GE1804

SAMPLE REFLECTION PAPER

CHAPTER I

Isang Pagtitipon [A Gathering]

A REFLECTION PAPER

In Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements

In the Subject GE1804

Rizal’s Life and Works

To be submitted to

Ma’am Marcy Badar

Submitted by

Ringor, John Michael

Date of submission: 26 April 2021

ABSTRACT

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The month of October is coming to an end and Don Santiago de los Santos (Captain Tiago) is hosting a
dinner at his house in Binondo which is located along Anloague Street and near the Pasig River. Captain
Tiago’s cousin is receiving the lady guests as well as offering cigars and a compound of betel nut, leaves,
and reappears. Sitting around one of the tables at the living room are Padre Dámaso, Padre Sibyla, a
blond youth who is a newcomer to the Philippines, senor Laruja, and a soldier. The five men are feasting
on English biscuits and bottle of wine. Padre Damasi is telling the group of how ignorant and indoldent
the Indio are.

Padre Dámaso and the Lieutenant nearly fight in a fist fight after the former insults the Vise-Royal
Patron (Captain General). But Padre Sibyla intervenes and prevents the potential scuttle. Doctor de
Espadana and his wife Dona Victorina arrives at the dinner party. Padre Dámaso and the group greet the
couple and engage them in a conversation about the invention of the gunpowder. This chapter alone
provides deep insights on how some of the friars view themselves and how they cling onto an image
that they so desperately try to maintain, all the while creating ominous foreboding for the thing to come
upon Ibarra’s homecoming.

Isang Pagtitipon [A Gathering]

In late October, Don Santiago de los the first time. Authoritatively speaking over the

Santos, who is known as Captain Tiago, throws a others, Fray Dámaso lectures this newcomer

large dinner party in Manila. He is very wealthy about the nature of “indios,” or native Filipinos.

and, as such, the party takes place in his

Father Dámaso explains to his listeners
impressive home, to which people eagerly flock
that his first post in the Philippines was in a
so as not to miss an important social event. As
small town, where he worked for three years.
the guests mill about, groups of soldiers,
He boasts that he made strong connections
European travelers, and priests speak to one
with the townspeople, who he claims loved and
another. An old lieutenant in the Civil Guard
respected him. When he was transferred three
engages in conversation with a quiet but
years later to the town of San Diego, he
argumentatively cunning Dominican friar
explains, the town was sad to see him go. He
named Fray Sibyla, a loudmouthed Franciscan
then spent the next twenty years in San Diego,
friar named Fray Dámaso, and two civilians, one
and though he still doesn’t understand very
of whom has just arrived in the Philippines for
much Tagalog—the country’s native language—

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he believes himself a good preacher who being lost…it is lost!” When Sibyla asks what he

intimately knows the townspeople. Because of means, Dámaso says, “The governors support

this, he is upset that when he recently ceased to the heretics against God’s own ministers!” This

be San Diego’s friar, only “a few old women and seems to unnerve the lieutenant, who begins to

a few tertiary brothers saw [him] off.” stand and asks Dámaso to clarify. “I mean that

when a priest tosses the body of a heretic out of

Continuing his rant, Father Dámaso says
his cemetery, no one, not even the king himself,
that “indios are very lazy.” The foreigner who is
has the right to interfere, and has even less
new to the Philippines challenges this notion,
right to impose punishment,” Dámaso says
asking, “Are these natives truly indolent by
without explanation. He then references a “little
nature, or is it, as a foreign traveler has said,
general,” before trailing off, which angers the
that we make excuses for our own indolence,
lieutenant. The lieutenant, a member of the
our backwardness, and our colonial system by
government’s Civil Guard, yells his support of
calling them indolent?” As Dámaso refutes this
the Spanish king’s representative in the
idea, Father Sibyla steps in and puts him back
Philippines, whom Dámaso has insulted.
on track, underhandedly prodding what he

intuits is a sensitive issue by asking the As Father Dámaso and the lieutenant

boisterous priest why he left San Diego after approach the possibility of a fistfight, Father

twenty years. Sibyla intervenes with philosophical and

diplomatic reasoning. The lieutenant dismisses

For the first time all evening, Fray
this, saying that Dámaso is out of line. He
Dámaso falls silent before slamming his fist into
explains that the man whose body was removed
his chair and cryptically shouting, “Either there
from the Catholic cemetery was a friend of his—
is religion or there isn’t, and that’s that, either
“a very distinguished person.” “So what if he
priests are free or they aren’t! The country is
never went to confessions,” the lieutenant says.

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“So what? I don’t go to confession either. But to INTERPRETATION DURING JUNIOR HIGH

claim that he committed suicide is a lie, a slur. A SCHOOL

man like him, with a son in whom he has placed

As a high school student, the most
all his hopes and affections, a man with faith in
common interpretation that I had was that
God, who understands his responsibilities to
Spaniards really done worst thing to the
society, an honorable and just man, does not
Philippines during the Spanish Occupation, as
commit suicide.”
described to the novel of Rizal. Our Filipino

Continuing with his story, the lieutenant teacher often gave an insight to Chapter I,

says that Father Dámaso exhumed this because the chapter is straightforward and

distinguished man’s body from the cemetery. explain itself.

The Captain General knew about this, and thus

Padre Dámaso is introduced to this
transferred Dámaso from San Diego as a
chapter as the antagonist. The chapter almost
punishment. Having finished the story, the
cover the conversations of Dámaso and Sibyla
lieutenant storms off, leaving Father Sibyla to
and the Guardia Civil.
say, “I am sorry that without knowing it I
The fact that Father Dámaso thinks he
touched upon such a delicate matter.” Changing
can generalize about the nature of “indios”
the subject, one of the civilians asks about
indicates his excessive confidence and lack of
Captain Tiago, the host of the party. Dámaso
cultural compassion, considering that the term
says that there is “no need for introductions”
“indio” is a derogatory term for Filipinos.
because Tiago is “a good sort.” And in any case,
Furthermore, his domineering character is
there are rumors that he has stepped out of the
evident by his authoritative tendency take
house for some reason, leaving his guests to
command of a conversation, lecturing
mingle. Just then, two people enter the room.
newcomers instead of welcoming their

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questions. It is clear right from the start, then, government and the church becomes apparent

that priests are afforded an outsized amount of when the lieutenant supports the dead man’s

power in this community. decision not to go to confession.

REFLECTIONS OF THE ISSUE TO MODERN PERSONAL REFLECTION

SOCIETY

In the novel’s dedication, Rizal explains Through Ibarra, Rizal the social

that there was once a type of cancer so terrible reformer makes it clear that he believed greatly

that the sufferer could not bear to be touched, in the transformative power of secular

and the disease was thus called noli me tangere education. To learn only by rote prevented the

(Latin: “do not touch me”). He believed that his ordinary Filipino from truly understanding his

homeland was similarly afflicted. The novel situation, hence Ibarra’s proposal to build a

offers both a panoramic view of every level of school for the town of San Diego. In contrast,

society in the Philippines of the time and droll what was the conventional view of education in

satire. Its description of the cruelty of Spanish San Diego? Why were Padre Damaso and, later

rule was a catalyst for the movement for on, Padre Salvi, against such innovation? How

independence in the country. did race figure in their opposition?

Once again, Rizal throws readers into a Capitan Tiago and Doña Victorina de

web of specifics they haven’t yet learned how Espadaña identify completely with the colonial

to untangle. Nonetheless, it is clear now that mind-set. In portraying the two, Rizal pokes fun

the dead person Father Dámaso referenced at their pretensions. What pretensions are

earlier was a respected man with friends in these and how are they lampooned? Is Rizal

relatively high places, considering that the gentler with one than the other?

lieutenant vouches for him so adamantly.

Furthermore, another delineation between the

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REFERENCES

LitCharts (n.d.). Noli Me Tangere chapter 1

summary and analysis. Lifted and modified from

[Link]

tangere/chapter-1-a-gathering

Luis, (f.l). INTRODUCTION TO JOSÉ RIZAL’S NOLI

ME TANGERE. Retrieve from

[Link]

/291131/noli-me-tangere-touch-me-not-by-

jose-rizal/9780143039693/readers-guide/

Patricia Bauer, The Social Cancer. Retrieve from

[Link]
Cancer

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