Friar Botod

Here's the text to be discussed on Monday.

FRIAR BOTOD

Graciano Lopez Jaena

¹       “Who is Botod?”

²       “Look at him, there he goes, he is there in the Plaza, that plump friar who is talking with a woman beside the trunk of the almendre tree!  Do you recognize him?”

³       “No.”

⁴       “Look well towards the center of the plaza, look across it, and fix your gaze on that small tower of bamboo and nipa that is the belfry of the town.  At the stairs, also made of bamboo and nipa, grow various luxuriant young almond trees, and beside the trunk of the largest trees and under its shade is Friar Botod, talking angrily with a woman.  Do you see him now?”

⁵       “Yes, yes, I see him.  He is a barbarian.  How he frowns!  The girl is not bad: but by what I see, by his movements and grimaces, Friar Botod, the devil, has a bestial look.  What do I see?  Now he raises his stick in a threatening manner.”

⁶       “He scares the girl so that she will grant him his wishes.”

⁷       “Will this rogue of a friar eat this girl?”

⁸       “He is capable of it.  See the crowd of small boys who are leaving the parochial school, naked, some from the waist down, others from the waist up, running towards his Reverence to kiss his hand.  The surrounded friar commands them in a scornful manner; the boys run away frightened.”

⁹       “But, look, look!  The shameless friar has slapped the girl twice… Hmm…  She falls down on her knees at his feet, looks as if she were asking his pardon.  She kisses his hand.  Poor girl.  He leads her away… the bad friar.  What a brute, what a detestable person.  But you permit and suffer the same abuses against the honor of this weak person, victim of the brutal force of this cynical friar.

¹⁰    “We are hardened to this sight; it happens all the time.”

¹¹    “But what does this religious devil do in God’s world?  He is the priest of this town.”

¹²    “A priest!  A friar is a priest!  I did not believe that the friars are parish priest in the Philippines.  They told me, and I never believed it.”

¹³    “then see it for yourself and be convinced.”

¹⁴    In my country there came a time when we kicked them out.”

¹⁵    “There is no more reedy, my friend; you must give the morcilla (black sausage) as you give it to dogs.”

¹⁶    “All things come to an end and all debts must be paid, says a proverb; the day will come and woe to them.  Meanwhile, let us leave everything which prolongs it.”

¹⁷    “This is horrible, worse than China, a thousand times worse than Warsaw.  Ah, let us leave these sad ideas, let us go near and see the rascally friar.”

¹⁸    “Jesus, Jesus!  How terrible, ho ugly!  …He looks like a seal.”

¹⁹    “What a comparison friend!”

²⁰    “Yes, yes, a seal, a seal without whiskers.”

²¹    “Well said.”

²²    “Let us describe a seal—I mean a friar—so that the whole world will know him.”

²³    Like this.

²⁴    Friar Botod is not called so because it is his proper name nor his family name.

²⁵    Botod means big abdomen, fat belly.  The town nicknamed him so because of his immense paunch.

²⁶    His baptismal name is Ano (anus) because he was born on St. Ann’s day; but he gets furious and very angry when he is called Friar Ano, preferring that they call him Botod rather than Ano.

²⁷    It is then Friar Botod or Friar Ano Aragones, son of unknown parentage, who was found near the vicinity of Eber by the stairs of the church of Pilar on a stormy night by a certain mule driver who passed by that place on his way from work.

²⁸    He educated the boy as well as he could; he wanted to teach the child his trade, but at the age of fourteen the boy ran away from the house of his aged foster father, and after walking and walking, he arrived at Valladolid, where he entered the convent of the Augustinian fathers.

²⁹    Not quite twenty-one years of age, he was sent by his superiors to the Philippines, to which he brought his boorish ways.

³⁰    He looked like a dead mosquito; but after being ordained and singing his first mass, after five years in the country, eating bananas and papayas and being angry and being called a priest in a town as important as this, he came out of his shell.  He changed completely.  He is a very valuable man.

³¹    He knows more than Lope, and he has more grammar than Santillan.

³²    There you get a sketch of the birth and novitiate of Friar Botod and his stay during his first years in the Philippines.

³³    [Lopez Jaena here describes the Physical appearance of the friar and concludes that Friar Botod looks like a well-fed pig who eats, drinks, sleeps and thinks of nothing but how to satisfy his carnal appetites.]

³⁴    Look, he is leaving the convento (parochial house) again accompanied by that young girl who is sobbing and crying bitterly.  Friar Botod is petting her, consoling her, but she is insensible and indifferent toward it all.  She continues crying and being overcome by fear, obeys and follows the friar automatically.”

³⁵    This time they don’t leave the convent alone; following them are some young girls, very beautiful, very young; others are grown up already, but all are beautiful and well-dressed. He now enters an omnibus to take them for a ride and a picnic.”

³⁶    “But who are these young girls and why does he have them in his convent, the Fray Botod?”

³⁷    “These are his canding-canding.”

³⁸    “Who are these canding-canding?”

³⁹    “In the Spanish language canding means goats.”

⁴⁰    “If you don’t explain it to us more clearly I will not be able to unravel the story.  Why does this devilish friar have in his power these innocent creatures and why are these angelic-looking girls called little goats?”

⁴¹    They are called little goats simply because in time when they mature… you hear it, do you understand now?  He has them in his power because they come from poor families.  Under the pretext of educating them in the Christian doctrine, the Catechism, reading, writing and other skills, he takes them from their homes, fooling the unfortunate parents, or even using force.”

⁴²    “But isn’t there a woman teacher in town?”

⁴³    “Yes, but the woman is of the same tribe as Fray Botod.”

⁴⁴    “This is unheard of!  Horrible!  But why don’t they denounce this barbarity of Boboo or this lascivious friar to the government?”

⁴⁵    “There is nobody in town who wants to meddle.  Oh!  The one who dares…

⁴⁶    “I do not wonder because since I was born I have not left this town but from what I have heard of the others, it is not venturing too far to infer that this practice is common.

⁴⁷    “Wretch!  What villainy!  In that manner the young buds open up near the heartless, soulless, friar, having the same fate as that of the bayaderas of India.”

⁴⁸    [An explanation of the bayaderas of India follows.  They are women kept by the Brahmins, supposedly for religious reasons but actually for their own gratification.]

⁴⁹    [For entertainment, Botod plays monte and burro with the town’s rich but he never loses.  The indios let him win; otherwise he is in a bad mood.]

⁵⁰    How does his “Reverence” discharge his duties towards his parishioners’ souls?

⁵¹    Tilin, tilin, tilin—a loud sound of the bell is heard at the door of the convent.

⁵²    “Open, boy.”

⁵³    The boy brings into the gambling room an old man, who walks slowly as if he had come from a long distance.

⁵⁴    “Good evening, sir.”

⁵⁵    “What do you want?”

⁵⁶    “Confession, sir.”

⁵⁷    “Go and call the assistant, father Marcelino.”

⁵⁸    “Not here, sir.”

⁵⁹    “What do you want?”

⁶⁰    “Confession, sir.”

⁶¹    “Go and call the assistant, father Marcelino?”

⁶²    “Not here, sir.”

⁶³    “What do you mean, not here?”

⁶⁴    “Father Marcelino, sir, is in the other confessional.”

⁶⁵    “Then wait for him.”

⁶⁶    “I cannot wait, sir.”

⁶⁷    “Why can’t you wait, you rogue, you savage.”

⁶⁸    “Because the sick person, sir, is dying.  He will die.”

⁶⁹    “Then let him die and let him go to hell.  I am not hearing confessions.”

⁷⁰    “Sir, pity, pity, sir.”

⁷¹    “Go, tell him to make an Act of Contrition and I will give him absolution from her.”

⁷²    “Sir, sir.”

⁷³    “Go rogue, do not bother me anymore.  I am losing, damn Jack!  Oh, brute, go.  Boy, open the door for this old man.”

⁷⁴    You can have a good idea here of how Fr. Botod regards his religion—

⁷⁵    He leaves a sick Christian who is asking for the last rites of the church to die without confession because of a Jack of Clubs.

⁷⁶    After the death.

⁷⁷    “Sir, that one died.”

⁷⁸    “Well, and what?”

⁷⁹    “The family wants, sir, that three priests get the corpse from the house and a Requiem Mass be said for him.”

⁸⁰    “Does the family of the dead person have much money?”

⁸¹    “No, just enough, sir, the family wants three priests.”

⁸²    “I will do it; but you can’t have three priests.”

⁸³    “The wife, sir, wants Father Marcelino to be the main priest.”

⁸⁴    “No, I don’t like it.  These things belong to me and do not concern the assistant at all.”

⁸⁵    “But, sir…”

⁸⁶    “Nothing doing.”

⁸⁷    “Well, sir, how much sir?”

⁸⁸    “One hundred and fifty pesos, second class funeral with an old cape with silver.”

⁸⁹    “Three priests, sir?”

⁹⁰    “Three?  It can’t be; I alone am worth three.”

⁹¹    “Father Marcelino, sir, asks only fifty pesos for three priests, and a first class funeral.”

⁹²    “You, with your assistant, can go to hell.  You are talking to the wrong party.  Father Marcelino is a scoundrel.”

⁹³    “Pardon, sir.”

⁹⁴    “Go bring the money.  If you do not come with the money, your dead will not be buried.  Do you understand?”

⁹⁵    “Very well, sir, I will consult the family.”

⁹⁶    “Whom will you consult?  No, bring the hundred fifty pesos.  If not, the corpse will rot in your house, and you and your whole family will go to jail.”

⁹⁷    “Sir (in a repentant tone), sir, he does not have much money, sir, the dead person.”

⁹⁸    “Go and ask the rest of the relatives to lend you money.”

⁹⁹    “They don’t want to lend it, sir.”

¹⁰⁰ “Go away, go away.  Sell the dead man’s rice field and you will have money.  Look for a loan company, you idler.  If not, I won’t bury your corpse.”

¹⁰¹ “Very well, sir.”

¹⁰² He kisses the hand of the priest and leaves the poor man.  Three hours later, the assistant priest, knowing the friar very well and that he will be the object of insults, arms himself with a strong drink and creates a scandal.

¹⁰³ With a glass of alcohol and tuba which he mixed well, Father Marcelino goes straight to the convent.

¹⁰⁴ The assistants of the secular order step themselves in vices to the same extent as the friars themselves.  The bad examples begin to spread.  The Indian priests follow the examples of their superiors, the friars.  They become as wicked as they, or worse.

¹⁰⁵ It is said then that Father Marcelino went to look for Friar Botod, planning to hit the chubby-cheeked “Reverence” in the abdomen.

¹⁰⁶ Father Botod, foreseeing that his assistant would be drunk and what he would do, ordered the boy to close the convent with an expressed order not to let the assistant in.

¹⁰⁷ Father Marcelino, doubly irritated by this measure, shouts loudly at the door of the convent, shocking the people.

¹⁰⁸ “Come down, come down, Botod, if you are not afraid, friar without shame, you filthy, stingy vile, bad man, see, see what I will do.  I will break your neck! Animal!  Friar, coward, you do not have a bit of shame.”

¹⁰⁹ Similar insults and others spurt out of that mouth, smelling of alcohol and tuba.

¹¹⁰ Fr. Botod does not utter a word against these diatribes, but after three days, the father assistant is called by the bishop and locked up in the Seminary.

¹¹¹ The corpse is given a pompous funeral but the family has gone into debt.

¹¹² [As host, he entertains visitors at the expense of the townspeople.  As money lender, he lends money but forces the tao to pay him back with cavans of rice, the price of which he dictates.]

¹¹³ How does he think and boast?

¹¹⁴ Preaching:

¹¹⁵ “Indios, laborers, we are all rich in Spain.  There on that soil of the Virgin, nobody is poor.  We all wade in gold.”

¹¹⁶ “Jesus, what a liar is this friar.”

¹¹⁷ Botod continues.

¹¹⁸ “We came here to these barbaric lands to conquer souls for heaven, in order to be dear to our great Father San Agustin.”

¹¹⁹ “Keep still, Manola,” exclaims a Spaniard who happens to hear this nonsense of Fr. Botod.

¹²⁰ He continues the sermon.

¹²¹ “We have come to civilize you, serfs, indios, carabaos, and illiterates.  You are all slaves of Spain, of Father San Agustin.  Do you understand? Amen.”

¹²² It is the first time that Fr. Botod has occupied the pulpit during his fifteen years of being a priest, and all he does is to hurl a lot of insults.

¹²³ [He eats like a pig and is fond of pepper, luya and other sexual stimulants.]

¹²⁴ Between a Kastila and his “Reverence”:

¹²⁵ “Father Botod, why don’t you educate, provide and endow the town with good instruction?”

¹²⁶ “It doesn’t suit me, countryman.”

¹²⁷ “Your mission is to instruct the country which you administer spiritually”

¹²⁸ “Political reasons forbid us.  The day when the Indio becomes educated and knows how to speak Spanish, we are lost.”

¹²⁹ “Why, father?”

¹³⁰ “Because they will rebel against us and will fight the integrity [sic] of the country.”

¹³¹ “I don’t believe it.  You will be the ones who will lose your substance and easily get gains, but Spain…”

¹³² “But why, are we not the same Spain?  Go, go, go!  The interest of the friars is the interest of Spain.  We cannot go back to the old ways.”

¹³³ How does the friar punish?

¹³⁴ Barbarously.

¹³⁵ Because a man did not work three days in the hacienda, he deprived him of salary and gave the unhappy laborer fifty lashes on his bare buttocks.

¹³⁶ See it:

¹³⁷ “Oy, tao, why didn’t you come to work for three days?”

¹³⁸ “My wife is sick, sir.”

¹³⁹ “Oy, boy.”

¹⁴⁰ “Sir.”

¹⁴¹ “The bench and the whip, ala, ala, hapa, hapa (stretch him out, stretch him out).”

¹⁴² “Sir, sir, my wife is sick, my wife is sick!”

¹⁴³ “You lie; ala, hapa!”

¹⁴⁴ The poor unfortunate lies down flat keeping his mouth above the bench.  Fray Botod at the same time takes off the man’s pants and his underwear, tying his head and feet to the bench.

¹⁴⁵ “And you, sacristan, get the whip and give him fifty lashes.”

¹⁴⁶ You should know that the punishment is in three measures, that is, that it is not fifty but one hundred fifty lashes.

¹⁴⁷ What brutality!

¹⁴⁸ “Enough sir, enough sir, aruy, aruy, aruy!  It hurts, sir, enough, sir, enough!”

¹⁴⁹ “Keep quiet, brute, animal.  Boy bring the hot peppered vinegar.”

¹⁵⁰ Over the body lacerated from the lashes, the inhuman friar pours the vinegar with the pepper in it, rubbing the vinegar and making the unfortunate man see stars.

¹⁵¹ “Compassion, compassion sir, enough, Padre, aruy, aruy, aruy!”

¹⁵² The poor laborer is doubling up because of the pain, trying to untie himself.

¹⁵³ After such a cruel operation, the sacristan applies the rest of the lashes until he completes the fifty.

¹⁵⁴ Terrible moments!  The man doubles up again, a nervous spasm chokes him—groans, moans die out in his throat.

¹⁵⁵ The friar in his cruelty is amusing himself, laughing like a fool.

¹⁵⁶ Sad reflections of the past Inquisition!  Fr. Botod is worse than a hyena.

(1874)

Meet the Writer

GRACIANO LÓPEZ Y JAENA (December 18, 1856 - January 20, 1896), was a Filipino writer and journalist in the Philippine Revolution. He was recognized as the "Prince of Filipino Orators" who wrote great and striking articles in the infamous newspaper La Solidaridad in Barcelona, Spain.  López Jaena was born in Jaro, Iloilo to Placido López and María Jacoba Jaena. His parents were poor; his mother was a seamstress and his father a general repairman. At the age of six, López Jaena was placed under the care of Friar Francisco Jayme who raised him.

His parents sent López Jaena to the Seminario de San Vicente Ferrer in Jaro which had been opened under the administration of Governor General Carlos María de la Torre. He was appointed to the San Juan de Dios Hospital as an apprentice. Unfortunately, due to financial problems, his parents could not afford to keep him in Manila. He returned to Iloilo and practiced medicine in communities.

During this period, his visits with the poor and the common people began to stir feelings about the injustices that were common. At the age of 18 he wrote the satirical story "Fray Botod" which depicted a fat and lecherous priest. Botod’s false piety "always had the Virgin and God on his lips no matter how unjust and underhanded his acts are." This naturally incurred the fury of the friars who knew that the story depicted them. Although it was not published a copy circulated in the region but the Friars could not prove that López Jaena was the author. However he got into trouble for refusing to testify that certain prisoners died of natural causes when it was obvious that they had died at the hands of the mayor of Pototan. López Jaena continued to agitate for justice and finally went to Spain when threats were made on his life.

López Jaena sailed for Spain in 1879. There he was to become a leading literary and oratorical spokesman for the Philippine reformal issues. Philippine historians regard López Jaena, along with Marcelo H. del Pilar and José P. Rizal, as the triumvirate of Filipino propagandists. Of these three Ilustrados, López Jaena was the first to arrive and may have founded the genesis of the Propaganda movement.

López Jaena pursued his medical studies at the University of Valencia but did not finish the course. Once Rizal approached Lopéz Jaena for not finishing his medical studies. Graciano replied, "On the shoulders of slaves should not rest a doctor's cape." Rizal countermanded, "The shoulders do not honor the doctor's cape, but the doctor's cape honors the shoulders."

Rizal noted, "His great love is politics and literature. I do not know for sure whether he loves politics in order to deliver speeches or he loves literature to be a politician." In addition he is remembered for his literary contributions to the propaganda movement. López Jaena founded the fortnightly newspaper, La Solidaridad. When the publication office moved from Barcelona to Madrid, the editorship was succeeded to Marcelo H. del Pilar.

López Jaena died of tuberculosis on January 20, 1896, eleven months short of his 40th birthday. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graciano_Lopez_Jaena)