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The Maori As He Was : A Brief Account of Maori Life as it was in Pre-European Days

Chapter IV

page viii

Chapter IV

The Religious Ideas of the Maori 61

No recognized national system of worship. Barbaric man deeply religious. Religious ceremonial permeated every activity. Interesting stage of development. Religion in the making. Atua, or supernormal beings. Classification of gods. Tutelary beings and personifications. The cult of Io. Departmental deities. Asiatic analogues. Natural phenomena personified. Ancestral spirits. Human mediums of gods. Evil spirits. Demoniacal possession. Atua as guardians. Forms of incarnation. Too much importance attached to ancestor-worship. Supreme Being not placated. Offerings to other gods. Human sacrifice. Lack of idols and images. Ritual. Magic formulae. Karakia, an expansive term. Ceremonial functions. Priestly experts—tohunga. Several classes of priests. No temples erected. Tuahu. The whare wananga. Spiritual concepts of the Maori. Purification of the spirits of the dead. Spirit-life. Spirit-world in west. How reached. The Broad Path of Tane. Two spirit-worlds. No punishment of soul after death. Tapu.