The worship of Sabino Arana: The double resurrection and the historical origin of Aberri Eguna in the Second Republic.

Abstract

This article studies diverse aspects of what it calls the worship of Sabino Arana by the founder of the PNV´s disciples and followers. Since his death in 1903, these mythicized and sacralized him to the point of comparing him with Jesus by considering him a new messiah sent by the divine Providence to redeem the Basque people in trance of perishing. The analysis focuses on the historical origin of a commemoration: the Day of the Country or Aberri Eguna, organized by the PNV in Bilbao on the Easter Sunday of 1932 to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of Sabino Arana’s «discovery» of nationalism during a conversation with his brother, Luis, at their home. Drawing on unpublished documentation from the PNV Archive, this article shows that such revelation did not happen on the Easter Day of 1882, but this religious festivity was chosen by the organizers of the first Aberri Eguna to emphasize the idea of a double resurrection: that of Christ and that of the Basque Region thanks to Sabino Arana’s nationalism, reinforcing this way the parallelism among both. Since then on, the Aberri Eguna became the official festivity of the PNV, which continued to celebrate it yearly during the Second Republic.