matters, it appears to have been supposed that the soul set out on its
far journey across the sea, and steps were accordingly taken to equip it
for the voyage. Thus we hear of a _wahi tapu_ or sacred repository of
the property of a deceased chief, which contained, among other things, a
little canoe with sail and paddles, "to serve as a ferry-boat for the
spirit to enter in safety into the eternal abodes." Nevertheless in the
same enclosure, which was fenced with a double set of palings,
"calabashes of food and water, and a dish prepared from the pigeon, were
placed for the ghost to regale itself when visiting the spot; and the
heathen natives aver that at night the spirit comes and feeds from the
sacred calabashes."[64]
[64] G. F. Angas, _Savage Life and Scenes in Australia and New
Zealand_, ii. 70 _sq._
Many people in the Taranaki district thought that souls went neither up
nor down, but always stayed near their mouldering bodies. Hence the
sacred grove in which their remains were buried was full of disembodied
spirits; and when a man died a violent death his soul wandered about
disconsolate, till a priest by his spells and enchantments had brought
the poor ghost within the spiritual fold.[65]
[65] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 220 _sq._
When a chief was killed in battle and eaten by his foes, as often
happened, his departed spirit entered the stones of the oven in which
his body had been cooked, and the stones retained their heat so long as
the ghost was in them. Meanwhile his sorrowing friends at home recited
their most potent spells to draw his soul out of the oven and back to
the sacred grove (_wahi tapu_) the burial-place of his people; for
otherwise the soul could find no repose, but must roam about for ever,
wreaking its spite on the living, for all disembodied spirits were
deemed malicious. Hence after a battle, if people could not obtain the
body of a slain friend, they sought to procure at least some drops of
his blood or shreds of his raiment, that by crooning over them the
appropriate spell they might draw home the vagrant spirit to his place
of rest. The burial-grounds were regarded with awe and fear, for
sometimes a restless ghost would break bounds and spread sickness among
the inhabitants of the neighbourhood. Within their sacred precincts
stood altars or stages for offerings to the gods, and any living man who
entered them did so at his peril. For the same reason no one would set
foot in a house where a dead man or woman had been buried. Hence in
nearly every village half the houses stood empty and deserted, falling
into decay, tenanted only by ghosts. The living had constantly before
their eyes the mansions of the dead.[66]
[66] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 221.
The common belief of the Maoris seems to have been that the souls of the
dead pass away to a region of the underworld, which was sometimes called
Po and sometimes Reinga. Properly speaking, Po was night or the
primaeval darkness out of which all forms of life and light were evolved
or created;[67] and Reinga was not so much the spirit land itself as the
leaping-off place where the souls bade good-bye to earth and took their
departure for the far country. This leaping-off place was at the North
Cape, the Land's End of New Zealand. The cape terminates in a steep
cliff with a sea-cave at its foot, into which the tide rushes with a
thunderous roar. There the evil spirit Wiro is thought to dwell, lurking
for his prey; for he battens on such of the passing souls of the dead as
he can get into his clutches. On their passage to the North Cape the
ghosts stop by the way at two hills; at the first, which is called
Wai-hokimai, they wail, cut themselves, and strip off their clothes; at
the second, which is called Wai-otioti, they turn their backs on the
land of the living and set their faces to the land of the dead. Arrived
at the cape they pass outward over a long narrow ledge of rock and then
leap down on a flat stone. There they see a mass of sea-weed floating on
the water, its roots hidden in the depth, its upper branches clinging to
a _pohutukawa_ tree. When they perceive an opening in the sea-weed they
dive and soon find themselves in the lower world. But before they reach
the abode of spirits they must cross a river by a plank; the river is
called Waiorotane or the River of the Water of Life; and sometimes the
warden of the plank will not suffer the ghosts to pass the river, but
drives them back with friendly violence and bids them return to their
friends on earth. Such souls come back to the bright world of light and
life, and tell their friends what they have seen and heard on the
journey to that bourne from which so many travellers return no more.
Hence when any one has recovered from a dangerous sickness or escaped
some great peril, they say of him that he has come back from the River
of the Water of Life. Even if a soul has crossed that sombre stream, he
may still return to the land of the living, if only he refuses to
partake of the food set before him by the ghosts; but should he taste of
it, he cannot come back. They say that people living near the North Cape
can hear the spirits of the dead passing through the air on their way to
the spirit land; and in the old days, when a battle had been fought and
before the news of it could reach them by word of mouth, the natives
near the cape were made aware of what had happened by the rushing sound
of a great multitude flitting by overhead in the darkness.[68] Perhaps
the sighing of the night-wind or the clangour of birds of passage
winging their way out to sea may have contributed to create or foster
these fancies.
[67] E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary_,
p. 342, _s.v._ "Po."
[68] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, pp. 150 _sqq._; _id._, _Maori Religion and
Mythology_, p. 45; R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 52, 231;
W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 140; E. Dieffenbach,
_Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 66 _sq._; E. Tregear, "The Maoris
of New Zealand," _Journal of the Anthropological Institute_,
xix. (1890) pp. 118 _sq._; _id._, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative
Dictionary_, pp. 407 _sq._, 591, _s.vv._ "Reinga" and "Waiora";
John White, "A Chapter from Maori Mythology," _Report of the
Third Meeting of the Australasian Association for the
Advancement of Science, held at Christchurch, New Zealand,
in January 1891_, pp. 361 _sq._
On the day after a burial the priest used to perform a ceremony to
facilitate the passage of the soul to its final rest. For this purpose
some men would go out in the morning and kill a small bird of the swamps
called _kokata_ and pluck up some reeds of a certain sort (_wiwi_).
These they brought to the priest at the grave. He asked them, "Whence
came ye?" They answered, "From the seeking, from the searching." He
asked them again, "Ah! what have you got? ah! what have you gained?"
Then the men threw the bird and the reeds on the ground. Next the priest
chose a stalk of grass or fern and put it near the grave in a direction
pointing towards Hawaiki, the land far away from which the forefathers
of the Maoris came long ago. Another stalk of grass or fern was laid
near the place of death, and along these stalks the soul of the dead man
travelled to rejoin his friends and kinsfolk who had gone before.[69]
[69] E. Shortland, _Maori Religion and Mythology_, p. 44. Such
a stalk to aid the spirit on its passage was called a _tiri_.
Compare E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary_,
p. 517, _s.v._ "Tiri." The ceremony described in the text
resembles in some points the one which seems intended to raise
the soul of the deceased to heaven. See above, p. 25.
As might be anticipated, the accounts which the Maoris gave of the
spirit world and of life in it were neither clear nor consistent.
According to one account, while the heavens increase in beauty as they
ascend one above the other, the lower regions increase in darkness and
horror as they descend, each being darker and worse than the one above
it, till in the lowest of all complete darkness reigns. There the souls,
deprived alike of light and food, wasted away and ultimately ceased to
exist; or according to another account they assumed the shape of worms
and in that guise returned to earth, where they died a second death and
so finally perished. But it was only the souls of common folk which came
to this melancholy end. Chiefs and priests were believed to be descended
from the gods, and at death their souls ascended to heaven, there to
live for ever.[70]
[70] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 232; John White, "A Chapter
from Maori Mythology," _Report of the Third Meeting of the
Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held
at Christchurch, New Zealand, in January 1891_, pp. 361 _sq._
Other reports, however, paint the nether world in more cheerful
colours. We are told that the souls of the dead live there very much as
people do on earth, but all good things are more plentiful there than
here. The staple food of the ghosts is sweet potatoes, and the quality
of the potatoes appears to be remarkably fine; for once a woman, who had
the good fortune to go to the spirit land and come back, received from
her dead father in the nether regions two roots of sweet potatoes of a
most prodigious size. These the ghost told her to take back to earth and
plant for the benefit of his grandchild. So she hurried away with them
and arriving at the foot of the North Cape had begun to clamber up the
face of the cliff, when two infant spirits overtook her and attempted to
drag her back to dead land by tugging at her cloak. To divert their
attention she threw the two roots of sweet potato behind her, and while
the sprites were munching them she made good her escape up the cliff and
succeeded in reaching home. Her friends were very glad to see her again,
but they always lamented that she had not brought back at least one of
those gigantic roots of sweet potato, since it would unquestionably have
done much to improve the quality of sweet potatoes grown here on
earth.[71]
[71] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 48 _sq._, 67,
118; E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, pp. 153 _sqq._; R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 233
_sq._
But the spirits of the dead are by no means strictly confined to the
lower world; they can quit it from time to time and return to earth,
there to influence the actions and fortunes of the living and to
communicate with them through the priest, who can hear their voices.
They speak in whistling tones, which even common folk can sometimes
distinguish as they walk about in the dark. Often their communications
are made to the priest or chief in dreams, and he announces the glad or
mournful tidings to other people in the morning. Any commands conveyed
in this manner from the other world are, or used to be, implicitly
obeyed and might decide the course to be pursued in the most important
affairs of life.[72] In some tribes, especially among the natives of
Wangunui, it used to be customary to keep in the houses small carved
images of wood, each of them dedicated to an ancestor of the family, who
was believed occasionally to enter into the image in order to hold
converse with his living descendants.[73] But even without the
intervention of such images the priest could summon up the spirits of
the dead and converse with them in the presence of the relatives or of
strangers; at these interviews, which were held within doors and in the
dark, the voices of the ghosts, or perhaps of the priestly
ventriloquist, were sometimes distinctly audible even to sceptical
Europeans. Nor was the art of necromancy confined to men; for we read of
an old woman who, like the witch of Endor, professed to exercise this
ghostly office, and treated an English visitor to an exhibition of her
powers.[74]
[72] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 67, 118; E.
Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New Zealanders_,
ii. 83, 84.
[73] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, p. 83.
[74] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, pp. 84 _sqq._; _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha
Maori (London, 1884), pp. 122 _sqq._ As to the belief in the
reappearance of the dead among the living compare R. A. Cruise,
_Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in New Zealand_ (London,
1823), p. 186: "The belief in the reappearance of the dead is
universal among the New Zealanders: they fancy they hear their
deceased relatives speaking to them when the wind is high;
whenever they pass the place where a man has been murdered, it
is customary for each person to throw a stone upon it; and the
same practice is observed by all those who visit a cavern at the
North Cape, through which the spirits of departed men are
supposed to pass on their way to a future world."
The spirits of the dead were sometimes useful to the living, for
commonly enough they would appear to their kinsfolk in dreams and warn
them of approaching foes or other dangers. Again, they might be and were
invoked by spells and enchantments to avenge a murder or even to slay an
innocent person against whom the enchanter had a grudge.[75] But for the
most part the ghosts were greatly dreaded as malicious demons who worked
harm to man.[76] Even the nearest and dearest relations were believed to
have their natures radically changed by death and to hate those whom
they had loved in life.[77] And so powerful were these malignant beings
supposed to be that they were confused with the gods, or rather the
spirits of the dead became themselves gods to all intents and purposes,
and played a much more important part in the religious life of the
Maoris than the high primaeval deities, the personifications of nature,
who figured in Maori mythology and cosmogony.[78] The gods whom the
Maoris feared, we are told, were the spirits of the dead, who were
believed to be constantly watching over the living with jealous eyes,
lest they should neglect any part of the law relating to persons or
things subject to the sacred restriction called taboo (_tapu_). These
spirits, however, confined their care almost exclusively to persons
among the living with whom they were connected by ties of relationship,
so that every tribe and every family had its own worshipful ancestral
spirit or god, whom members of the tribe or family invoked with
appropriate prayers or spells (_karakias_). Ancestral spirits who lived
in the flesh before the Maoris emigrated to New Zealand were invoked by
all the tribes in New Zealand without distinction, so far as their names
and memories survived in tradition. Thus the worship of these remote
ancestors constituted what may be called the national religion of the
Maoris as distinguished from the tribal and family religions, which
consisted in the worship of nearer and better remembered progenitors.
The great importance attached by the Maoris to the worship of ancestors
may account, we are told, for the care with which they preserved their
genealogies; since the names of ancestors often formed the groundwork of
their religious formulas (_karakias_), and any error or even hesitation
in repeating these prayers or incantations was deemed fatal to their
efficacy.[79] "Ancestor worship, or rather the deification of
ancestors, was essentially a Maori cult. It was a form of necrolatry, or
hero worship. A man would placate the spirit of his father, grandfather,
or ancestor, and make offerings to the same, that such spirit might
protect his life principle, warn him of approaching danger, and give
force or effectiveness to his rites and charms of black or white
magic."[80]
[75] Elsdon Best, "Spiritual Concepts of the Maori," _Journal of
the Polynesian Society_, vol. ix. no. 4 (December 1900), p. 182.
[76] Elsdon Best, _op. cit._ p. 184.
[77] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 104.
[78] E. Shortland, _The Southern Districts of New Zealand_
(London, 1851), p. 294; _id._, _Traditions and Superstitions of
the New Zealanders_, pp. 80, 81; _id._, _Maori Religion and
Mythology_, pp. 10 _sq._; R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 108,
"Maori gods are so mixed up with the spirits of ancestors, whose
worship entered largely into their religion, that it is
difficult to distinguish one from the other."
[79] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, p. 81; _id._, _Maori Religion and Mythology_, p.
11. As to the _karakias_, which were prayers or invocations,
spells or incantations, addressed to gods or ancestral spirits,
see E. Shortland, _Maori Religion and Mythology_, pp. 28 _sqq._;
E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary_, p. 128,
_s.v._ "karakia." Apparently the _karakia_ partook of the nature
of a spell rather than of a prayer, since it was believed to be
so potent that the mere utterance of it compelled the gods to do
the will of the person who recited the formula. See R. Taylor,
_Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 180 _sq._: "The Maori, in his heathen
state, never undertook any work, whether hunting, fishing,
planting, or war, without first uttering a _karakia_; he would
not even take a journey without repeating a spell to secure his
safety; still he could not be said to pray, for, properly
speaking, they had no such thing as prayer. As in war, they
armed themselves with the most formidable weapons they could
procure, and laid their plans with the greatest skill they
possessed, so to secure the fruition of their desires, they used
their most powerful means to compel the gods to be obedient to
their wishes, whether they sought for victory over their foes,
fruitful crops, successful fishings, or huntings, they called in
the aid of potent incantations; when they planted their _kumara_
[sweet potatoes], they sought to compel the god who presided
over them to yield a good increase; when they prepared their
nets and their hooks, they must force the ocean god to let his
fish enter them; as the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and
the violent take it by storm, so the heathen Maori sought, by
spells and incantations, to compel the gods to yield to their
wishes; they added sacrifices and offerings at the same time, to
appease as it were their anger, for being thus constrained to do
what they wished them. Their ancestors were addressed as
powerful familiar friends; they gave them offerings, and if it
can be said that any prayers were offered up, it was to them
they were made. The word _karakia_, which we use for prayer,
formerly meant a spell, charm, or incantation."
[80] Elsdon Best, "Maori Religion," _Report of the Twelfth
Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of
Science, held at Brisbane, 1909_, p. 459.
The ancestral spirits who particularly watched over the fortunes of a
tribe were the souls of its dead warriors and great men. In war these
powerful, though invisible, beings were thought to attend the army and
direct its movements on the march by communicating advice or warning
through some one or other of their nearest living kinsmen. In battle
they hovered over the combatants and inspired courage into the hearts of
their own tribe. Hence when, on the eve of battle, any young man showed
signs of the white feather, recourse was immediately had to the family
priest, who repeated a charm, invoking the aid of his friendly spirit;
for the sensation of fear was ascribed to the baneful influence of a
hostile spirit. If the friendly spirit prevailed, and the craven spirit
was expelled, the young man would rush into the thickest of the fight
and prove himself the bravest of the brave.[81]
[81] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, pp. 81 _sq._
The interest taken by the spirits of the dead in mundane affairs seldom
extended beyond the limits of the tribe to which they belonged. Hence a
captive in war, who was carried away and enslaved by another tribe,
ceased from that moment to be under the protection and care of any
ancestral spirit or god. For the ancestral spirits of his own tribe did
not trouble themselves to follow him among a hostile tribe and hostile
spirits, and the ancestral spirits of the tribe whom he served as a
slave would not deign to give him a thought. Hence being forsaken of
god and left to their own devices, slaves were relieved from many of
the burdensome restrictions which the Maori gods laid upon their
worshippers; they were therefore free to perform many menial offices,
particularly in regard to carrying and cooking food, which no free Maori
could discharge without sinning against the sacred law of taboo and
incurring the wrath of the ancestral spirits, who for such a
transgression might punish the sinner with sickness or death.[82]
[82] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, pp. 82 _sq._; _id._, _The Southern Districts of New
Zealand_, pp. 296 _sq._
In addition to their deified ancestors, who had lived as men of flesh
and blood on earth, the Maoris believed in certain great primaeval
deities, who had existed before the human race came into being, and
whose doings were the theme of many mythical stories. These mighty
beings appear to have been personifications of the various forces or
elements of nature, such as the sky and the earth. But though fancy wove
round them a glistering web of myth and fable, they were apparently
believed to stand aloof in cold abstraction from human affairs and to
take no interest in the present race of men. The practical religion of
the Maori was concentrated on the souls of his deceased kinsfolk and
forefathers: "neither in any existing superstition nor tradition, purely
such, is there to be found internal evidence that an idea of God existed
more exalted than that of the spirit of a dead ancestor."[83]
[83] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, p. 80. Compare _id._, _Traditions and Superstitions
of the New Zealanders_, p. 81; _id._, _The Southern Districts of
New Zealand_, p. 294; _id._, _Maori Religion and Mythology_, pp.
10 _sq._ In Maori mythology Rangi is the personification of the
sky, and Papa of earth. They were the primal parents, and the
other great gods were their offspring. See Elsdon Best, "The
Maori Genius for Personification," _Transactions of the New
Zealand Institute_, liii. (1921) p. 2. Among the great
primordial deities who were worshipped by all tribes of New
Zealand may be mentioned Tane, Tu, Tangaroa, and Rongo. Of the
four, Tane was the origin and tutelary deity of forests and
birds: no tree might be felled and no bird caught till certain
rites had been performed to placate him. Tu was the god of war.
Tangaroa was the god of the ocean, the origin and tutelary deity
of fish. Rongo was the god of peace, and presided over
agriculture. See Elsdon Best, "Maori Religion," _Report of the
Twelfth Meeting of the Australasian Association for the
Advancement of Science, held at Brisbane, 1909_, p. 458. The
same four gods, with names only dialectically different, were,
as we shall see later on, the principal deities of the Sandwich
Islanders, the most distant geographically from the Maoris of
all the Polynesians. The coincidence furnishes an example of the
homogeneity of religion which prevailed among the various
branches of the Polynesian race.
The word which the Maoris applied to a god, whether a personification of
nature or the spirit of a dead ancestor, was _atua_. The name is not
confined to the Maori language, but is the common word for god
throughout Polynesia.[84] When the Maoris attempt to define the nature
of an _atua_, they have recourse to the same comparisons with a shadow
and with breath which appear to underlie their conception of the human
soul.[85] But though "god" is the nearest English equivalent of the word
_atua_, we must beware of assuming that the Maori idea of godhead
coincided with ours. On this subject one of our best authorities tells
us that the term "god" is really not applicable to the _Atua Maori_, the
so-called gods of the Maoris. For these beings, he says, "were, with few
exceptions, malignant demons, to be feared and placated or conciliated,
but not worshipped. Their principal task seems to have been the
inflicting upon mankind of diverse evils, pains, and penalties. Of the
few good offices performed by them, the warning of the people in regard
to coming troubles, seems to have been the most important. The vast
majority of the so-called gods of the Maori were simply deified
ancestors."[86]
[84] E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary_, pp.
30 _sq._, _s.v._ "Atua."
[85] J. Dumont d'Urville, _Voyage autour du Monde et a la
recherche de la Perouse, Histoire du Voyage_ (Paris, 1832-1833),
ii. 516 _sq._
[86] Elsdon Best, "Notes on the Art of War as conducted by the
Maori of New Zealand," _Journal of the Polynesian Society_, vol.
xi. no. 2 (June 1902). pp. 63 _sq._
In order to illustrate the difference between the Maori conception of
deity and our own, I will quote the words of another eminent authority
on the native religion of the New Zealanders. He says, "Before the
mythology of the Maori is further considered, it will be necessary
briefly to state what were the ideas of God entertained by the natives.
The word _atua_, or spirit, which is used for God, formerly had various
significations; a plague or disease was also _he atua_, or God; a thief
was an _atua_, thus also a thievish dog was _he kuri atua_, a god-like
dog, so also _he tangata atua ki te muru_, a man equal to a god in
stealing; a child who pilfered was _he tamaiti atua_, a divine child;
there were great spirits and small ones, a man's spirit was an _atua
pore pore_, a little spirit, but Maru Rongomai and other gods were _Atua
nui_, great gods; there were _atua ika_, reptile or fish gods; a great
chief was called _He ika_, a fish, sea monster, or reptile, and was
regarded as a malignant god in life, and a still worse one after death;
there were likewise _Atua marau_, as the _toroa_, albatross, the _ruru_,
owl; and _karu karu_, the film which shades its eye from the light, was
also an _atua_; male and female spirits presided over dreams, and were
regarded as _atuas, Ko nga atua moe moea o te poko_, the gods of dreams;
_Tunui a rangi_, a male, _Pare kewa_, a female deity, both were prayed
to as gods; the _atua kore_ and _atua kiko kiko_ were inferior gods. The
_Atua ngarara_ or reptile gods were very abundant, and were supposed to
be the cause of all diseases and death, being always ready to avail
themselves of every opportunity of crawling down the throat during
sleep, and thus preying upon the lives of unfortunate creatures. _Atuas_
or spirits of the deceased were thought to be able to revisit the earth
and reveal to their friends the cause of their sickness. Everything that
was evil or noxious was supposed especially to belong to the gods; thus
a species of euphorbium, whose milk or juice is highly poisonous, is
called _wai u atua_, the milk of the gods."[87] "In fact, in the
accounts which the natives give of their gods and their exploits, we
have but a magnified history of their chiefs, their wars, murders, and
lusts, with the addition of some supernatural powers; they were
cannibals; influenced by like feelings and passions as men, and were
uniformly bad; to them were ascribed all the evils incident to the human
race; each disease was supposed to be occasioned by a different god, who
resided in the part affected; thus, Tonga, the god who caused headache,
took up his abode in the forehead; Moko Titi, a lizard god, was the
source of all pains in the breast; Tu-tangata-kino was the god of the
stomach; Titihai occasioned pains in the ankles and feet; Rongomai and
Tuparitapua were the gods of consumption, and the wasting away of the
legs and arms; Koro-kio-ewe presided over childbirth, and did his worst
to unfortunate females in that state. In fact, the entire human body
appears to have been shared out amongst those evil beings, who ruled
over each part, to afflict and pain the poor creatures who worshipped
them."[88]
[87] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 134 _sq._
[88] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 137.
Anything, indeed, whether good or evil, which excited the fear or wonder
of the Maoris would seem in the old days to have been dubbed by them an
_atua_ and invested with the attributes of divinity. For example, when a
traveller in the early years of the nineteenth century showed his watch
to some Maoris, the ticking struck them with such astonishment that they
deemed it nothing less than the voice of a god; and the watch itself,
being looked upon as a deity (_atua_) in person, was treated by the
whole of them with profound reverence.[89] Other travellers have had
similar experiences among the Maoris,[90] and compasses and barometers
have also been accorded divine honours by these ignorant savages.[91]
[89] J. L. Nicholas, _Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand_
(London, 1817), i. 254.
[90] J. Dumont d'Urville, _Voyage autour du Monde et a la
recherche de la Perouse, Histoire du Voyage_ (Paris, 1832-1833),
ii. 516.
[91] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 118.
Sec. 5. _Taboo among the Maoris_
But the most momentous practical consequence which flowed from their
belief in the spirits of the dead was the enormous influence which that
creed wielded in establishing and maintaining the system of taboo, the
most remarkable and characteristic institution in the life of the Maoris
and of the Polynesians in general. I shall first give some account of
the taboo or _tapu_, as the Maoris called it, and afterwards show how
this extraordinary system of society and religion was directly based on
a belief in the existence of ghosts and their mighty power over human
destiny.
First, then, as to taboo or _tapu_ itself. This curious institution, as
I have said, prevailed throughout all the widely scattered islands of
Polynesia, but nowhere to a greater extent than in New Zealand. It
pervaded the whole life of the natives, affected their plans, influenced
their actions, and in the absence of an efficient police provided a
certain security both for their persons and their property. Sometimes it
was used for political, and sometimes for religious purposes; sometimes
it was the means of saving life, and at other times it was the
ostensible reason for taking life away.[92] It may be defined as a
system of consecration which made any person, place, or thing sacred
either permanently or for a limited time.[93] The effect of this
consecration was to separate the sacred person or thing from all contact
with common (_noa_)[94] persons and things: it established a sort of
quarantine for the protection not only of the sacred persons themselves,
but of common folk, who were supposed to be injured or killed by mere
contact with a tabooed person or object. For the sanctity which the
taboo conferred on people and things was conceived of as a sort of
dangerous atmosphere, charged with a spiritual electricity, which
discharged itself with serious and even fatal effect on all rash
intruders. A tabooed person might not be touched by any one, so long as
the taboo or state of consecration lasted; he might not even put his own
hand to his own head; and he was most stringently forbidden to touch
food with his hands. Hence he was either fed like a child by another,
who put the food into his mouth; or he had to lap up his victuals like a
dog from the ground, with his hands held behind his back; or lastly he
might convey the nourishment by means of a fern stalk to his mouth. When
he wished to drink, somebody else poured water into his mouth from a
calabash without allowing the vessel to touch his lips; for mere contact
with the lips of the tabooed man would have rendered the vessel itself
sacred or tabooed and therefore unfit for common use. Similarly, when he
desired to wash his hands, water had to be poured on them from a
distance by his attendant. This state of consecration or defilement, as
we might be tempted rather to call it, was incurred by any person who
had touched either a young child or a corpse or had assisted at a
funeral. The taboo contracted by association with the dead was the
strictest and most virulent of all. It extended not only to the persons
who had handled the corpse or paid the last offices of respect to the
departed; it applied to the place where the body was buried or the bones
deposited. So sacred, indeed, was deemed the spot where a chief had died
that in the old days everything upon it was destroyed by fire. Hence in
order to avoid the destruction of a house, which a death in it would
have entailed, it was customary to remove a sick or dying man to a
temporary shed just large enough to shelter him from the sun or screen
him from the rain; for if the man died in it, the destruction of the
wretched hovel was no great loss to the survivors.[95] A widow was
tabooed and had to observe the aforesaid restrictions from the death of
her husband until his bones had been scraped and deposited in their last
resting-place; and the same rule applied to a widower.[96] These taboos
were temporary and could be removed by a priest, who performed certain
rites and repeated certain spells (_karakias_), and thereby relieved the
tabooed person from the state of sanctity or consecration under which he
had laboured. The performance of the ceremony put an end to the
spiritual quarantine; the man ceased to be sacred, he became common
(_noa_) once more, and could mingle freely with his fellows. One of the
ceremonies of desecration, as we may call it, was to pass a consecrated
piece of wood over the right shoulder of the tabooed person, then round
his loins, and back again over the left shoulder, after which the stick
was broken in two and buried, burned, or cast into the sea.[97] Again, a
temporary taboo was laid on all persons who were engaged in planting
sweet potatoes, or in sorting the seed, or in digging and preparing the
ground; they might not leave the fields where they were at work nor
undertake any other labour. The fields themselves were sacred during
these operations; none but the persons who were tabooed for the purpose
might set foot on the ground or pluck up the weeds which grow rankly
round the roots of the vegetable.[98] Similarly, in their great
fishing-expeditions to catch mackerel, all concerned in making or
mending the nets were under a taboo: the ground where the nets were made
was sacred, and so was the river on the banks of which the work went on.
No man but the tabooed persons might walk over the land or pass up or
down the river in a canoe: no fire might be lighted within a prescribed
distance: no food might be dressed while the taboo lasted. Not till the
net had been finished and wetted with the sacred water, and the owner
had caught and eaten a fish, did these burdensome restrictions come to
an end by the removal of the taboo.[99] Once more, the men who took part
in a warlike expedition were under a severe taboo and had to observe
very strictly the customs which that mysterious state of consecration
rendered obligatory.[100] Even after their return home they were not
allowed to enter their houses or to hold any direct communication with
their families who had remained there, till they had been rendered
common (_noa_) by a ceremony of desecration. Before that ceremony took
place, the warriors were obliged to throw away the remains of the bodies
of their foes on which, as usual, they had been feasting; for being
sacred food the flesh could only be touched by sacred or tabooed
persons. One woman only, the _wahine ariki_, as she was called, that is
the elder female of the elder branch of the stock from which the tribe
traced their descent, was permitted to touch the sanctified meat;
indeed, in order to carry out the ritual of desecration in due form she
was expected and required to swallow an ear of the first enemy killed in
battle.[101] A warlike expedition might lay even people at home under a
taboo; for all who remained behind, including old men, women, and
slaves, were often required to observe a rigid fast and to abstain from
smoking till the return of the warriors.[102]
[92] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, pp. 84 _sq._
[93] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 84; R. Taylor, _Te
Ika A Maui_, p. 163.
[94] E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary_, pp.
268 _sq._, _s.v._ "Noa."
[95] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, pp. 85 _sq._; R.
Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 163, 164.
[96] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 40.
[97] J. Dumont d'Urville, _Voyage autour du Monde et a la
recherche de la Perouse, Histoire du Voyage_ (Paris, 1832-1833),
iii. 685; W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 86; E.
Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 104 _sq._; Servant,
"Notice sur la Nouvelle-Zelande," _Annales de la Propagation de
la Foi_, xv. (1843) p. 23; R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 166
_sq._; _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 104 _sqq._ The
taboo could be got rid of more simply by the tabooed man
touching his child or grandchild and taking food or drink from
the child's hands. But when that was done, the taboo was
transferred to the child, who retained it for the rest of the
day. See E. Dieffenbach, _op. cit._ ii. 105.
[98] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 85; R. Taylor,
_Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 165 _sq._; _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha
Maori, pp. 103 _sq._
[99] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 85.
[100] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 96, 114 _sq._
[101] E. Shortland, _The Southern Districts of New Zealand_, pp.
68 _sq._
[102] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 114 _sq._
But in contrast to the temporary taboos which affected common folk and
debarred them for a time from familiar intercourse with their fellows, a
perpetual and very stringent taboo was laid on the persons and property
of chiefs, especially of those high hereditary chiefs who bore the title
of _Ariki_ and were thought to be able at any time to hold visible
converse with their dead ancestors.[103] Strictly speaking, "the _ariki_
of a Maori tribe is the senior male descendant of the elder branch of
the tribe, that is, he is a descendant of the elder son of the elder son
of each generation from the time of the original ancestor down to the
present day. As such, he was of old regarded almost as a god, inasmuch
as he represented all that there was of _m[)a]na_ and sacredness of his
tribe. That he should have been regarded in this light is not
astonishing, for the Maoris believed he was something more than human,
in that he was the shrine of an hereditary _Atua_, the guardian spirit
of the tribe, and could therefore at any time communicate with the
tribal gods.... Such a man was not only _tapu_ in person but he made
everything he touched so dangerously sacred as to be a source of terror
to the tribe. To smoke his pipe, or drink from any vessel he had
touched, was death speedy and certain at the hands of the gods, who
avenge breaches of the _tapu_."[104] "The gods being no more than
deceased chiefs, the _arikis_ were regarded as living ones, and thus
were not to be killed by inferior men, but only by those who had more
powerful _atuas_ in them; the victorious chief who had slain numbers,
swallowed their eyes, and drunk their blood, was supposed to have added
the spirits of his victims to his own, and thus increased his _mana_ or
power; to keep up this idea, and hinder the lower orders from trying
whether it were possible to kill such corporeal and living gods, was the
grand work of the _tapu_."[105] The godhead of a chief was thought to
reside in his eyes, especially in his left eye; that was why by
swallowing the eye or eyes of a slain chief a living chief was believed
to absorb the divine spirit of the dead man and thereby to strengthen
his own divinity; the more eyes he swallowed, the greater god he
became.[106]
[103] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 40, 112
_sq._, 356; E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the
New Zealanders_, p. 104; R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 149,
164, 212 _sq._; E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative
Dictionary_, pp. 23 _sq._, _s.v._ "Ariki." The word _ariki_
signifies properly the first-born or heir, whether male or
female, of a family.
[104] Lieut.-Col. W. E. Gudgeon, "Maori Religion," _Journal of
the Polynesian Society_, vol. xiv. no. 3 (September 1905), p.
130. Compare _id._, "The Tipua-Kura and other Manifestations of
the Spirit World," _Journal of the Polynesian Society_, vol. xv.
no. 57 (March 1906), p. 38.
[105] R. Taylor, _Te Ika a Maui_, p. 173. _Mana_ means
authority, especially divine authority or supernatural power.
See E. Tregear, _Maori-Polynesian Comparative Dictionary_, p.
203, _s.v._ "Mana"; and for a full discussion of the conception
see Lieut.-Col. W. E. Gudgeon, "Mana Tangata," _Journal of the
Polynesian Society_, vol. xiv. no. 2 (June 1905), pp. 49-66.
"_Mana_ plays a leading part in the ability of a leader, or
successes in war of celebrated warriors. When a man frequently
undertakes daring deeds, which ought under ordinary
circumstances to fail, but none the less prove successful, he is
said to possess _mana_, and thereafter is regarded as one
peculiarly favoured by the gods, and in such cases it is held
that he can only be overcome by some act or default; such as a
disregard or neglect of some religious or warlike observance,
which has been shown by experience to be essential to success in
war, but which our warrior, spoiled by a long career of good
fortune, had come to regard as necessary to ordinary mortals
only and of but little consequence to men of _mana_" (W. E.
Gudgeon, _op. cit._ p. 62). "There were cases in which the
_mana_ of a man depended upon the facility with which he could
communicate with the spirits of departed ancestors, that is,
upon his capacity to enforce the aid and attendance of these
minor deities. To this end every man with any pretension to
_mana_ had a knowledge of certain forms of invocation by which
he could summon the spirits of long departed heroes and
ancestors, but it must not be supposed that these invocations
would necessarily have power in the mouths of all men, for such
was not the case. The efficacy of a _karakia_ or invocation
depended in part on its method of delivery, and in part on the
_mana_ of the man who used it" (W. E. Gudgeon, _op. cit._ p.
50). Compare R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 172, 173; _Old New
Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 100.
[106] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 147, 352. The soul was
thought to reside especially in the left eye; accordingly it was
the left eye of an enemy which was most commonly swallowed by a
victorious chief who desired to increase his spiritual power.
See J. Dumont d'Urville, _Voyage autour du Monde et a la
recherche de la Perouse, Histoire du Voyage_ (Paris, 1832-1833),
ii. 527; E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 118, 128
_sq._
Every such divine chief was under a permanent taboo; he was as it were
surrounded by an atmosphere of sanctity which attached to his person and
never left him; it was his birthright, a part of himself of which he
could not be divested, and it was well understood and recognised by
everybody at all times. And the sanctity was not confined to his person,
it was an infection which extended or was communicated to all his
movable property, especially to his clothes, weapons, ornaments, and
tools, indeed to everything which he touched. Even the petty chiefs and
fighting men, everybody indeed who could claim the title of _rangatira_
or gentleman, possessed in some degree this mysterious quality.[107]
However, in young people of rank the sanctity which appertained to them
by virtue of their birth was supposed to be only latent; it did not
develop or burst into full bloom till they had reached mature age and
set up house on their own account. Hence noble boys and lads were under
none of the irksome restrictions to which in their adult years they were
afterwards bound to submit; they mixed freely with the profane vulgar
and did not even disdain to carry fuel or provisions on their backs, a
thing which no man of any standing could possibly do; at all events, if
he did so demean himself, the food was thereby rendered taboo and could
accordingly be used by nobody but himself. "If he went into the shed
used as a kitchen (a thing, however, he would never think of doing
except on some great emergency), all the pots, ovens, food, etc., would
be at once rendered useless--none of the cooks or inferior people could
make use of them, or partake of anything which had been cooked in them.
He might certainly light a little fire in his own house, not for
cooking, as that never by any chance could be done in his house, but for
warmth; but that, or any other fire, if he should have blown upon it
with his breath in lighting it, became at once _tapu_, and could be used
for no common or culinary purpose. Even to light a pipe at it would
subject any inferior person, or in many instances an equal, to a
terrible attack of the _tapu morbus_, besides being a slight or affront
to the dignity of the person himself. I have seen two or three young men
fairly wearing themselves out on a wet day and with bad apparatus
trying to make fire to cook with, by rubbing two sticks together, when
on a journey, and at the same time there was a roaring fire close at
hand at which several _rangatira_ and myself were warming ourselves, but
it was _tapu_, or sacred fire--one of the _rangatira_ had made it from
his own tinder-box, and blown upon it in lighting it, and as there was
not another tinder-box amongst us, fast we must, though hungry as
sharks, till common culinary fire could be obtained."[108]
[107] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 94.
[108] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 98.
The head of a chief was always and at all times deemed most sacred, and
in consequence he might not even touch it with his own hand; if he
chanced to commit the sacrilege, he was obliged at once to apply his
fingers to his sacred nose and to snuff up the odour of sanctity which
they had abstracted, thus restoring the holy effluvium to the place from
which it had been taken.[109] For the same reason the cutting of a
chief's hair was a most difficult and delicate operation. While it
lasted neither the great man himself nor the barber who operated on him
was allowed to do anything or partake of any food except under the
restrictions imposed on all sacred or tabooed persons; to use the
scissors or the shell, with which the operation was performed, for any
other purpose or any other person would have been a terrible profanation
of sacred things, and would have rendered the rash sacrilegious wretch,
who had dared so to appropriate it, liable to the severest punishment.
The severed hair was collected and buried or hung up on a tree,[110]
probably to put it out of the way of common folk, who might have been
struck dead by contact with the holy locks. But apparently the dangers
incident to hair-cutting were by no means confined to chiefs, but
extended to any one who was bold enough to submit his head to the
barber's shears; for one of the early writers on the Maoris tells us
that "he who has had his hair cut is in the immediate charge of the
_Atua_; he is removed from the contact and society of his family and his
tribe; he dare not touch his food himself; it is put into his mouth by
another person; nor can he for some days resume his accustomed
occupations, or associate with his fellow-men."[111] The hair of the
first-born of a family in particular, on account of his extreme
sanctity, might be cut by nobody but a priest; and for many days after
the operation had been performed the priestly barber was in a state of
strict taboo. He could do nothing for himself, and might not go near
anybody. He might not touch food with his hands, and no less than three
persons were required to feed him. One of them prepared the food at a
safe distance, took it to a certain place, and retired; a second came
forward, picked up the victuals, carried them to another spot and left
them; finally, a third, venturing into the danger zone, actually brought
the food to the priest and put it into his mouth.[112]
[109] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 87; R. Taylor,
_Te Ika A Maui_, p. 165.
[110] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 87; E.
Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 104.
[111] Richard A. Cruise, _Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in
New Zealand_ (London, 1823), pp. 283 _sq._ Compare J. Dumont
d'Urville, _Voyage autour du Monde et a la recherche de la
Perouse, Histoire du Voyage_ (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 533.
[112] Elsdon Best, "Maori Religion," _Report of the Twelfth
Meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of
Science, held at Brisbane, 1909_, p. 463.
The atmosphere of taboo or sanctity which thus surrounded Maori chiefs
and gentlemen not only imposed many troublesome and inconvenient
restraints on the men themselves, it was also frequently a source of
very real danger, loss, and annoyance to other people. For example, it
was a rule that a chief should not blow on a fire with his mouth,
because his breath being sacred would communicate its sanctity to the
fire, and if a slave or a common man afterwards cooked food at the fire
or merely took a brand from it, the chief's holiness would cause that
man's death.[113] Again, if the blood of a high chief flowed on
anything, though it were but a single drop, it rendered the thing sacred
to him, so that it could be used by nobody else. Thus it once happened
that a party of natives came in a fine new canoe to pay their respects
to an eminent chief; the great man stepped into the canoe, and in doing
so he chanced to strike a splinter into his foot, which bled. That
sufficed to consecrate the canoe to him. The owner at once leaped out,
drew the canoe ashore opposite to the chief's house and left it
there.[114] Again, a Maori gentleman, visiting a missionary, knocked
his head against a beam in the house, and his sacred blood was spilt.
The natives present thereupon told the missionary that in former times
his house would after such an accident have belonged to his noble
visitor.[115] Even the cast garments of a chief had acquired, by contact
with his holy body, so virulent a degree of sanctity that they would
kill anybody else who might happen in ignorance to find and wear them.
On a journey, when a chief found his blanket too heavy to carry, he has
been known to throw it very considerately down a precipice where nobody
would be likely to light on it, lest some future traveller should be
struck dead by appropriating the sacred garment. Once a chief's lost
tinder-box actually caused the death of several persons; for having
found it and used it to light their pipes, they literally died of fright
on learning the sacrilege which they had committed.[116] Such fatal
effects consequent on the discovery of a breach of taboo were not
uncommon among the Maoris. For instance, a woman once ate some peaches
which, though she did not know it, had been taken from a tabooed place.
As soon as she heard where the fruit had come from, the basket which she
was carrying dropped from her hands, and she exclaimed in agony that the
spirit (_atua_) of the chief whose sanctuary had thus been profaned
would kill her. That happened in the afternoon, and next day by twelve
o'clock she was dead.[117] Again, a slave, a strong man in the prime of
life, once found the remains of a chief's dinner beside the road, and
being hungry ate it up without asking any questions. No sooner, however,
did he hear to whom the food had belonged than he was seized with the
most extraordinary convulsions and cramps in the stomach, which never
ceased till he died about sundown the same day. The English eyewitness
who reports the case adds, that any European freethinker who should have
denied that the man was killed by the chief's taboo would have been
listened to by the Maoris with feelings of contempt for his ignorance
and inability to understand plain and direct evidence.[118]
[113] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 165.
[114] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 101; R.
Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 164 _sq._
[115] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 165.
[116] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, pp. 164 _sq._
[117] W. Brown, _New Zealand and its Aborigines_ (London, 1845),
p. 76.
[118] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, pp. 95-97.
In order that a thing should be consecrated or tabooed to the exclusive
use and possession of a chief, it was not necessary that his sacred
blood should flow on it, or that he should merely touch it; he had only
to call it his head, or his back-bone, or any other part of his body,
and at once the thing, by a legal fiction, became his and might be
appropriated by nobody else under pain of violating the taboo which the
chief had laid upon it. For example, when a chief desired to prevent a
piece of ground from being cultivated by any one but himself, he often
resorted to the expedient of calling it his back-bone; after that if any
man dared to set foot on the land so consecrated, the transgression was
equivalent to a declaration of war. In this simple and easy fashion a
chief might acquire anything that took his fancy from an axe or a canoe
to a landed estate, and the rightful owner of the property dared not
complain nor dispute the claim of his superior.[119]
[119] E. Shortland, _Traditions and Superstitions of the New
Zealanders_, p. 111; _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, pp.
137 _sqq._; R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 168.
Nevertheless in daily life even ordinary people used the taboo to secure
their property or to acquire for themselves what had hitherto been
common to all. For example, if a man found a piece of drift timber, he
could make it his own by tying something to it or giving it a chop with
his axe; he thereby set his taboo on the log, and as a general rule the
taboo would be respected. Again, with a simple piece of flax he might
bar the door of his house or his store of food; the contents of the
house or store were thus rendered inviolable, nobody would meddle with
them.[120]
[120] R. Taylor, _Te Ika A Maui_, p. 171.
It is easy to see that this form of taboo must have greatly contributed
to create and confirm respect for the rights of private property. The
most valuable articles might, we are told, under ordinary circumstances
be left to its protection in the absence of the owners for any length of
time.[121] Indeed so obvious and so useful is this function of taboo
that one well-informed writer supposes the original purpose of the
institution to have been no other than the preservation of private
property;[122] and another observer, after eulogising its beneficent
effects, declares that "it was undoubtedly the ordinance of a wise
legislator."[123] But to say this is greatly to overrate the wisdom and
foresight of primitive man in general and of the Polynesians in
particular; it implies a fundamental misconception of the real nature
and history of taboo. That curious institution was not the creation of a
prudent and sagacious legislator, who devised this system of checks and
restrictions for the purpose of curbing the passions of a savage race
and inducing them to submit to the salutary restraints of law and
morality. It was in its origin, I believe, simply a crude and barbarous
form of superstition, which, like many other superstitions, has
accidentally led to good results that were never contemplated by its
ignorant and foolish votaries. It is thus that in the long history of
mankind things which to a contemporary spectator might seem to be almost
unmitigated evils turn out in the end to be fraught with incalculable
good to humanity. This experience, often repeated, enables students of
the past to look forward, even in the darkest hours, with cheerful
confidence to the future.
[121] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 97.
[122] _Old New Zealand_, by a Pakeha Maori, p. 94.
[123] E. Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 100,
"Ridiculous as this custom of the _tapu_ has appeared to some,
and as many of its applications really are, it was,
notwithstanding, a wholesome restraint, and, in many cases,
almost the only one that could have been imposed; the heavy
penalties attached to the violation of its laws serving in one
tribe, or in several not in actual hostility with each other, as
moral and legal commandments. It was undoubtedly the ordinance
of a wise legislator." Compare G. F. Angas, _Savage Life and
Scenes in Australia and New Zealand_, i. 330, "Doubtless this
law is the result of some wise regulation for the protection of
property and individuals, and it has in many things a beneficial
influence amongst a people who have no written or regularly
established code of laws of their own." To the same effect
another authority on the Maoris observes: "The most politic and
useful of all the superstitious institutions of the Maori people
is that which involves the rites of _tapu_. It has always seemed
to me that this institution, with its far-reaching
ramifications, must have been the conception of a very gifted
mind, for, as a governing factor, it is very superior to the
Hindu institution of caste. It must, moreover, have been
initiated during a period of civilisation, to which the
Polynesians have long been strangers, but with which at one
period of their history they were sufficiently familiar." See
Lieut.-Colonel Gudgeon, "The Tipua-Kura and other Manifestations
of the Spirit World," _Journal of the Polynesian Society_, vol.
xv. no. 57 (March 1906), p. 49.
The particular superstition which lies at the root of taboo and has
incidentally exercised a beneficent influence by inspiring a respect for
law and morality appears to be a belief in the existence of ghosts and
their power to affect the fortunes of the living for good or evil. For
the ultimate sanction of the taboo, in other words, that which engaged
the people to observe its commandments, was a firm persuasion that any
breach of these commandments would surely and speedily be punished by an
_atua_ or ghost, who would afflict the sinner with a painful malady till
he died. From youth upwards the Maori was bred in the faith that the
souls of his dead ancestors, jealous of any infraction of the
traditionary rites, would commission some spirit of their kin to enter
into the transgressor's body and prey on a vital part. The visible signs
of this hidden and mysterious process they fancied to be the various
forms of disease. The mildest ailments were thought to be caused by the
spirits of those who had known the sufferer on earth, and who
accordingly were imagined to be more merciful and more reluctant to
injure an old friend and relation. On the other hand the most malignant
forms of disease were attributed to the spirits of dead infants, who
having never learned to love their living friends, would rend and devour
the bowels of their nearest kin without compunction. With these ideas as
to the origin of disease the Maoris naturally did not attempt to heal
the sick through the curative properties of herbs and other drugs; their
remedies consisted not in medicine but in exorcism: instead of a
physician they sent for a priest, who by his spells and incantations
undertook to drive the dangerous sprite from the body of the patient and
to appease the ancestral spirit, whose wrath was believed to be the
cause of all the mischief. If the deity proved recalcitrant and
obstinately declined to accept this notice to quit, they did not
hesitate to resort to the most threatening and outrageous language,
sometimes telling him that they would kill and eat him, and at others
that they would burn him to a cinder if he did not take himself off at
once and allow the patient to recover.[124] Curiously enough, the
spirit which preyed on the vitals of a sick man was supposed to assume
the form of a lizard; hence these animals, especially a beautiful green
species which the Maoris called _kakariki_, were regarded with fear and
horror by the natives.[125] Once when a Maori of Herculean thews and
sinews was inadvertently shown some green lizards preserved in a bottle
of spirits, his massive frame shrank back as from a mortal wound, and
his face betrayed signs of extreme horror. An aged chief in the room, on
learning what was the matter, cried out, "I shall die! I shall die!" and
crawled away on hands and knees; while the other man gallantly
interposed himself as a bulwark between the fugitive and the green gods
(_atuas_) in the bottle, shifting his position adroitly so as to screen
the chief till he was out of range of the deities.[126] An old man once
assured a missionary very seriously that in attending to a sick person
he had seen the god come out of the sufferer's mouth in the form of a
lizard, and that from the same moment the patient began to mend and was
soon restored to perfect health.[127]
[124] E. Shortland, _The Southern Districts of New Zealand_, pp.
30 _sq._, 294 _sq._; _id._, _Traditions and Superstitions of the
New Zealanders_, pp. 114 _sqq._; _id._, _Maori Religion and
Mythology_, 31 _sq._; W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, pp.
141 _sq._ Most malignant and dangerous of all appear to have
been thought the spirits of abortions or still-born infants. See
Elsdon Best, "The Lore of the _Whare-Kohanga_," _Journal of the
Polynesian Society_, vol. xv. no. 57 (March 1906), pp. 12-15;
_Reise der Oesterreichischen Fregatte Novara um die Erde,
Anthropologischer Theil, Dritte Abtheilung, Ethnographie_,
bearbeitet von Dr. Fr. Mueller (Vienna, 1868), pp. 59 _sq._ Even
more dangerous than the spirits of dead infants were supposed to
be the spirits of human germs, which the Maoris imagined to
exist in the menstrual fluid. See E. Shortland, _Traditions and
Superstitions of the New Zealanders_, pp. 115, 292; _id._,
_Maori Religion and Mythology_, pp. 107 _sq._ As to disease
inflicted by ancestral spirits (_atuas_) for breaches of taboo,
see further J. L. Nicholas, _Narrative of a Voyage to New
Zealand_ (London, 1817), i. 272 _sq._, ii. 176 _sq._; E.
Dieffenbach, _Travels in New Zealand_, ii. 105, "The breaking of
the _tapu_, if the crime does not become known, is, they
believe, punished by the _Atua_, who inflicts disease upon the
criminal; if discovered, it is punished by him whom it regards,
and often becomes the cause of war."
[125] Richard A. Cruise, _Journal of a Ten Months' Residence in
New Zealand_ (London, 1823), p. 320; J. Dumont d'Urville,
_Voyage autour du Monde et a la recherche de la Perouse,
Histoire du Voyage_ (Paris, 1832-1833), ii. 517; W. Yate, _An
Account of New Zealand_, pp. 141 _sq._; E. Dieffenbach, _Travels
in New Zealand_, ii. 117; Elsdon Best, "Maori Medical Lore,"
_Journal of the Polynesian Society_, vol. xiii. no. 4 (December
1904), p. 228. As to the superstitious veneration of lizards
among the peoples of the Malay-Polynesian stock, see G. A.
Wilken, _Verspreide Geschriften_ (The Hague, 1912), iv. 125
_sqq._
[126] G. F. Angas, _Savage Life and Scenes in Australia and New
Zealand_, ii. 67.
[127] W. Yate, _An Account of New Zealand_, p. 142.
Sec. 6. _Conclusion_
If now we attempt to sum up the effects which the belief in human
immortality exercised on the life of the Maoris we may perhaps conclude
that these effects were partly good and partly evil. On the one hand by
ascribing to the chiefs the special protection of the powerful spirits
of the dead, it invested the governing class with a degree of authority
to which on merely natural or rational grounds they could have laid no
claim; hence it tended to strengthen the respect for government and to
ensure the maintenance of law and order. Moreover, by lending a
supernatural sanction to the rights of private property among all
classes it further contributed to abolish one of the most fruitful
sources of discord and crime in the community and thereby to foster
economic progress, which cannot exist without some measure of peace and
security for life and possessions. These were great gains, and so far as
the faith in immortality helped to win them for the Maoris, it certainly
ameliorated their condition and furthered the cause of civilisation
among them. But on the other hand the belief in the essential malignancy
of the spirits of the dead and in their great power to harm the living
added a host of purely imaginary terrors to the real evils with which
man's existence on earth is naturally and inevitably encompassed: it
imposed a regular system of needless and vexatious restrictions on
social intercourse and the simplest acts of daily life; and it erected
an almost insuperable barrier to the growth of science, and particularly
of that beneficent branch of science which has for its object the
alleviation of human suffering, since by concentrating the whole
attention of the people on a false and absurd theory of supernatural
agency it diverted them from that fruitful investigation of natural
causes which alone can strengthen and extend man's control over matter.
This was a heavy toll to pay for the advantages incidental to a belief
in immortality; and if we were asked to strike a balance between the
good and the evil which that belief entailed on the Maoris, we might
well hesitate to say to which side the scales of judgment should
incline.