|
The Ancestral Voices of Hawaii
Inner Traditions 2005 ISBN #089281127-7 The Cry of the Huna is the second book from Moke Kupihea on native Hawaiian spirituality (the first being The Seven Dawns of the Aumakua). It could be the story of any indigenous people, their spirituality, and the changes that were brought about after contact with Western thoughts and practices. In this instance, Kupihea is of direct Hawaiian priestly lineage, and his experiences reflect the Hawaiian spiritual tradition and way of living. This book reflects an inner journey, the journey of someone who is part of the last generation to understand and live the old ways. The inner journey of someone who saw "progress" take away an entire way of living, resulting in a sense of loss, and a sense of deep seated anger. Kupihea's journey has to do with finding his personal destiny, with dealing with his anger, and finding a resolution to it. In the end, his becomes one of the voices that reconnects his people to their past, to the voices of the ancestors. From this reconnection comes the route to forgiveness, and from forgiveness comes wholeness. The crux of this work reflects on the nature of Hawaiian spirituality - that an individual needs to be a conscious participant in witnessing and transmitting traditional spiritual values connecting the present to the time of its origin. Any weak link in this chain weakens the chain as a whole. A weakened chain can be broken, and a tradition lost. What we as readers are privy to is an insiders view of an oral spiritual tradition, a tradition based on the sacred nature of the land, and a sacred way of living in harmony with the land. Kupihea describes himself as a "hereditary scribe" for his people. He has a unique ability to connect with the past - both the near past and the distant past - and hear the voices of his ancestors. In his prologue, Kupihea speaks of "hala" - an act that bound the wrongdoer to the person against whom the wrong was committed. The hala was the debt between them. The fault can spread to members of a generation, and to members of future generations. At the least, we see a large number of people not at ease with themselves, not satisfied, and, in this day and age, perhaps prone to acts of violence. Kupihea presents a "short list" of examples of hala, including the Hawaiian monarchy to its people, and the United States of America to the Hawaiian Monarchy. The point here is to find the way out, to find the cure. In Hawaiian spirituality, this would be termed "kala", defined as untying, unbinding, and setting free. The wrongs of the past need to be unbound, by making right the future. Kala itself can only take place in the present, as the healing itself takes place in the future. The debtor can only be set free by the people he is indebted to. Kupihea is attempting to reconnect his people with these voices. The voices seek kala: kala to hear their voices without fault; kala to worship together without fault; kala to travel upon their hereditary lands without fault; kala to practice gathering without fault; kala to descend without fault; kala to avoid the final spiritual genocide being generated by the hoo mau hala, the faults held fast, that loom over the survivors of the race today. In a very chilling statement, he says: "If this turns out to be the last recorded callings of such voices, then the ancestral murmurings that speak in the accounts to come have only truly been heard by "the last kahuna"." Kupihea's journey here is a physical, as well as a spiritual, journey. Everything in life has its time. In his forty-second year, a woman, a descendent of the Naumu (the people the ancients called the Mu, or silent ones) came into his life. It was she who would travel with him on his spiritual journey. Their journey together would include physically visiting known Hawaiian spiritual lands, sites of heiau (temples, or churches). But they had a deeper interpersonal connection, giving them the ability to travel together in visions. What they saw in initial visions they experienced in the reality of the heiau's. But the visions obtained in the heiau's went much deeper, clearly showing what had happened in the ancient as well as the near past. Kupihea makes reference to "taking back seven", which I understood to mean mentally going back seven generations. I was stunned at this reference, as it so closely aligns with the "seven generation back, seven generation forward" thought of Native American peoples. Kupihea's writing is so clear, so concise, that the reader is literally taking this trip with him. Through his contact with Hawaiian elders as he was growing up, through his direct lineage, through his will to retain his Hawaiian heritage, through his ability to move between the past and the present, we are given a clear view of a culture that is most important that we not allow to die away. This book will touch you, the reader, in unexpected ways. It will become part of your spiritual growth, whether you are of Hawaiian lineage or not. You will become a better person if you experience these words.
Bonnie Cehovet
Graphics by Art for the web |
