The Psychology of the Filipino

Title

Creator

Romualdez, Norberto

Language

English

Source

The Little Apostle of the Mountain Province 1 (1) June 1924

Year

1924

Subject

Missions--Philippines

Psychology, Religious

Filipinos--Psychology

Philippines--Religious life and customs

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

The Psychology of the Filipino By Hon. Norberto Romualdez .h:>oriate J11.~lice of the Supreme Court rd the l'hilij!pine lslwHI:> I. Preliminary Rtmarks j A story i~ told of a certain missionary who was asked to write his opinion of the Filipinos, and was given big books in blank for this purpose. The missionary accepted the task. Years elapsed and the 8 missionary died. Time anrl efforts were not spared in looking for the I. books to find what the missionary The Need of Knowing the Filipino. had written. The books were found; but upon turning over the pages, not more than a single line was written on the first page of the first volume. And it runs thus: 'Here is all that I have found about the Filipinos". The rest of the page, as well as the next succeeding pages and books, was in blank. This was understood to mean that the Spanish missionary must ha;-e found it impossible to comprehend the Filipino, and that the same was for him a blank page, fittingly represented by the blank books. I cannot vouch for the veracity of this story, but I give it here merely to emphasize the fact that it is, indeed, difficult for the occidental to understand our idiosyncracy. The peculiar Psychology of the Filipino was recognized, although not fully understood, I think, by the Spanish legislators, .as shown by the insertion in our Ptnal Code, of the provision contained in act. 11, which says : "the circumstance of the offender being a native, mestizo. or chinaman, shall be taken into consideration by the judges and courts in their discretion, for the purpose of mitigating or aggravating the penalties, according to the degree of intent, the nature of the act, and the circumstances of the off ended person.'' Thi,; difficult~· of knowing the Filipino, is due, in my judgement, to the differenc0 in the manner of thinking and aeting between the oecidentals a 1Hl the orientals; and thif' is aggrarnted b,v the fact that, very often, we have tn communicate our thoughts and ferlingf< in a language not our own, aml must make our manner of thinking and speaking tn conform with it. I refer, of course, to the great mass of Filipino,., and not to some of the new generation who begin to grasp more readily American ideas and ways. The present lecture is airne<l a,t facilitating this knowledge of the Filipino, and is here given upon invitation by the Rev. Fr. President of the Ateneo, my Alma Mater. Our dear President wants the Americans, in general, and the American community in the Philippines. in particular, to know the Philippines and the Filipinos better, that thereby, out of this better understanding, mutual respect and esteem may grow between the two peoples. I do not feel equal to the responsibility imposed upon me, but I shall try my best to respond to such a laudable desire of the Rev. Fr. President. 2. Explanation of the Subject. The nwthod followed in thi:; le('.ture is more analytic than synthetil·, be,-ause thesubjPet itf'elfso reqnirei3, it being a broad and fertile field not wholly explored; anrl right at the outset, I am thus giYing you an instance of the manifef'tation of the Filipino psychology, whieh is that of leaving the obsen·er to draw his own conclusions. I shall talk to you about the psy\'hology of the Filipino, as especially mani fe:0ted in our Ii teratu re a nll arts. I deem it neces,;ary, however, to give first, the historical background of our i;;lands, that you may better grasp the natural . relati011s which our history ha:- with our arts and literature. Hi;;tory and literature are kindred <'OIH'eptions, both being the written :<tory of the life that has been lived. While Philippine history places before us the life of the pioneers of our ral'e, as exhi bited by their action, literature presents the inner life, - thought, emotion, and ideals - of our people. Both history and literature reveal to us the life of a 11ation. In giving !'lome historical data, I shall not aim designedly at any particular epoch of history, but shall pick up those historical points which, in my judgment, may be taken as demonstrative of the Filipino idiosyncrasy. Thus, the data I shall give, refer more to the preSpanish times. J. Historical Data. a). Primitive Inhabitants and Immigrations. There i:< a diYersity of opinions among the hi;;torian;; a~ to the ethnology of the <1ifft>n•11t r:u·es that people the Philippine Arehipelago. Following, howe\·er, what we may consider we! I founded cont! usio11s, we <·.an say that, besides the aboriginal °i'\pgritos, there 1wre two separate immigrations, the fir>'t heing the Indonesian, and thP next, the Maln.v, both oceuring many <'Pnturies before Christ. ~Ian.v of ll" haYe seen :'\egritos, the aboriginal race in the Philippine~. The Indonesians, forced the ~eg ritos to the mountains, and, afterwards, the '.\falays can1e, and occupied, 111 turn, the l'Oasts and plains, and compelled the Indonesians to work their way to the interior regions of the Islands. The Igorots, Ginanes Apayos, and Gaddans in Luzon; the Bagobos, and Mandayas in l\Iindanaw; the Tagbanwas in Pala wan; and the Samals, in the island of Samal near Daba w, are the rem nan ts of those Indonesians who formed the first stream of immigrants. The Tingyans are also Indonesians. But it must be observed that the name Tingyans (derived from the Malay 'tinge'' which means "mountain") 10 rneans, in general, men of the rnom1tainR: hence, the word tinge or tyangc ha,; heen used for market, that is, a pla<·e where people of the mountains bri 11g down their products to the plai 11s, to sell. However, nowadays, the name Tinzyans is only applied to the inhabitants of some parts of Abra, the Ilokos provinces, and Vnion. In the Philippines, we can see every day, types of the first immigrants, - the Irnlonef'ians. There are some of these types in this hall. I myself being a nati,·e of Leyte, might haw_, something Indonesian in my type. The .Malays who definitely occupied the «oa;;:t" and plains, are the predominant race among the Moros of Mindanaw, the Bisayans, the Tagalogs, the Pampangans, the Ilokanos, and the Kagayans. T:1e Malay race is a product of a fusion of different peoples of Southeastern Asia, and of Malacca, Java, and other Oceanic Islands. .Many of the Malay immigrants to the Philippine::::, came from )lalaeca. \Vith reference to the l\Ialay immigration, there are certain accounts relatiw to the first :Malay chiefs called datus who arrived at 'the island of Panay. According to one of these acemmts, the said datus were called Puti, Bankaya, Paiburog, Sumakwel, Padohinog, Dumansol, Lubay, Dumalogdog and Bakalsusa, disgusted with their king named Makatunaw, who abused them cruelly. This information appears in a nianns<Tipt \Yhid1 trrn.\be found in the ar<'hin'::< of the Agu:<tinian Father". It i,: very probable that thi:=< same <l<'l'<>unt wa,.: eopied in a pamphlet entitled "1'1 aragtas", published in Iloilo in the year HlO/, with a prologue by the ex-~eeretary of Commerce and Communications, Hon. ~alrndor Laguda. )Jr. :\Jannel A tiigas, a bibliograpliPr i 11 l'harge of tlw Filipiniana Divi~io,J. of the Fhilippine Library and ,\[u8eum, makes referenl'e to thci:;enarne;; and rna1111seri11t itt hi" "Historia de Fili-pinas." b). Conquests. There is a belief that, hefore the coming of the Spaniards, this Arcl'ipelago was subject to Hindu-,'\1al:iyan empires in ~umatra, Indochina, and Borneo. In my opinion, the historical data availahle do not fnll,\justify such a co ncl lll"ion. As we h:we ;;:een, tht> }[,;Jay datus jltst referred to, left their land, due to trouble!" with their king, for whieh rea:lon it eannot be sairl that they cvnquered this Archipelago in the name of said king. There are historians, like Hen·as y Panduro, \Yl10 assure that the immigrations of the Brown or .Mongoloid race into the Philippines was due, in part, to troubles with their country-men in their native land, which confirm!" the account about the immigration to the island of Panay above referred to. To be continued.

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7-10

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