The Story of Hawaii: History, Customs, Mythology, Geography & Archaeology. Fowke Gerard

of Contents

      THE HALAU

      In building a halau, or hall, in which to perform the hula a Hawaiian of the old, old time was making a temple for his god. In later and degenerate ages almost any structure would serve the purpose; it might be a flimsy shed or an extemporaneous lanai such as is used to shelter that al fresco entertainment, the luau. But in the old times of strict tabu and rigorous etiquette, when the chief had but to lift his hand and the entire population of a district ransacked plain, valley, and mountain to collect the poles, beams, thatch, and cordstuff; when the workers were so numerous that the structure grew and took shape in a day, we may well believe that ambitious and punctilious patrons of the hula, such as La'a, Liloa, or Lono-i-ka-makahiki, did not allow the divine art of Laka to house in a barn.

      The choice of a site was a matter of prime importance. A formidable code enunciated the principles governing the selection. But--a matter of great solicitude--there were omens to be heeded, snares and pitfalls devised by the superstitious mind for its own entanglement. The untimely sneeze, the ophthalmic eye, the hunched back were omens to be shunned.

      Within historic times, since the abrogation of the tabu system and the loosening of the old polytheistic ideas, there has been in the hula a lowering of former standards, in some respects a degeneration. The old gods, however, were not entirely dethroned; the people of the hula still continued to maintain the form of divine service and still appealed to them for good luck; but the soul of worship had exhaled; the main study now was to make of the hula a pecuniary success.

      In an important sense the old way was in sympathy with the thought, "Except God be with the workmen, they labor in vain that build the house." The means for gaining divine favor and averting the frown of the gods were those practised by all religionists in the infantile state of the human mind--the observance of fasts and tabus, the offering of special prayers and sacrifices. The ceremonial purification of the site, or of the building if it had been used for profane purposes, was accomplished by aspersions with sea water mixed with turmeric or red earth.

When one considers the tenacious hold which all rites and ceremonies growing out of what we are accustomed to call superstitions had on the mind of the primitive Hawaiian, it puzzles one to account for the entire dropping out from modern memory of the prayers which were recited during the erection of a hall for the shelter of an institution so festive and so popular as the hula, while the prayers and gloomy ritual of the temple service have survived. The explanation may be found, perhaps, in the fact that the priests of the temple held position by the sovereign's appointment; they formed a hierarchy by themselves, whereas the position of the kumu-hula, who was also a priest, was open to anyone who fitted himself for it by training and study and by passing successfully the ai-lolo² ordeal. After that he had the right to approach the altar of the hula god with the prescribed offerings and to present the prayers and petitions of the company to Laka or Kapo.

      In pleasing contrast to the worship of the heiau, the service of the hula was not marred by the presence of groaning victims and bloody sacrifices. Instead we find the offerings to have been mostly rustic tokens, things entirely consistent with light-heartedness, joy, and ecstasy of devotion, as if to celebrate the fact that heaven had come down to earth and Pan, with all the nymphs, was dancing.

      During the time the halau was building the tabus and rules that regulated conduct were enforced with the utmost strictness. The members of the company were required to maintain the greatest propriety of demeanor, to suppress all rudeness of speech and manner, to abstain from all carnal indulgence, to deny themselves specified articles of food, and above all to avoid contact with a corpse. If anyone, even by accident, suffered such defilement, before being received again into fellowship or permitted to enter the halau and take part in the exercises he must have ceremonial cleansing (huikala). The kumu offered up prayers, sprinkled the offender with salt water and turmeric, commanded him to bathe in the ocean, and he was clean. If the breach of discipline was gross and willful, an act of outrageous violence or the neglect of tabu, the offender could be restored only after penitence and confession.

      THE KUAHU

      In every halau stood the kuahu, or altar, as the visible temporary abode of the deity, whose presence was at once the inspiration of the performance and the luck-bringer of the enterprise--a rustic frame embowered in greenery. The gathering of the green leaves and other sweet finery of nature for its construction and decoration was a matter of so great importance that it could not be intrusted to any chance assemblage of wild youth, who might see fit to take the work in hand. There were formalities that must be observed, songs to be chanted, prayers to be recited. It was necessary to bear in mind that when one deflowered the woods of their fronds of íe-íe and fern or tore the trailing lengths of maile--albeit in honor of Laka herself--the body of the goddess was being despoiled, and the despoiling must be done with all tactful grace and etiquette.

      It must not be gathered from this that the occasion was made solemn and oppressive with weight of ceremony, as when a temple was erected or as when a tabu chief walked abroad, and all men lay with their mouths in the dust. On the contrary, it was a time of joy and decorous exultation, a time when in prayer-songs and ascriptions of praise the poet ransacked all nature for figures and allusions to be used in caressing the deity.

      The following adulatory prayer (kánaenáe) in adoration of Laka was recited while gathering the woodland decorations for the altar. It is worthy of preservation for its intrinsic beauty, for the spirit of trustfulness it breathes. We remark the petitions it utters for the growth of tree and shrub, as if Laka had been the alma mater under whose influence all nature budded and rejoiced.

      It would seem as if the physical ecstasy of the dance and the sensuous joy of all nature's finery had breathed their spirit into the aspiration and that the beauty of leaf and flower, all of them familiar forms of the god's metamorphosis--accessible to their touch and for the regalement of their senses--had brought such nearness and dearness, of affection between goddess and worshiper that all fear was removed.

       He kánaenáe no Laka

      A ke kua-hiwi, i ke kua-lono,

      Ku ana o Laka i ka mauna;

      Noho ana o Laka i ke po'o o ka ohu.

      O Laka kumu hula,

Nana i a'e ka tvao-kele,³

      Kahi, kahi i moli'a i ka pua'a,

      I ke po'o pua'a,

He pua'a hiwa na Kane.⁴

      He kane na Laka,

      Na ka wahine i oni a kelakela i ka lani:

      I kupu ke a'a i ke kumu,

      I lau a puka ka mu'o,

      Ka liko, ka ao i-luna.

      Kupu ka lala, hua ma ka Hikina;

Kupu ka laau ona a Maka-li'i,⁵

O Maka-lei,⁶ laau kaulana mai ka Po mai.⁷

      Mai ka Po mai ka oiaio--

      I ho-i'o i-luna, i o'o i-luna.

      He luna au e ki'i mai nei ia oe, e Laka,

E ho'i ke ko-kua⁸ pa-ú;

He la uniki