Our national hero. Dr. Jose Rizal, foreshadowed the 1896 struggles for independence and called it the "working of physical laws set in motion by moral forces." These words, written in 1890, could equally be said to have foreshadowed the 1986 EDSA Revolution. These two Revolutions, bracketing almost a century of Philippine history, are the two most compelling turning points that prove our capacity to go beyond ourselves and lead events that define epochs. The 1896 Revolution began the attrition of colonialism in all of Asia while the 1986 EDSA Revolution spread the message of people power across the globe shaking dictatorships along its path.
Our generation witnessed the EDSA Revolution. Its experience, still so tactile and proximate, compels us now, during its anniversary, to relive its lessons. Hopefully the power of its moral light can guide our unsteady passage through the coming elections.
The EDSA Revolution, in essence, was a resurfacing of the Filipino soul – quite aptly on an avenue denoting "epiphany of the saints" – at a moment of trial for the nation. Numerous Filipinos from all walks of life, aware that they could be martyrs for national deliverance, gathered at EDSA to pray and relive their lost sense of community. Millions of their countrymen in homes across the land joined them in spirit. Filipinos expressed their rejection of an immoral regime and thereby – at least for the moment – restored the oneness of their innermost values and their worldly actions.
At EDSA, the 1841 peasant Cofradia de San Jose of Apolinario de la Cruz and the 1896 class-ridden Katipunan of Andres Bonifacio, both important historical movements in the growth of national consciousness, gave way to a class-transcending show of inner strength among a people scorned for cowardice in the face of a 20-year authoritarian rule that was mortgaging their future. It was an unparalleled exercise in unorganized nonviolent revolution that expelled an unpopular regime and restored democratic space as the best political environment within which to pursue national development goals.
Many wondered how it all happened, that hundreds of thousands of Filipinos would converge on EDSA and for three "dark days" shield a group of military defectors with only their bodies and their prayers against the tanks and guns of an entrenched strongman. With their simple faith, they disarmed battle-ready soldiers who could not muster the courage to kill their citizenbrothers.
The moral element of EDSA, the "moral forces" adverted to by Rizal, remains to this day a matter of wonder and reflection among many Filipinos, not the least among those whose bodies knelt before the tanks. Robert Chabeldin, for instance, narrated his EDSA experience as follows:
"I positioned myself along with others, in the barricade in front of Camp Aguinaldo so that when the reported tank assault coming from Malacañang would come, we would all be crushed to death. But before I did that, I told my wife to return to the car so that if I die, someone would be left behind to take care of the children. Come to think of it, at that time I realized I was willing to die.
Actually, it may sound like we were all doing heroic acts, but it was more like dealing with some inner feelings in the realm of the spiritual. To this date, I still cannot explain where we all got that sense of spirituality. I thought by forming the barricades, I was being one of them and them being part of me. That in sharing these moments of challenge, we have achieved a breakthrough in national consciousness. It is difficult to explain it, but you have to experience it to know what it is all about."
"Being one of them, and them being part of me" reechoed the longings of solidarity in struggle, of brotherhood, of compassion and damay that have percolated in popular consciousness among Filipinos since the days of their forefathers. In a truly wonderful sense, the Filipinos at EDSA rediscovered their moral bonds – the same inner strength and brotherhood in the face of trials and even possible death that, generations before, allowed their brothers in the Cofradia de San Jose and the Katipunan to participate and die in the struggle to attain a common dream.
EDSA might be likened, therefore, to a reenactment of the redemptive process. And for many Filipinos, EDSA would provide the telling proof that the prophetic vision expressed by Dr. Jose Rizal in the last chapter of El Filibusterismo had been fulfilled. In the last scene of the novel where the dying Simoun implored Padre Florentino to explain why, despite good intentions, the former’s use of force and corruption to overthrow the bankrupt colonial regime failed, the wise, old priest said:
"The just and the worthy must suffer in order that their ideas may be known and extended. You must shake or shatter the vase to spread its perfume, you must smite the rock to get the spark… We must secure our liberty by making ourselves worthy of it, by exalting the intelligence and the dignity of the individual, by loving justice, right and greatness, even to the extent of dying for them… and when a people reaches that height, God will provide a weapon, the idols will be shattered, tyranny will crumble like a house of cards and liberty will shine out like the first dawn."
Robert Chabeldin declared that in EDSA he realized he was willing to die. Ninoy Aquino said the same thing differently: "The Filipino is worth dying for." And when a people reaches that height, Rizal said God would provide a weapon. In EDSA eighteen years ago, the idols did shatter and the house of cards did crumble.
Two and a half months from now, it is not the candidates who must ultimately win but the people. They must wrest back the initiative from the socalled Messiahs and rediscover their moral bonds, their solidarity in struggle, their stake in the future. It is they who have the power to win. If we vote on the strength of our moral convictions, Rizal may yet surprise our generation with another foreshadowing of "the working of physical laws set in motion by moral forces."
