Zaide’s Life of Jose Rizal and R. G. Collingwood’s The Idea of History

Zaide’s Life of Jose Rizal and R. G. Collingwood’s The Idea of History

Gregorio Zaide’s book on Jose Rizal entitled “Jose Rizal: Life, works, and writings of a genuis, writer, scientist, and national hero” was probably Zaide’s finer works about our national hero. Zaide was known in the history circle as a meticulous and free-flowing writer of history. He doesn’t compromise his ideas in the mainstream historicism but this was also his downside. One example was on the issue of the infamous fraud of Jose E. Marco and the Code of Kalantiaw that was already proven a hoax; Zaide continued to believe in him and even included him in his textbooks! It will be only in 1998 when the National Historical Institute will accept the fraud of Jose E. Marco.

Nevertheless, Zaide is not all bad. In fact, his book about Rizal was so well written, as if he was telling a bedtime story, you can never help but be amazed by Rizal and Zaide’s presentation of Rizal. One thing I noticed on this work of Zaide is that as if he’s putting the shoes of Rizal. Zaide’s colorful description on each chapter and the mood of the chapter was very well captured and works your imagination.

If Zaide will be compared with another historian, that will be R. G. Collingwood. Collingwood is most famous for The Idea of History, a work collated soon after his death from various sources by his pupil, T. M. Knox. The book came to be a major inspiration for postwar philosophy of history in the English-speaking world. It is extensively cited in works on historiography. Someone remarked that Collingwood was one of the century's best-known "neglected" thinkers.

Collingwood held that historical understanding occurs when an Historian undergoes the very same thought processes as did the historical personage whom he or she is studying and that in some sense, "recollection" of past thought by an Historian is the very same "thinking" as that of the historical personage. This doctrine, presented in the section of "The Idea of History" entitled "History as the Recollection of Past Experience" invites examination of the act/object distinction for thought. That is, Collingwood considered whether two different people can have the same thought qua act of thinking and not just qua content, writing that "there is no tenable theory of personal identity" preventing such a doctrine.

Zaide and Collingwood have both something in common. One of which is they both sense and recollect their ideas and put their selves in the shoes of their subjects. Zaide’s fluidity in writing & his vivid descriptions and Collingwood’s idea on history make sense. However, Zaide keeps on standing his ground thus refusing any neither conformity nor compromise. This proves his undoing like in the example of the Kalantiaw Code and also a proof that Zaide lacks some rigid framework that will focus a specific main idea on his work. Collingwood stated that such subjects should be examined further so it can have distinction for such.

This comparison between Zaide and Collingwood doesn’t mean to compare who is greater between the two historians. This can help us on how historian’s mind on writing and their understanding on history. We can learn from both of them like Zaide’s “storytelling” method of history that makes history not a boring matter and that can be enjoyed. Collingwood suggest us that history should be taken into the shoes of the subject to a deeper and more critical historiography.