MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 19 October 1939, Page 2

MAORI MEMORIES

MAORI THEOLOGY. (Recorded by J.H.S. for “Times-Age.”) Discussing what we Pakeha people call “the colour bar” with the Maori, when we referred to his dark skin as a handicap, he replied, with that characteristic intimacy of all things in nature, drawing attention to the protective disguises given by the Maori Gods of Nature whom he worshipped, he asked the puzzled white man, “Which of us would be the most difficult to protect against an enemy attack in the depth of the forest, a white or a brown?” Then he proceeded in Maori fashion to show how his Gods gave flight to birds, and life without air to fishes, providing food and drink for both, with clothing suitable to each. There seems to be no problem forwhich he cannot find a parallel in Nature. He never questioned the wisdom of death as the only means of making room for the vigorous youngsters coming along. This was easier for him because his heaven (Te Reinga) was only an extension of his physical life on earth, or rather under it, where be was delivered from all ills. So far as our swiftly passing belief in everlasting fire affected the Maori mind, his only conception of it was quite the opposite of punishment. “Ahi ka roa” ("fire alight for years”) was the strongest title to land. His theology is precisely that of a modern philosopher who had no idea that he was eloquently voicing the Maori religion when he wrote: “Heaven is a habit, now and here —Hell is a pleasantry. We are punished by our sins, not for them. There is no Devil but fear.”