Nowadays, Hawaii is one of the most popular travel destinations. The first associations that come to one’s mind hearing about Hawaii are board surfing, aloha, hula, and incredibly beautiful ocean and sky. However, despite the seeming enervation, Hawaii islands have a rich history rooted in the history of the Polynesian Triangle. This paper aims to discuss the history and culture of ancient Hawaii and the kingdom.
As well as New Zealand and Rapa Nui (Easter Island), Hawaii is one of the corners of the Polynesian Triangle. Most cultures of the islands in the Polynesian Triangle have similar Polynesian languages that came from the ancient proto-Malayo-Polynesian language, which was common for Southeast Asia about 5000 years ago. Moreover, Polynesians have similar cultural beliefs, arts, sciences, and religion. Anthropologists say that the reason of such similarity lies in a common ancestral culture, which was established in the South Pacific by Malayo-Polynesian migrants. According to Kirch, the settlement of Hawaii started near the end of the first millennium (Kirch 49). This conclusion is based on the fact that the earliest settlement of Eastern Island dates back to between 900 AD and 1100 AD, and New Zealand was founded in 1250-1300 AD. The first Polynesian settlers brought to Hawaii their clothing, livestock, and plants and laid the basis for Hawaiian culture. They cultivated bananas (mai’a), breadfruits (ulu), and coconuts (niu) and built traditional Hawaiian homes (hale) and temples (heiau). The first contact between Hawaiians and Western people happened in 1777-1778 during the expedition of the British explorer captain James Cook. As Menton and Tamura write, Cook “found a chain of islands divided into small chiefdoms ruled by chiefs and chiefesses who worried with each other to expand their territory and control” (Menton 3). The further development of Hawaii was hardly possible under those conditions. However, everything was changed within the next thirty years that marked the unification of the Hawaiian Islands under the rule of the most powerful and famous chief Kamehameha and the new life of Hawaii as the one common state, the Kingdom of Hawaii.
The social structure of ancient Hawaii was based on castes. Since their birth, Hawaiian people had belonged to specific social classes, and they had no opportunity to change them and to move into another caste but could fall into the outcast status and to become a slave. Each of the castes had its own responsibilities and had to contribute to the development of the whole society. The main Hawaiian caste was called Ali’l. It was the royal class consisted of chiefs and protected by divine power mana. Quoting Shore, Hommon writes that mana was “the power of the gods in the human world” (Hommon 19). The mana gave chiefs the sexual potency and the power to manage social food resources. Furthermore, mana was closely associated with religion and with the concepts of kapu and noa. According to Shore, kapu is “a state of contact with the divine” and noa means “the unbounded state of separation from the divine” (Hommon 19). Those people who were closer to the divine had more power. The concepts of kapu and noa gave the beginnings to the Hawaiian feudal system; for instance, low-rank chiefs were kapu to commoners but noa to the chiefs with the higher ranks. Another caste, Maka‘ainana, included commoners who performed different manufacturing and agricultural activities that were necessary for the flourish of the Hawaiian kingdom. The work of each commoner was concentrated on the specific territory called ‘aiana, or “the land” and on the development of that territory. One should also note the group called kahuna. Hommon writes that kahuna was not the caste but “someone of either class who was a recognized expert or specialist in any of a variety of fields such as a canoe building” (Hommon 11). Furthermore, kahuna included priests that were mostly called kahuna pules, or “prayers experts.”
One could notice that religion constituted the best part of the ancient Hawaiians’ lives. Mulholland writes that the ancient Hawaiian religion was similar to the rest of Polynesian religions and consisted of mythology, theology, rituals, and a code of conduct (Mulholland 7). Hawaiian mythology had a lot of gods and heroes. Generally, all gods and gods’ manifestations were divided into pure and impure ones. As Valeri notices, manifestations of the pure gods “personified to the highest degree the accepted types of human action” (Valeri 86). Impure manifestations, on the contrary, referred to corpses and monstrous beings. Hawaiians believed that everything including gods was born from the sky father Wakea and the earth mother Papa. The four main Hawaiian gods were the creator Kane, the god of rain, storm, and fertility Lono, the god of the war Ku, and the god of the sea and of death Kanaloa (Mulholland 7). Furthermore, Hawaiians had several lesser gods that protected specific activities, such as hula dancing and building. The concepts of pure and impure also played a crucial role in Hawaiian perception of women and their roles in society and religion. Valeri states that Hawaiians saw menstruation as “the most impure bodily process” (Valeri 85). Thus, women filed by blood could not serve both as worshippers of pure gods and as sacrifices to them. At the same time, they often took part in sorcery rituals and the worshipping of sorcery gods, as those gods were seen as impure (Valeri 86).
All religious ideas of ancient Hawaiians were united by power. As it was mentioned above, the main divine power was mana, and the access to the mana was based on the concepts of kapu and noa. Kapu formed the code of conduct and served two major purposes: protection of the mana and keeping it from bringing harm to anyone. However, kahuna pules could get the direct access to the mana through rituals. The ancient Hawaiian religion implied to the widespread performing heavy kahuna, or human sacrifices, which were universally replaced by light kahuna, or rituals and chants, only with the coming of Christianity. The close connection between religion and life of the ancient Hawaiians developed the central concept of Hawaiians, aloha. According to Mulholland, aloha means, “we are all united with affection in our common life” (Mulholland 12). Later, aloha became the powerful aspect of Hawaiian Christianity.
I feel that principles and religious beliefs of ancient Hawaiians were very different from the traditional understanding of Christianity. First of all, the difference lied in the role of the religion in the state system of the Kingdom of Hawaii. Ancient Hawaiian religion played a crucial role in the feudal system, as it established the outgiving of mana to castes and was the basis of power. Furthermore, ancient Hawaiians had a lot of gods, and their religion was pagan, as Christianity has only one God. The next difference refers to the role of women in the religion. As well as Christianity, ancient Hawaiian religion placed women lower than men, but the concept of impurity determined women as impure human creatures, while the New Testament loses the concepts of pure and impure. The Old Testament determines impurity as mortality and depravity. Menstruations remind about human mortality, and, thus, women can be assimilated with impurity. But the New Testament makes the Savior equal to Life. Jesus Christ does not follow the concepts of pure and impure. He touches the deceased and allows the bleeding woman to touch himself, and every follower of the Savior becomes alive after death. Christianity suggests the lay chalice that is possible even in the days of menstruations. However, I want to note that despite all the differences, ancient Hawaiian religion formed the basis for the establishment of Christianity in the Kingdom of Hawaii, and it primarily refers to the concept of aloha, Hawaiian way of life that means the love for yourself and sharing this love with others. Nowadays, aloha is the sartorial statement of Hawaii that determines the world perception of Hawaiians and attracts tourists from all over the world.
Works Cited
Hommon, Robert J. The Ancient Hawaiian State: Origins of a Political Society. Oxford, NY: OUP USA, 2103. Print.
Kirch, Patrick Vinton. A Shark Going Inland Is My Chief: The Island Civilization of Ancient Hawai'i. Berkley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press, 2012. Print.
Menton, Linda K., and Eileen Tamura. A History of Hawaii. Honolulu: CRDG, 1999. Print.
Mulholland, John F. Hawaii’s Religions. Tokyo: Tuttle Publishing, 1970. Print.
Valeri, Valerio. Kingship and Sacrifice: Ritual and Society in Ancient Hawaii. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985. Print.
