Isabelo de los Reyes

Isabelo de los Reyes was born to Leona Florentino and Elías de los Reyes in Vigan, Ilocos Sur and baptized as Roman Catholic. His mother, who was of mixed Spanish and Filipino descent and forced in marriage at the age of 14, is recognized as the first significant female poet of the Philippines for her works in both Spanish and Ilocano and is recognized as the "mother of Philippine women's literature" and a pioneer in Philippine lesbian literature. De los Reyes may have been distantly related to Ventura de los Reyes, a creole merchant who was the first Philippine delegate to the Spanish Cortes through his father's side. He may also have been a "distant cousin" of José Rizal through a Chinese tax collector married to both Rizal's grandmother and de los Reyes' grand-aunt. In 1880 at age 16, de los Reyes went to Manila without his uncle's consent, where he finished Bachiller en Artes at the Colegio de San Juan de Letran. After that, he studied the Civil Code, Penal Code, the Mercantile Code, judicial proceedings and drafting documents, palaeography, and anthropology at the Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas. It was in Santo Tomas where he first met Gregorio Aglipay. ==Early career and journalism==

in honor of de los Reyes in Vigan, owned by the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP). While studying in the Colegio de San Juan de Letran, he supplemented his allowance by taking to journalism, Ever since he was young, de los Reyes had been intrigued by the growing interest in the "new science" of El saber popular (folklore). On March 25, 1884, Jose Felipe Del Pan wrote an article in La Oceania Filipina calling readers to contribute folklore articles, inspired by interest in the subject in the peninsula. De los Reyes was urged by del Pan to contribute and gave him books on the subject that piqued his interest. Two months later, de los Reyes submitted his articles concerning the folklore of Ilocos, Malabon, and Zambales. De los Reyes declared that he founded El Ilocano to "serve [our] beloved pueblo Ilocos by contributing to the enlightenment of her children, defending her interests." El Iloco lasted for seven years. By 1893, de los Reyes was able to acquire his own printing press, which he set up in the basement of his house in Binondo and called Imprenta de Isabelo de los Reyes. Proud of his provincial origins, he boasted that the press parts were fabricated by Vigan artisans and he hired Ilocanos as printshop personnel. Aside from El Ilocano, de los Reyes also published the periodicals La Lectura Popular (1890–1892), a Tagalog biweekly joint venture with Jose de Jesus, and El Minicipio Filipino (1894), a short-lived Spanish-Tagalog magazine devoted to colonial jurisprudence. ==Imprisonment and exile==

As the Philippine Revolution of 1896 began, multiple personalities suspected of being a part of it were arrested by the Spanish government. One of these people was de los Reyes, who at the time, openly advocated reforms, and if necessary, "take up arms against the tyrants". He began reading the works of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Mikhail Bakunin, and other socialist thinkers. He also joined protest actions and was imprisoned for a short time by police authorities. He was released and was forced to relocate from Barcelona to Madrid. During his time in Madrid, he was taken in by Doña Justa Jugo Vidal and met with other Filipinos to discuss the Philippine situation. He also met Señorita María Ángeles López Montero and married her on Christmas Eve in 1898. He published La Religion del Katipunan, which he wrote during his stay in Montjuïc, and he was commissioned by the British and Foreign Bible Society to translate the Bible to Iloko. De los Reyes later said that this work was "one way by which [he] could contribute to the liberalization of dogmatic religion." At the onset of the Spanish–American War, de los Reyes was employed as Counselor of the Ministry of the Colonies (Consejero del Ministerio de Ultramar), which he held until 1901. In this capacity, de los Reyes helped rally Filipino support against the Americans, thinking that this would create conditions favorable to the Philippines. He believed that once the Americans were repelled, they would be granted autonomy, and should Spain renege, then the already armed Filipinos could take matters to their own hands. He had received assurances from the governor-general Basilio Augustín regarding autonomy, and together with other Filipinos in Spain, offered to return to the Philippines to organize militias to fight the Americans. De los Reyes wrote anti-American articles for La Correspondencia de Epaña and other papers. On November 10, 1898, as Spain's loss of the Philippines became imminent, he and Dominador Gómez published Filipinas ante Europa, which had the editorial logo: Contra Norte-America, no; contra el imperialismo, sí, hasta la muerte! (Against the Americans, no; against Imperialism, yes, until death!) It ran for 86 issues between October 25, 1899, and June 10, 1901. After closing, it briefly reappeared as El Defensor de Filipinas, which ran monthly from July 1 to October 1, 1901. After Aguinaldo's surrender, de los Reyes was repatriated to Manila on July 1, 1901. Given guarantees by the American consul in Barcelona that he will not be harassed upon his arrival in the Philippines, he left Spain on September 14 aboard the steamer Montevideo. De los Reyes arrived in Manila on October 15, 1901. ==Return to the Philippines==

On his return, de los Reyes quickly set about to launching several initiatives that he already had in mind while still in Spain. On October 25, 1901, ten days after he returned to Manila, he sought authority from the Philippine Commission to publish his Defensor de Filipinas, which was refused. On October 31, he appeared before the commission, with Pedro Paterno and Pascual H. Poblete to seek permission to form a political party, the Partido Nacionalista, which was also denied. He wanted to push for a party that would push for independence within the framework of US occupation. Eventually, Poblete persistently managed to form the short-lived Partido Nacionalista (predecessor of the Nacionalista Party), which de los Reyes had also joined. He was eventually named its leader. The Union Democratica de Litografos, Impresores, Encuadernadores y Otros Obreros was thus formed, which came to be known as the labor union federation Union Obrera Democratica (UOD) on February 2, 1902. De los Reyes was its first president. De los Reyes took home with him works by socialists such as Karl Marx, Proudhon, Bakunin, and Errico Malatesta. Malatesta's Propaganda socialista fra contadini was particularly familiar to union organizers. The UOD was the first labor union federation in the Philippines, soon being joined by neighborhood associations from Cavite, Quiapo, Santa Cruz and Sampaloc; company guilds from the San Miguel Brewery and L.R. Yangco Shipping Company; and trade associations of printers, tabaqueros, tailors, sculptors, seamen, and cooks. At its peak in 1903, the UOD's membership was estimated at twenty thousand. As conceived by de los Reyes, the UOD's aim was to "achieve the longed-for alliance between capital and labor" by bringing together workers and employers in a spirit of friendship, mutual respect, and recognized interdependence. De los Reyes also wished to enlighten the masses as a prerequisite to modern nationhood. In this end, he organized veladas instructivo-recreativas as a way to "improve themselves and learn the life of cultured peoples". He had observed that workers in Europe had clubs and cafes where they could read newspapers and discuss current events, and wished to emulate that in the Philippines. De los Reyes also published the UOD's official organ, La Redencion del Obrero. De los Reyes spent this time mediating in labor disputes and other union-organizing activities. The press at this time called him a "Malay Lerroux" and compared him to Spanish labor leader Pablo Iglesias. On August 17, 1902, he was arrested on the trumped-up charge that he gave orders to assassinate scabs in a strike at the Commercial Tobacco Factory. De los Reyes was eventually released on January 30, 1903, by Governor William Howard Taft, stating that the statute "was not in line with current American thinking on the subject" and was given the condition that he would henceforth shy away from labor organizations. While in prison, de los Reyes tendered his resignation from the UOD on September 14, 1902, and was later replaced by Dominador Gómez. After leaving the UOD, de los Reyes tried to patch up internal rivalries within the organization but ultimately failed. The UOD was dissolved and in its place was the Unión del Trabajo de Filipinas, headed by writer Lope K. Santos. After this, de los Reyes focused on his Redencion del Obrero while contributing to papers like El Comercio, Grito del Pueblo, and others. He took up causes such as labor rights, universal suffrage, the exclusion of Chinese immigrant labor, and parity of Filipinos and Americans in the civil service. The right of women to suffrage was an important advocacy of Isabelo during his adult life. ==Japan, Hong Kong, and return to Spain==

De los Reyes left the Philippines in February 1903 for a vacation, going to Japan and Hong Kong. He also sought to continue his translation of the bible and to oversee its printing in Yokohama, although others suggest that his true purpose was to meet with Filipino revolutionary general Artemio Ricarte, who was in exile at the time. Details are unclear whether de los Reyes met with Ricarte in Yokohama or in Hong Kong, although it was certain that a meeting took place between the two in Manila. De los Reyes relayed to him the Philippine situation and tried to dissuade him from resuming hostilities with the US. In 1905, de los Reyes once again left for Spain where he stayed until 1909. During this time, he worked as a juror in Barcelona until 1908. He also went back to mend relations with his wife, María Ángeles López Montero, who repeatedly urged him to stay away from politics. During his stay in Spain, he wrote texts such as Gregorio Aglipay y otros prelados de la Iglesia Filipina Independiente (1906) and Biblia Filipina. He also published La Religion Antigua de Filipinas (1909). De los Reyes returned to Manila on April 3, 1909, with Lopez, however she could not adjust to the climate. After a few months, he brought her to Tokyo to recuperate. Lopez died on February 10, 1910, while giving birth to twin daughters. ==Later years and death==

museum in Baliuag, Bulacan. In 1912 at the age of 48, de los Reyes was elected a board member (councilor) of Manila, and began his political career. Winning re-election, he served until 1919. The Isabelo de los Reyes Elementary School in Tondo, Manila was named after his honor. ==Philippine Independent Church==

Albeit an anti-friar, de los Reyes was a very religious person. De los Reyes was involved with the secular Filipino clergy as early as 1899, when he became a part of negotiations with the Holy See. On his return to the Philippines in 1901, de los Reyes campaigned for the establishment of a Filipino Church independent from the authority of the Roman Catholic Church. On August 3, 1902, with the help of Pascual H. Poblete and other members of the UOD, the Iglesia Filipina Independiente (Philippine Independent Church or also known as the Aglipayan Church) was formed, with Gregorio Aglipay, an excommunicated priest from the Roman Catholic Church, as its proposed head (albeit in absentia). At the time, Aglipay was in talks with the Protestants and the Jesuits to prevent a schism, though neither of these events bore fruit. Aglipay initially dissociated himself from the schism, before realizing the futility of staying outside it. In September 1902, he accepted de los Reyes' offer for the position of Obispo Maximo (Supreme Bishop) and subsequently got consecrated to episcopacy and in turn, also consecrated some other bishops for the new church. De los Reyes, who was also later excommunicated formally by the Roman Catholic Church as a schismatic apostate, traveled all over the country to rally people to the new church. He also directed the Church publications Boletin de la Iglesia Filipina Independiente and La Iglesia Filipina Independiente: Revista Catolica. He also turned his residence into a temporary seminary. In 1929, de los Reyes was appointed an honorary bishop, a position he held until his death. In this capacity, he wrote multiple devotional and doctrinal texts such as the Biblia Filipina, Oficio Divino, Catequesis, Plegarias, Genesis Cientifico y Moderno and the Calendario Aglipayano. ==Marriage and family==

In 1884, at the age of 20, de los Reyes married Josefa Sevilla, the daughter of Gregorio Sevilla, the capitan of Malabon. He and his wife had ten children. His wife died of illness in 1897 while he was in Bilibid prison. De los Reyes' last marriage in 1912 was to the 18-year-old María Lim, a mestiza de sangley from Tondo. They married in the independent Aglipayan Church. They also had several children before María also died in childbirth in 1923. Before her death, she had asked that they be married according to the Roman Catholic rite, to which de los Reyes agreed. With his own family spanning Roman Catholic and Aglipayan traditions, de los Reyes was tolerant of religious diversity among his children. His namesake Isabelo de los Reyes Jr. (1900–1971), a son from his second marriage with Lopez and whom he shares the same death day with at October 10, although baptized Roman Catholic, was ordained an Aglipayan priest and later became Obispo Máximo IV of the Church for 25 years. De los Reyes Jr. is also widely known as the "Father of Ecumenism in the Philippines". His daughters Ángeles, Elisa, and Elvira also from his second marriage, along with Crescencia from his third marriage, became professed nuns in the Roman Catholic Church. De los Reyes was married and widowed three times, siring a total of 27 children. He survived all his wives. ==Works and writings==

Throughout his life, Isabelo de los Reyes wrote and published multiple works in various subjects, such as history, folklore, politics, and religion. He used Spanish, Tagalog, and Ilokano in his writings. De los Reyes also published multiple newspapers. He wrote critically of the Spanish and American colonial governments in the Philippines. Publications • El Ilocano • La Lectura Popular • El Municipio Filipino • Filipinas ante Europa • El Defensor de Filipinas • La Redencion del Obrero • Boletin de la Iglesia Filipina Independiente • La Iglesia Filipina Independiente: Revista Catolica Scholarly works and essays of de los Reyes situated at the University of the Philippines School of Labor and Industrial Relations in UP Diliman. • El Folk-lore Filipino • La expedicion de Li-Ma-Hong contra Filipinas • Ilocandias • Articulos Varios • Las Islas Visayas en la epoca de la conquista • Historia de Filipinas • Historia de Ilocos • Memoria sobre la revolution • Memoria de agravios de los Filipinos • Kalendariong Maanghang • La Religion Antigua de Filipinas Novels and stories • Mariquit the Tramp • Sing sing ni Diego • Ang Singsing ng Dalagang Marmol (circa 1905), a novel Religious texts • Gregorio Aglipay y otros prelados de la Iglesia Filipina Independiente • Biblia Filipina • Oficio Divino • Catequesis • Plegarias • Genesis Cientifico y Moderno • Calendario Aglipayano He also translated into Iloko the Gospels of the New Testament and the Acts of the Apostles. ==References==