44 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



The Grand Healing Rites. 



(1.) Ripa or Parepare (the Defensive Charm). 



When a person, in former times, believed himself falling ill 

 he would consult the tohunga in order to get him to avert the 

 trouble. The priest would take him to the waterside — a pond, 

 pool, or stream near the village, at which many rites were per- 

 formed, and which was avoided by the people at other times, 

 it being sacred (tapu). These rites were always performed 

 early in the morning, or after sundown in the evening. The 

 priest would divest himself of his clothing, save a girdle round 

 his waist, and the patient had to disrobe and appear in a similar 

 manner. Bearing a small branch of the karamuramu shrub 

 in his hand, the priest would enter the water, and, dipping the 

 leafy end of his wand in the water, sprinkle the water therefrom 

 over his patient, repeating a karakia to avert the evil influence 

 at work on him, or to weaken or destroy the power of the at- 

 tacking atua. Such a charm is a ripa. parepare, or momono, 

 which terms mean " to avert, to ward off, to overpower." The 

 following is a specimen of such a karakia : — 



Whakataha ra koe 

 E te anewa o te rangi 

 E tu nei 



He tupua, he tawhito to toliu 

 To makutu e kite mai nei koe 

 E homai nei koe kei taku ure 

 Na te tapu ihi, na te tapu mana 

 Takoto ki raro ki to kauwhau ariki. 



In those cases where diseases were supposed to have been 

 caused by hara (infringement of the tapu) the aim of the to- 

 hunga or seer was to divine what sin (hara) had been com- 

 mitted by his patient, after that his course of action was clear 

 to him. For it would often be that the patient himself would 

 be ignorant of the cause of his illness — that is to say, ignorant 

 of having disregarded any of the numerous laws of the Maori 

 system of tapu. In order to ascertain, or diagnose, the cause 

 of the illness of the patient, the tohunga would tell him to ac- 

 company him to the wax tapu, or sacred pool, described above. 

 Thither they would proceed after sunset. Should the sick person 

 be feeble, one or two persons would be allowed to assist him to the 

 waterside. All the rest of the inhabitants of the village would 

 remain carefully within the huts, lest their ivairua or spirit^ 

 wander forth to the waterside and there be destroyed by the 

 magic spells of the priest as he performed the rites over the 

 sick person. And if a person's wairua was slain, naturally the 

 body, its physical basis, must also soon perish. 



