in the mid 1880s.

If Cruz possessed an original manuscript of the poem, he apparently updated it from the standard Tagalog orthography of the 1860s, which followed Spanish spelling conventions and did not use certain letters that appear in this version, such as K and W.Cruz introduced the work as a Tagalog language poem written by the hero Jose Rizal in 1869 when he was only about eight years old. In a footnote, he added this about the poems provenance:For this poem I am indebted to my friend, Mr. Gabriel BeatoFrancisco. This was given to him by Mr. Saturnino Raselis, anative of Lukban, who was a teacher (maestro) in Mahayhay in 1884. This gentleman was a very close friend of Rizal who gavehim (the teacher) a copy of this poem himself, a symbol,apparently, of their close friendship.

Gabriel Francisco was a poet, novelist and the author of an 1899 play, Ang Katipunan. Mr. Saturnino Raselis, however, is a bit of a mystery. So far, I have found no mention of this very close friend of Rizal anywhere except in this footnote by Cruz. A letter from Rizals brother-in-law, Manuel Hidalgo, reported the cholera death of a Judge Saturnino in Calamba in 1882 but our Maestro Raselis(or Racelis) was apparently alive and well in Majayjay in 1884. The Racelis clan of Lucban, Quezon has a web site showing their family tree reaching back to before 1870, but nobody named Saturnino is listed.

Another origin story

Austin Coates had a different story with even fewer details about where this poem, or perhaps another copy of it, came from. In his 1968 biography of Jose Rizal, he wrote, This poem, copied from hand to hand, is said to have made a deep impression on Tagalog poets and those few others interested whom it reachedand in a footnote, he added, One of the very rare copies of this poem came many years later into the hands of Antonio Luna, the Filipino revolutionary general to whom it owes its survival.

While Coates book is generally considered one of the better biographies of Jose Rizal, he did not provide extensive information about the sources of specic claims such as this because he was writing for the general public rather than academics. He offered nothing further about Lunas connection to the poem, however, the part about the popularity of the poem among Tagalog poets seems to echo what Pascual Poblete wrote in his 1909 biography of Rizal:

The public came to recognize his skill in poetry when he was only eight years old because of a beautiful poem that he composed, which astounded all the Tagalog poets in the province of Laguna.

Who really wrote Sa Aking Mga Kabata?

At this point we can only speculate. Since Cruz was apparently the rst to bring the poem to public attention, I would suspect that either he or one of his sources was the true author. And since we cant even be sure at this point if the schoolteacher Saturnino Racelis ever existed, we are left with only Cruz and the poet/playwright/novelist, Francisco. Did Francisco dupe Cruz with a phoney Rizal poem or were they in cahoots? Did one of these men commit a fraud bypassing off his own work as Rizals or as Nilo Ocampo speculated did their unquestioning admiration for the national hero simply lead them to attribute an anonymous poem to Rizal by mistake? (See part 1 of this series) With only circumstantial evidence and my suspicions I would place my bets on the poet, Gabriel Beato Francisco, as being the real author of Sa Aking Mga Kabata.Next time well look into some of the possible reasons why this poem might have been attributed to Jose Rizal and why it has been so successful.

(http://www.pilipino-express.com/pdfs/inotherwords/Something%20Fishy%20About%20Rizal%20Poem.pdf)

Ambeth Ocampo: Rizal did not write Sa Aking Mga Kabata

Finally.

Two years ago, I contended that Rizal never wrote Sa Aking Mga Kabata which reeked of Tagalista fervor as well as dubious, unRizalistic entries in almost each line. Early this morning, no less than the countrys foremost historian today, Ambeth R. Ocampo, finally ended the issue.

Did young Rizal really write poem for children?By Ambeth R. OcampoPhilippine Daily Inquirer

IN 1892, Jose Rizal began a new novel in Tagalog.He realized that in order to reach a wider readership in his country, he had to write in his native tongue.During this time of exile in Hong Kong, his elder brother, Paciano, had completed a translation of the Noli Me Tangere from the original Spanish into Tagalog that was corrected and finalized by Rizal.

Envisioned as a popular edition with illustrations by Juan Luna, this book was never to be. The original manuscript translation by Paciano has since been missing.Nevertheless, Rizal completed a chapter of his satirical Tagalog novel and gave it the title Makamisa (After the Mass), but unfortunately he did not have the energy to complete it.He stopped writing in Tagalog and began anew in Spanish. The drafts of this work were first published in 1993 in my book Makamisa: The Search for Rizals Third Novel.Rizal spoke and wrote in Tagalog fluently, but he was unable to write a whole novel in his mother tongue. This is quite surprising for is he not, like Manuel L. Quezon, inextricably linked to the adoption of Tagalog as the national language of the Philippines?Most quoted line

Isnt the most quoted line from Rizals many poems that from Sa Aking Mga Kabata that goes, Ang hindi marunong magmahal sa sariling wika/masahol pa sa hayop at malansang isda. (He who loves not his own language/is worse than a beast and a stinking fish.)Did Rizal write this poem at 8 years old? Did Rizal write this poem at all?No original manuscript, in Rizals own hand, exists for Sa Aking Mga Kabata, traditionally believed to be his first poem.Rizal had 35 years to publish or assert authorship. He did not. The poem was published posthumously, a decade after his execution, as an appendix to Kun sino ang kumatha ng Florante: Kasaysayan ng Buhay ni Francisco Baltazar at pag-uulat nang kanyang karunungat kadakilaan (Manila: Libreria Manila-Filatelico, 1906.) by the poet Herminigildo Cruz as follows:

Sa Aking Mga KabataKapagka ang bayay sadyang umiibigsa kanyang salitang kaloob ng langit.sanlang kalayaan nasa ring masapitkatulad ng ibong nasa himpapawid.Pagkat ang salitay isang kahatulansa bayan, sa nayot mga kaharian,at ang isang taoy katulad kabagayng alinmang likha noong kalayaan.Ang hindi magmahal sa kanyang salitamahigit sa hayop at malansang isda,kaya ang marapat pagyamaning kusana tulad sa inang tunay na nagpala.Ang wikang Tagalog tulad din sa Latin,sa Ingles, Kastila, at salitang angel,sapagkat ang Poong maalam tuminginang siyang nag-gawad, nagbigay sa atin.Ang salita natiy tulad din sa ibana may alfabeto at sariling letrana kaya nawalay dinatnan ng sigwaang lunday sa lawa noong dakong una.

Provenance

Tracing the provenance of the poem to its source, Cruz claims to have received the poem from his friend, the poet Gabriel Beato Francisco, who got it from a certain Saturnino Raselis of Lukban, a bosom friend of Rizal and teacher in Majayjay, Laguna, in 1884.Raselis is alleged to have received a copy of this poem from Rizal himself, a token of their close friendship.Unfortunately, Raselis name does not appear in Rizals voluminous correspondence, diaries or writings. When Jaime C. de Veyra established the definitive canon of Rizals poetry in 1946 with a compilation published in the series Documentos de la Biblioteca Nacional de Filipinas (Documents from the National Library of the Philippines) Sa Aking Mga Kabata was not published in the original Tagalog but in a free Spanish translation of the Tagalog by Epifanio de los Santos as A mis compaeros de niez.Tagalog, according to the 8-year-old Rizal, has its own alphabet and letters. It goes back to pre-Spanish times. The precocious child even compared Tagalog with Latin, English, Spanish and the language of angels, whatever that is.

Second look

Filipinos raised on textbook history that depicts Rizal as a superhuman genius should give the poem a second look and ask, Was it really written by an 8-year-old from Calamba just learning to read at his mothers knee?The poem could not have been written in 1869 when Rizal was eight based on the use of the letter k, which was a reform in Tagalog orthography proposed by the mature Rizal.In Rizals childhood they spelled words with a c rather than k. Further, the word kalayaan (freedom) is used twice. First, in the third line of the first stanza, there is mention of sanlang kalayaan (pawned freedom).Was Rizal aware of the colonial condition at this young age? Kalayaan appears the second time in the last line of the second stanza.

Encounter with kalayaan

These two references ring a bell because kalayaan as we know it today was not widely used in the 19th century. As a matter of fact, Rizal encountered the word first in the summer of 1882 when he was 21 years old!In a letter to his brother, Paciano, dated Oct. 12, 1886, Rizal related difficulties encountered with Schillers Wilhelm Tell that he was translating from the original German into Tagalog:Im sending you at last the translation of Wilhelm Tell by Schiller which was delayed one week, being unable to finish it sooner on account of my numerous tasks. Im aware of its many mistakes that I entrust to you and my brothers-in-law to correct. It is almost a literal translation. Im forgetting Tagalog a little, as I dont speak it with anyone. I lacked many words, for example, for the word Freiheit or liberty, one cannot use the Tagalog word kaligtasan of course because this means that he was formerly in some prison, slavery, etc. I encountered in the translation of Amor Patrio the noun malay, kalayahan that Marcelo del Pilar used. In the only Tagalog book I have, Florante [at Laura], I dont find an equivalent noun.

El Amor Patrio

El Amor Patrio was the first article Rizal wrote on Spanish soil. He wrote it in Barcelona in the summer of 1882 and it was published in Diariong Tagalog in August 1882 both in Spanish and a Tagalog translation, Pag-ibig Sa Tinubuang Lupa, by Marcelo H. del Pilar.If, as Rizal admitted, he did not encounter the word kalayaan until he was studying in Europe at 21 years old, how can he have used it at 8 years old in Calamba?In light of its complicated provenance and the anachronistic use of the word kalayaan a shadow of doubt has been cast on Sa Aking Mga Kabata.There are only two poems attributed to Rizal in Tagalog, the other is Kundiman. Both are questionable. All his documented poems are in Spanish.If Rizal did not compose Sa Aking Mga Kabata, who did?Our two suspects are the poets Herminigildo Cruz or Gabriel Beato Francisco.Identifying the true author of Sa Aking Mga Kabata is important because millions of Filipino children are miseducated each year during Buwan ng Wika when they are told that Rizal composed a poem on his mother tongue when he was 8.Will the real author of Sa Aking Mga Kabata please stand up for he who does not love his own poem/is worse than a beast and a stinking fish (ang di magmahal sa sariling tula/mahigit sa hayop at malansang isda).

Read more: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/45479/did-young-rizal-really-write-poem-for-children#ixzz2tCqwS6bZ Follow us: @inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook

Read more: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/45479/did-young-rizal-really-write-poem-for-children#ixzz2tCqZuKLHFollow us: @inquirerdotnet on Twitter | inquirerdotnet on Facebook(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ambeth.jpg)(http://filipinoscribbles.wordpress.com/2011/08/22/ocampo-rizal-did-not-write-sa-aking-mga-kabata/)Historians Point of View

To historian Ambeth Ocampo, also the current go-to person for all things Rizal, state at the UP Baguio last Wednesday that he was quite certain the line and the poem Sa Aking mga Kababata were not written by Rizal. Ocampo cited a couple of items to support his take.

First, said he, there is language in the poem that does not belong in 1869, the (now) supposed year that the poem was supposedly written. Ocampo in particular cited the word himpapawid, used in the poem, calling it a 20th century term, langit being its 1869 version.

Second, Ocampo pointed out that there is no extant manuscript of said poem, when other writings of Rizal either have extant manuscripts or were once manuscripts whose existence can stand the test of verification.

Ocampo also points out that Sa Aking mga Kababata was published only in 1902 and cannot be traced back to Rizal, i.e., there is no evidence that said poem was actually part of his body of work. That said works were actually already accounted for even during Rizals lifetime, as Ocampo points out, lends credence to the theory that the poem was actually not written by Rizal.

(http://www.sunstar.com.ph/baguio/opinion/2011/09/17/carino-malansang-isda-179891)

XIAO CHUA Opo, alam ko pong masakit tanggapin ngunit ilang dekada pong naniwala sa kasinungalingan ang mga kabataan sa bagay na iyan. Maging ako po nasaktan. Biruin mo, 12 years na akong nagaaral, sa 12 years na yun, since Prep ang alam ko si Rizal ang nagsulat ng Tulang iyan. Hardcore! [term courtesy of Prof. Xiao Chua]

So eto na nga, may mga bagay akong babanggitin at pilit kong ipapaliwanag sa abot ng makakaya ng neuron(s) ko.

Una, dapat muna nating isipin na ang Sa Aking mga Kabata ay lumabas sa Madla sa isang libro ng isang manunulat na Pilipino matapos ang ilang mga taon buhat ng pumanaw si Rizal. WALA po sa anumang dokumento ang DIREKTANG nakaugnay sa pangalan ni Jose Rizal- Walang manuscript. Gayundin, sa hinaba-haba ng buhay ni Jose Rizal hindi po nya ito naipublish

(Private Message from Mr. Xiao Chua consultant of HISTORY: TSISMIS NOON, KASAYSAYAN NGAYON TV5)at hindi nya po ito nabanggit sa kahit sinumang kaibigan, kamaganak at hindi manlang itolumabas sa kahit anong diary and correspondence nya.

Pangalawa, sa kanlungan lamang ng kanyang ina sya natuto magbasa at magsulat. at sa edad na 8 y/o di umano nya ito isinulat. Sa edad na ito, kahina-hinala na alam na nya ang mga konsepto ng pagkakagapos o kolonyalismo (nabanggit nya ang kalayaan).

Pangatlo, wala pang salitang KALAYAAN noong 19th Century sa Pilipinas. Ni-hindi rin alam ni Rizal ang salitang KALAYAAN. Ito lamang ay nalaman nya noong sya ay nagaaral na sa Europa. Sa katunayan, sa isang sulat nya sa kanyang kapatid na si Paciano, nabanggit nya na ang librong (Wilhem Tell ni Schiller) kanyang isinasalin sa wikang tagalog ay hindi nya lubusang maperpekto. Sinabi pa nya na literal translation ang ginawa nya. Ang salitang LIBERTY ay isinalin nya sa tagalog na salitang LIGTAS.

Pangapat, ang paggamit sa letrang K ay hindi prominente sa panahong yaon. Sa unang publikasyon nito (orihinal na kopya) ang lahat ng pagbabay-bay ay naaayon na sa revised Filipino language.

(http://edito-real.tumblr.com/post/38590510401/sa-aking-mga-kabata-not-rizals)