These extracts are obviously speculative rather than in any sense mythological The element of myth just shows itself when we are told that the sky dwelt with the earth and produced certain islands. But myth of a familiar character is very fully represented among the Maoris. Their mythical gods, though "mixed up with the spirits of ancestors," are great natural powers, first Heaven and Earth, Rangi and Papa, the parents of all. These are conceived as having originally been united in such a close embrace, the Heaven lying on the Earth, that between their frames all was darkness, and in darkness the younger gods, Atua, O-te-po, their children, were obliged to dwell. These children or younger gods (answering to the Cronidæ) were the god of war (Tumatauenga), the forest-god (Tane Mahuta), in shape a tree, the wind-god (Tawhiri Matea), the gods of cultivated and natural fruits, the god of ocean (Tangaroa). These gods were unable to endure the dungeon and the darkness of their condition, so they consulted together and said: "Let us seek means whereby to destroy Heaven and Earth, or to separate them from each other". The counsel of Tane Mahuta prevailed: "Let one go upwards and become a stranger to us; let the other remain below and be a parent to us". Finally, Tane Mahuta rent asunder Heaven and Earth, pushing Heaven up where he has ever since remained. The wind-god followed his father, abode with him in the open spaces of the sky, and thence makes war on the trees of the forest-god, his enemy. Tangaroa went, like Poseidon, to the great deep, and his children, the reptiles and fishes, clove part to the waters, part to the dry land. The war-god, Tu, was more of a human being than the other gods, though his "brethren" are plants, fish and reptiles. Still, Tu is not precisely the first man of New Zealand.
Though all these mythical beings are in a sense departmental gods, they yield in renown to a later child of their race, Maui, the great culture-hero, who is an advanced form of the culture-heroes, mainly theriomorphic, of the lower races.*
Maui, like many heroes of myth, was a youngest son. He was prematurely born (a similar story comes in the Brahmanic legend of the Adityas); his mother wrapped him up in her long hair and threw him out to sea. A kinsman rescued him, and he grew up to be much the most important member of his family, like Qat in his larger circle of brethren. Maui it was who snared the sun, beat him,** and taught him to run his appointed course, instead of careering at will and at any pace he chose about the heavens.
* Te-Heu-Heu, a powerful chief, described to Mr. Taylor the
departmental character of his gods. "Is there one maker of
things among Europeans? Is not one a carpenter, another a
blacksmith, another a shipbuilder? So it was in the
beginning. One made this, another that. Tane made trees, Ru
mountains, Tangaroa fish, and so forth." Taylor, New
Zealand, p. 108, note.
** The sun, when beaten, cried out and revealed his great
name, exactly as Indra did in his terror and flight after
slaying the serpent. Taylor, op. cit., p. 131.
He was the culture-hero who invented barbs for spears and hooks; he turned his brother into the first dog, whence dogs are sacred, he fished New Zealand out of the sea; he stole fire for men. How Maui performed this feat, and how he "brought death into the world and all our woe," are topics that belong to the myths of Death and of the Fire-Stealer.* Maui could not only change men into animals, but could himself assume animal shapes at will.
Such is a brief account of the ancient traditions of mythical Maori gods and of the culture-hero. In practice, the conception of Atua (or a kind of extra-natural power or powers) possesses much influence in New Zealand. All manner of spirits in all manner of forms are Atuas. "A great chief was regarded as a malignant god in life, and a still worse one after death."** Again, "after Maui came a host of gods, each with his history and wonderful deeds.... These were ancestors who became deified by their respective tribes,"***—a statement which must be regarded as theoretical.
* See La Mythologie, A. L., Paris, 1886.
** Taylor, op. cit., pp. 134, 136.
***Op. cit., p. 136.
It is odd enough, if true, that Maru should be the war-god of the southern island, and that the planet Mars is called after him Maru. "There were also gods in human forms, and others with those of reptiles.... At one period there seems to have been a mixed offspring from the same parents. Thus while Tawaki was of the human form, his brethren were taniwa and sharks; there were likewise mixed marriages among them." These legends are the natural result of that lack of distinction between man and the other things in the world which, as we demonstrated, prevails in early thought. It appears that the great mythical gods of the Maoris have not much concern with their morality. The myths are "but a magnified history of their chiefs, their wars, murders and lusts, with the addition of some supernatural powers"—such as the chiefs are very apt to claim.* In the opinion of a competent observer, the gods, or Atua, who are feared in daily life, are "spirits of the dead," and their attention is chiefly confined to the conduct of their living descendants and clansmen. They inspire courage, the leading virtue. When converted, the natives are said not to expel, but merely to subordinate their Atua, "believing Christ to be a more powerful Atua".**
* Op. cit., p. 137.
** Shortland, Trad, and Superst. of New Zealanders, 1856,
pp. 83-85.
The Maoris are perhaps the least elevated race in which a well-developed polytheism has obscured almost wholly that belief in a moral Maker which we find among the lowest savages who have but a rudimentary polytheism. When we advance to ancient civilised peoples, like the Greeks, we shall find the archaic Theism obscured, or obliterated, in a similar way.