Rodriguez, Simon (philosopher)

Born in Caracas (at that time - the province of Venezuela of the Spanish Empire). Simone's mother, Rosalia Rodriguez, was the daughter of a farm owner, a native of the Canary Islands ^[1] . In 1791, the city council (cabildo) of Caracas appointed S. Rodrigues to the post of teacher in the “School of reading and writing for boys”. Among his students was Simon Bolivar , in the future - an outstanding military and political leader of Latin America. Rodriguez was familiar with the works of the French Enlightenment, a special influence on him had the works of J.-J. Rousseau . In 1794, Rodriguez presented his essay “Reflections on defects that prevent the work of an elementary school in reading and writing for boys and the means of its reforming” to the city council ( Ref . Reflexiones sobre los defectos que vicra la escuela de ratras letras por un nuevo establecimiento ). In this work, Rodriguez presented his original view on the structure of the school system, contrary to the canons of the Spanish colonial administration.

In 1797, Simon Rodriguez took part in the conspiracy of Gual against the Spanish colonial authorities. The conspiracy failed, and Rodriguez was forced to flee the country to Jamaica , where, for conspiracy reasons, he changed his name to "Samuel Robinson", under which he lived all the time of emigration. S. Rodrigues first lived for several years in the United States, and in 1801 he moved to France. In 1804 in France, he met his former pupil Simon Bolivar ^[2] , who by that time was 21 years old. Rodriguez and Bolivar traveled together in Europe, in 1805 they witnessed the coronation of Napoleon Bonaparte in Milan as king of Italy . In Rome, on Mount Monte Sacro, Bolivar made his famous oath: “I swear to you, I swear to God by my parents, I swear by honor, I swear by my Homeland that I will not give either my hands peace or rest to my soul until I I will destroy the shackles in which we are shackled by the will of the Spanish government ” ^[3] . After that, Bolivar first went to the United States, and in 1807 he returned to the province of Venezuela, where he joined the fight against the Spanish authorities, Rodriguez stayed in Europe and from 1806 to 1823 he lived in Italy , Prussia and Russia , where he worked in the chemical laboratory , participated in the work of socialist circles, led an elementary school in a small Russian town ^[4] .

Rodriguez returned to Latin America only in 1823, when the war for the independence of the Spanish colonies ended, and Bolivar, nicknamed "The Liberator", became president of Great Colombia , which included Venezuela , now Colombia with Panama and Ecuador . At home, the philosopher regained the name "Simon Rodriguez" and again engaged in enlightenment. In 1824, Bolivar appointed Rodriguez “Director of Education, Physics and Mathematics and Arts” of Peru and “Director of the Mines, Agriculture and Public Roads” of Bolivia . But Bolivar's associate Antonio Sucre , who took the presidency of Bolivia since 1826, was tense with Rodriguez, and Rodriguez resigned in the same year. After that, until the end of his life, Rodriguez worked as a teacher and writer in various places in Peru, Chile and Ecuador. Among his works, a special place is occupied by the work “American Societies” ( Spanish Sociedades Americanas ), which was published in several issues published in Arequipa (1828), Concepcion (1834), Valparaiso (1838) and in Lima (1842).

Most of the writings of Rodriguez were kept in Ecuador’s capital, Guayaquil , but died during the fire of 1896.

Simon Rodriguez died in Peru in 1854. A century later, his ashes were reburied in the National Pantheon in Caracas.

The portrait of Rodriguez is placed on the Venezuelan bill of denomination of 50 bolivars of Fuerte 2007 (the portrait of S. Bolivar himself is placed on the bill of denomination of 100 bolivars). On the old-style banknotes (until 2007), his portrait was placed on a banknote worth 20 thousand bolivars.

In Venezuela, during the reign of Hugo Chávez, one of the state programs to combat poverty received the name of the Robinson mission in honor of S. Rodrigues , by his pseudonym of times of emigration.

• Simón Rodríguez 'Work, Sociedades Americanas ( American Societies ) (isp.)
• Glrbv.org.ve (isp.)