In the indigenous religion of the ancient Tagalogs, Bathalà/Maykapál was the transcendent Supreme God, the originator and ruler of the universe. He is commonly known and referred to in the modern era as Bathalà, a term or title which, in earlier times, also applied to lesser beings such as personal tutelary spirits, omen birds, comets, and other heavenly bodies which the early Tagalog people believed predicted events. It was after the arrival of the Spanish missionaries in the Philippines in the 16th century that Bathalà /Maykapál came to be identified with the Christian God, hence its synonymy with Diyós. Over the course of the 19th century, the term Bathala was totally replaced by Panginoón (Lord) and Diyós (God). It was no longer used until it was popularized again by Filipinos who learned from chronicles that the Tagalogs' indigenous God was called Bathalà.Reyes y Florentino, Isabelo de los (1909). La religión antigua de los Filipinos. Manila: Impr. de el Renacimiento, 1909. Page 33-34, 113.
Etymology
Most scholars believed that Bathalà (Chirino 1595–1602), Badhala (Plasencia 1589), Batala (Loarca 1582), or Bachtala (Boxer Codex 1590) was derived from the Sanskrit word bhattara or bhattarakaR. Ghose (1966), Saivism in Indonesia during the Hindu-Javanese period, The University of Hong Kong Press, pages 16, 123, 494-495, 550-552 (noble lord) which appeared as the sixteenth-century title batara in the southern Philippines and Borneo. In the Indonesian language, batara means "god"; its feminine counterpart is batari. In Malay, betara means "holy", and was applied to the greater Hindu gods in Java. Betara was also assumed by the ruler of Majapahit.Scott, William Henry (1994). Barangay: Sixteenth Century Philippine Culture and Society. Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press. . Page 234.
Dr. Pardo de Tavera, a linguist, states that bhattala could have come from avatara, avatar; that is, the descent of a god on earth in a visible form, such as the ten avatars of Vishnu.de los Reyes y Florentino, Isabelo (2014). History of Ilocos, Volume 1. University of the Philippines Press, 2014. . Page 83. According to John Crawfurd, the Malay word Batara is derived from avatara both in "sense and orthography", and is a prefix to connote any deity.John Crawfurd (2013). History of the Indian Archipelago: Containing an Account of the Manners, Art, Languages, Religions, Institutions, and Commerce of Its Inhabitants. Cambridge University Press. pp. 219–220. .
According to Jose Rizal's former mentor Rev. Pablo Pastells, S.J., who reprinted in 1900 the early work of his fellow Jesuit, Fr. Pedro Chirino, Labor Evangelica, which was first published in 1663 from an anonymous document dated April 20, 1572, the name of Bathala can be ascertained "by resolving the word into its primary elements, Batà and Ala = 'Son God, or Son of God.'" This is why the first missionaries did not deprive the natives of this name when they instructed them about the existence of God and the mysteries of the Trinity, the incarnation, and redemption, as states an anonymous but very circumstantial relation written in Manila, on April 20, 1572.Blair, Emma Helen, ed. d.1911., Robertson, James Alexander, joint ed. 1873-1939., Bourne, Edward Gaylord, 1860-1908.The Philippine Islands, 1493-1803. [Vol. 1, no. 40]. Page 70.Sevilla, Fred (1997). Poet of the People Francisco Balagtas and the Roots of Filipino Nationalism. Trademark Pub., 1997. . Page 474.
Other possible origins of the term Bathala or Batala are the Malay word Berhala ("idol")Potet, Jean-Paul G. (2016). Tagalog Borrowings and Cognates. Lulu.com, 2016. . Page 61. and the Arabic expression ‘Allah-ta’ala ("God, be exalted"), which is the origin of Bathala’s other name Anatala.Potet, Jean-Paul G. (2018). Ancient Beliefs and Customs of the Tagalogs. Lulu.com, 2018. . Page 162.
Mentions during Spanish colonial era
The name of the supreme being of the Tagalogs was given as Batala in "Relacion de las Yslas Filipinas" (1582) by Miguel de Loarca, Bathala mei capal in "Relación de las Islas Filipinas" (1595–1602) by Pedro Chirino, Badhala in "Relacion de las Costumbres de Los Tagalos" (1589) by Juan de Plasencia, Bachtala napal nanca calgna salahat (Bathalà na kumapál at nangangalagà sa lahát – God the creator and preserver of all things), Mulayri, Molaiari, Molayare, and Dioata in the Boxer Codex (1590), Anatala and Ang Maygawâ in "Carta sobre la idolatria de los naturales de la provincia de Zambales, y de los del pueblo de Santo Tomas y otros circunvecinos" (1686–1688) by Felipe Pardo, O.P., and Bathala mei Capal and Diuata in "The history of Sumatra: containing an account of the government, laws, customs and manners of the native inhabitants, with a description of the natural productions, and a relation of the ancient political state of that island." (1784) by William Marsden. The true name of this deity, however, is actually unknown, and the ancient Tagalogs usually referred to and addressed him under several titles and epithets.Potet, Jean-Paul G. (2018). Ancient Beliefs and Customs of the Tagalogs. Lulu.com, 2018. . Page 22.
Jose Rizal, in his letter to his friend Ferdinand Blumentritt (17 April 1890), wrote that the word Bathala was an error of Chirino or some missionary older than or ahead of him who had been copied by subsequent historians, because, according to him, the majority of the historians of the Philippines were mere copyists. He believed that the phrase Bathalà/Maykapál that was adopted by other historians after Chirino was nothing more than the phrase Bahala ang Maykapal wrongly written; that is, equivalent to Alla or Alah of the Muslims or to the Malayan Tuan Alla punia Kraja. This is because Bahalà ang May Kapál means "God will take care", a meaning given also in a dictionary to the phrase Bathalà May Kapal. The fact that the phrase Bathalà May Kapál was so often encountered made Rizal presume that it may only have been a copy, and that another source where the word Bathala was used without the denomination May Kapál could not be found. Rizal believed that the Tagalogs never pronounced the name of their God, just as they did not pronounce the names of their parents, especially before strangers whom they considered their greatest enemies. He believed that they only called him Maykapál, a designation still used and understood by most Tagalogs today. He also pointed out that there was no trace at all of the name Bathalà among the Tagalogs in the local towns despite the fact that they used words such as Tikbalang, Asuang, Anito, Nunò, Tiyanak, etc. and retained many pagan usages, traditions, legends, and stories. He believed that the old missionaries did not take much interest in getting to know the religion of the Tagalogs. On account of their religious zeal, the missionaries considered the Tagalogs' religion unworthy and diabolical, and as a result, they never undertook a thorough investigation of it.Rizal, Jose (1961). The Rizal-Blumentritt Correspondence, Part 1. José Rizal National Centennial Commission, 1961. Page 350.
For Isabelo de los Reyes, the name of the Tagalog supreme god was Maykapal or Lumikhâ, and hence they called their sacred images likhâ and not Badhala, since the latter was not a specific name, but a common treatment of deities, ominous beings, and other fabulous beings that they feared. Thus, there was Badhala Maykapal (Lord Maker), Badhala Katutubo (Conborn Lord Anito), and Badhala Tigmamanok, or Blue Bird, which actually referred to the kásay-kásay (Kingfisher). Their names were Badhala, like comets, not because they were gods, but because they were ominous. The word was pronounced Badhala and not Bathalà, as an enlightened Tagalog elder told de los Reyes, and this was confirmed by Fr. Noceda in his old Dictionario Tagalog (1754). Also, according to Fr. Noceda, the term Bathalà, or Badhala, was only used among Tagalogs who had connections with Malay Hindus or Mohammedans, i.e. those from Manila to the South. Moreover, the Tagalogs did not remember the word Bathala, Batala, or Badhala until it was popularized again by Filipinos when they learned from lightly written chronicles that the indigenous Tagalog God was called Bathalà.Reyes y Florentino, Isabelo de los (1909). La religión antigua de los Filipinos. Manila: Impr. de el Renacimiento, 190. Page 113-114.
Other names, titles and epithets 1. Mulayari (Boxer Codex: Mulayri [42r], Molaiari [59r], Molayare [62r]) – In the transcription and translation of the Boxer Codex (1590) by George Bryan Souza and Jeffrey Scott Turley (2015), the word May-ari ("Owner" or "Owner of Property") is used instead of the original spelling Mulayri. The footnote explains: "Q&G, 419, gloss this Tagalog term as "an indirect appellation of God"".Souza, George Bryan & Turley, Jeffrey Scott (2015). The Boxer Codex: Transcription and Translation of an Illustrated Late Sixteenth-Century Spanish Manuscript Concerning the Geography, History and Ethnography of the Pacific, South-east and East Asia. BRILL, 2015. . Page 358. According to the author Jean-Paul G. Potet (Ancient Beliefs and Customs of the Tagalogs, 2018) "Its compounds are mula "origin" and yari "power", therefore it means "Source of Power". The absence of linker between the two components, as in Malay, points at the Bruneian period for the time when it was coined".Potet, Jean-Paul G. (2018). Ancient Beliefs and Customs of the Tagalogs. Lulu.com, 2018. . Page 433. The word yari also means "made, finished or complete, etc."Potet, Jean-Paul G. (2016). Tagalog Borrowings and Cognates. Lulu.com, 2016. . Page 182. Thus, the meaning of Mulayari is also similar to that of Mulajadi ("Beginning of Becoming"),Verlag der Missionsdruckerei St. Gabriel, 1981. Studia Instituti Anthropos, Volumes 37-39. Page 48. which is the name of the creator deity of the Batak people of Indonesia.M. Nijhoff, 1995. Anthropologica, Volume 151. Page 643. The Tagalog and Malay word mula is derived from Sanskrit mula, meaning "root",Potet, Jean-Paul G. (2016). Tagalog Borrowings and Cognates. Lulu.com, 2016. . Page 290. while the Malay word jadi and its Tagalog equivalent yari are descended from the Sanskrit word jati (birth),Kamus Dewan, Fourth Edition, Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, →ISBN, 2005.Pusat Rujukan Persuratan Melayu | Malay Literary Reference Centre, Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 2017. and both words can mean "finished" or completed regarding something made or created (becoming/being).Lendoyro, Constantino (1909). The Tagalog Language. Page XLVI. Another possible origin of the name Mulayari is the Malayalam word mulayari which means "bamboo seed".Pires, Tomé (1967). The Suma Oriental of Tome Pires. Kraus Reprint, 1967. Page 59. The name Mulayari was not entered by Spanish lexicographers in the old Tagalog dictionaries.