Kepelino's: Traditions of Hawaii (Bernice P. Bishop Museum Bulletin)

Features

• Cover Type: Hard Cover with 206 pages
• Published by: Bishop Museum Press; 2 Revised edition November 2007
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 1581780605
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-1581780604
• Book Dimensions: 10 x 7 x 0.8 inches
• Weighs: 1.7 pounds

Reader Reviews
Kepelino was a Hawaiian man born around 1830. He was schooled by Catholic missionaries, traveled to Tahiti in 1847 to open a mission, and became a prolific contributor to Catholic newspapers and Hawaiian language newspapers. He also sided with Queen Emma in her fight for the Hawaiian throne; this effort had him jailed and sentenced to hang for treason (the first person so sentenced). He was eventually pardoned, and died in 1878. At one point in his life he sat down with his missionary friends and dictated his recollections of life, legends, and customs as a Hawaiian. This volume, in English and Hawaiian, is that compilation. Some tidbits: "Special persons called 'Poe-o-kahi-kapu' attended to the private parts of a chief when he was ill and of the chiefess during her menstruating period. They alone had the right to do this service, no one else. If another stepped into the position he would be put to death. This was a post handed down in a family" (p. 130). "The commoners comprise only those people who have no chiefly blood. A chief is known by his name. This is a peculiarity of Hawaii. The name of a chief is tabu and cannot be given to a commoner or he would die. Hence the chiefs are distinguished by their names from the commoners and the commoners from the chiefs. This is a custom peculiar to Hawaii. Among the white people names are not significant, but to the Hawaiian the name is important. Many are the strange things to be learned about Hawaii. However diligently the foreigner seeks he cannot find out all. He gets a fragment here and there and goes home. A heap of absurdities is all he has to show from great Hawaii" (p. 142). "There are many ways of planting taro. One way is called 'prodding,' another 'steering', another 'covering', another 'mounding', another 'stopping up', another 'leaf filling'" (p. 152; they are described in turn). "There were many kinds of dances in Hawaii: There was the chest-slapping dance, the dance in which time was beaten with sticks, the dance with marionettes, and so on. All these things were sinful. Eyes, hands, feet and body ensnared the onlooker. The dance taught the young people to sin. he who had known no wrong would quickly learn it in the dance. There was no dance, not a single chant of Hawaii, that was not filthy. Hawaiian chants were all bad, even the name chants. They were all filthy. But the calling chants and some of the genealogical chants of gods and chiefs contained no double meanings, and the ancestral chants were almost free of them. All the rest of the chants were made by Lucifer" (p. 164, 166). "Kane, Lono, Kanaloa were the Gods who made Heaven and Earth. These three Gods were one in their nature as God, that is, a very holy One-God-in-three, 'Akua-kahi-kolu.' Before them there was no Heaven and no Earth. ...They saw the light and the darkness and they were good. ...They said, 'Let us make a man, a being like ourselves, knowing all things.' ...They said, 'Let us make women to be a companion for the man, to bear seed for the broad earth.' ...They ceased making the earth and blessed it. This was the sixth period" (p. 174, 176, 178; written by G. M. Keone and T. C. Polikapa and included as appendix). Clearly, it is difficult to tell what was truly Hawaiian and what was a "missionary Hawaiian" interpretation. That there is a European influence on Kepelino's window to his world I have no doubt. The notes on dancing are a good example. However, I would assume the farming notes are more accurate. Giving the absolute and radical decimation of the Hawaiian race and its customs throughout the late 18th and all the 19th centuries, even Kepelino is missing information. In a forward written by Noelani Arista, Arista stated "Kepelino's position within that changing tradition cannot be understood without considering the different kinds of education and training he received and the particular ways in which these influenced his intellectual production" (p. ix). I agree. Arista also noted "While foreign missionaries expressed an urgent interest in preserving Hawaiian traditions, which they believed would soon be lost as a result of the decline of the Hawaiian population, some of the same missionaries tried to radically change, and even destroy the very traditions that they had asked the Hawaiian historians to commit to writing" (p. x). I see this as well. Finally, the original translator of this work, Martha Warren Beckwith, wrote in 1931 that "...we must accept this record for what it is worth, an attempt by a Hawaiian of exceptional inheritance and training to explain the beliefs and traditions of the past as they had been handed down to those Hawaiians of his own time who interested themselves in these matters" (p. 7). She added, "Even those who demand more rigorous proof of the historical accuracy of the Kepelino manuscript as an exact replica of antiquity, may grant its value as the genuine thought about his own ancient heritage of a native Hawaiian who grew up during the stirring days of the missions and the monarchy in Hawaii" (p. 7). But the evidence indicates a profound loss of Hawaiian cultural traditions within decades of the coming of whalers, European businessmen, and missionaries. Because of this, we depend on the accounts of Kepelino, Malo, and others to give us insight. But this is almost the best we have, this glimpse into a Hawaiian life.