History of The Otago Region - The Ngai Tahu and Christianity

The Ngai Tahu and Christianity

Tuhawaiki had become the paramount rangatira of the Ngai Tahu and played a decisive role in shaping the future of his people. Born at Taununu, at the mouth of the Matua-a (or Clutha), around 1805 as a nephew of Te Whakataupuka, Tuhawaiki had direct descent from Hautapu-nui-o-tu and from Honekai; he also had an impeccable Ngati Mamoe lineage and close kin-ties with such prominent Pākehā as James Cadell and John Kelly. He had won great mana in both worlds. He had a well-established reputation as a harpooner and sailor, he had an intimate knowledge of Pākehā customs, and in the long campaign against Te Rauparaha he had enhanced his mana. Like his uncle he understood the value of the Pākehā presence and placed them under his mana. Even the truculent Taiaroa obeyed. Unlike his uncle, Tuhawaiki realized that his people could only survive the expansion of European society by borrowing more extensively. He owned a trading ship, built himself a Pākehā house, and dressed like a Pākehā. He encouraged agriculture, traded widely, and appears to have blessed Jones's attempt to colonise the Waikouaiti region. He must also have recognized that the Pākehā presence afforded additional protection against Te Rauparaha. Most Pākehā agreed that he was shrewd, wily and knowledgeable, 'probably one of the most Europeanised Māori...most correctly and completely dressed in white man's clothes, even to the refinement of the cotton pocket handkerchief.'

Tuhawaiki doubtless realised that whaling had transformed the world of his people. Many kaiks or villages moved to the vicinity of the whaling-stations (although some may represent foundations by refugees from the Ngati Toa). Large numbers of Māori men worked in the whaling stations while many women lived in de facto marriages with Pākehā men. These Māori joined one of the lowest strata of European society, characterised by violence and drunkenness. Many observers concluded that Māori wives helped to civilise the whalers. Yet some demoralisation occurred. Perceptive observers like Shortland thought relations between the two races were often very good at the whaling stations. Probably no other tribe in New Zealand was so extensively intermarried with and involved in Pākehā society. Possibly nowhere else was the Pākehā so willing to tolerate or adopt Māori customs. Most of the Māori living in the whaling stations dressed like Europeans and during the 1830s acquired an addiction for tobacco and alcohol. But in this they did not differ from the whalers.

Tuhawaiki adopted a threefold strategy for coping with the new world. Firstly, he encouraged the development of skills appropriate to the emergent world of Pākehā and Māori. Secondly, he clearly envisaged the peaceful integration of these two worlds on terms acceptable to the Māori. And thirdly, he recognised the importance of Pākehā religion and the power of the Pākehā Atua (or God). Tuhawaiki, widely traveled and knowledgeable in the ways of the Pākehā, possibly ascribed to the Pākehā Atua the role of unifying the two peoples. In accepting James Watkin, the Methodist parson at Waikouaiti, and yet inviting another missionary to Ruapuke, he may have responded to the conversion of his own followers. In any case he traveled to Waikouaiti to hear Watkin's first sermon, asked for a missionary to be sent to Ruapuke, and extended a warm and hospitable welcome to visiting clergy.

During the 1830s Christianity had caught on through much of the North Island. Slaves of the Ngā Puhi in Northland first accepted the Gospel. The news spread fast. Weariness of war, the mana of the Bible, and a passion for literacy fueled the fire. Māori teachers, often self-taught, carried the Word far beyond the zones of the European missionaries. The magic of literacy most dramatically expressed the power of the Pākehā atua. Bibles, or a few pages from any book, represented a new magic which Māori believed could protect its owner from death in battle, bestow eternal life, ward off sickness, and thus complement the power of traditional karakia (or incantations). Ngai Tahu sailors must have heard the Word. Northern converts such as Te Rauparaha's son, brought the new Word south. When Watkin arrived at Waikouaiti he found ready a Māori market for his spiritual wares. A large crowd attended his first service and listened attentively "tho' they could not understand anything that was said. When he printed some Bibles, 'they were eagerly sought after'.

Pākehā magic and the mana that one could win by possessing its secret persuaded the southern Māori to turn, in their own way and for their own reasons, to Christianity. When Wohlers arrived at Ruapuke the tohunga karakia (or priests) welcomed him as a comrade and explained their theology. The chiefs, led by Tuhawaiki, also adopted the new faith and sponsored traditional Ngai Tahu teachers for baptism. The tohunga karakia quickly accepted certain elements of the Christian faith, but they, like the young men of inherited mana who patronized Watkin's school, wanted to adapt the new Gospel to the old karakia. These men also wanted to achieve mana as teachers of the Pākehā magic and quickly voiced resentment when the Pākehā tohunga started to baptise everyone. Wohlers discovered that both Watkin and Bishop Selwyn had complied with this pressure and for a while the Māori teachers so arranged matters that "applicants had to go to them in order to be recommended."

The Pākehā missionaries then realised that their mana as teachers depended on the number of converts they made. Watkin's register of baptisms records the explosive result. In 1841, he baptized two Māori (one of them intended marrying a Pākehā); in 1842 he baptized three Māori; and then in 1843 he baptized 193 and another 158 before leaving in 1844. As many missionaries realised, the Māori transformed Christianity in the process of 'conversion'. To the despair of Watkin, the Māori interpreted the Christian karakia in their own way. Much to the dismay of the practical Wohlers, the strict moral code of the Old Testament proved infectious. When Selwyn preached a 'sermon on contentment with one's lot' the Māori stopped producing food and trade with American whalers fell off abruptly; "the pigs ate the potatoes, the Māori ate the pigs, and there was nothing left."

At Waikouaiti and Moeraki the Māori refused to work on Sundays. Not only did the Māori shape the Christian message to their own beliefs, but they found in the denominational structure a familiar world. The different churches proved perfect instruments for sustaining traditional rivalries and animosities while learning Pākehā ways. Because the Ngati Toa became Anglican, most of the prominent Ngai Tahu joined the Wesleyans. Some villages acknowledged the mana of each denomination's Atua. Very small kaiks sometimes built two churches and two schools and the chief at Moeraki made part of his hapu Catholic, part Anglican, and part traditional. Among the Māori the generosity and mana of the Pākehā tohunga counted for much. The Roman Catholic Bishop, Jean Baptiste Pompallier visited the south in 1840, and poor Watkin watched his flock transfer allegiance to the Papist. The worried Wesleyan confided in his journal: "Their mode of worship and wonderful legends would lead me to fear that Popery would prevail over Protestantism." The local Māori, probably with a strong leavening of northern refugees, flocked to the new tohunga. His robes and vestments attracted much favourable comment, the pomp of Catholic ritual and liturgy impressed, and some Māori told Watkin to his face that they regretted his 'plain dress and equally plain mode of conducting religious worship'. Pompallier baptised freely, unlike the prudent Protestants, and responded with tolerance to Māori dance and tattooing. To Watkin's horror, Bishop Pompallier even told the local Māori that Hine, the wife of Maui, was the Virgin Mary. The Catholic Church lacked the resources to capitalize upon the Bishop's success and the Wesleyans, left to themselves, regained the lost ground. But allegiances remained volatile. When Selwyn, walking south, swam a flooded river, an entire village joined his church.