Mana (Oceanian cultures)

{{Short description|Life force energy, power, effectiveness, and prestige in Pacific Island culture}}

In Melanesian and Polynesian cultures, mana is a supernatural force that permeates the universe.{{Cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/mana-Polynesian-and-Melanesian-religion |title=Mana (Polynesian and Melanesian religion) |website=Encyclopedia Britannica |language=en|access-date=28 November 2019}} Anyone or anything can have mana. They believed it to be a cultivation or possession of energy and power, rather than being a source of power. It is an intentional force.

Mana has been discussed mostly in relation to cultures of Polynesia, but also of Melanesia, notably the Solomon Islands{{Cite book| publisher = Columbia University Press| last = Keesing| first = Roger| title = Kwaio Religion: The Living and the Dead in a Solomon Island Society| location = New York| date = 1982}}{{sfn|Keesing|1984}} and Vanuatu.{{harvcoltxt|Codrington|1891|p=118 ff.}}{{Cite journal| doi = 10.2307/2843828| issn = 0307-3114| volume = 61| pages = 157–166| last = Ivens| first = W. G.| title = The Place of Vui and Tamate in the Religion of Mota.| journal = The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland | date = 1931| jstor = 2843828}}{{sfn|Mondragón|2004}}{{Citation

| last = François

| first = Alexandre

| author-link =Alexandre François

| contribution = Shadows of bygone lives: The histories of spiritual words in northern Vanuatu

| editor1-last = Mailhammer

| editor1-first = Robert

| title = Lexical and structural etymology: Beyond word histories

| volume = 11

| pages = 185–244

| publisher = DeGruyter Mouton

| place = Berlin

| year = 2013

| series = Studies in Language Change

| isbn =

| contribution-url = https://marama.huma-num.fr/data/AlexFrancois_2013_Shadows-of-bygone-lives-The-histories-of-spiritual-words-in-northern-Vanuatu.pdf

| chapter-format =

| url=

}}{{Cite journal| doi = 10.1353/ol.2022.0017| volume = 61| issue = 1| pages = 212–255| last = François| first = Alexandre | title = Awesome forces and warning signs: Charting the semantic history of *tabu words in Vanuatu| journal = Oceanic Linguistics| access-date = 2022-07-11| date = 2022| url = https://marama.huma-num.fr/data/AlexFrancois_2022_Awesome-Forces_Tabu_Vanuatu_OceanicLinguistics.pdf |ref=tabu}}

In the 19th century, scholars compared mana to similar concepts such as the orenda of the Iroquois Indians and theorized that mana was a universal phenomenon that explained the origin of religions.

Etymology

The reconstructed Proto-Oceanic word *mana is thought to have referred to "powerful forces of nature such as thunder and storm winds" rather than supernatural power.{{cite journal |last1=Blust|first1=Robert|author-link=Robert Blust |date=2007 |title=Proto-Oceanic *mana Revisited |url=https://www.academia.edu/21896750 |journal=Oceanic Linguistics |volume=46 |issue=2|pages=404–423|doi=10.1353/ol.2008.0005|s2cid=144945623}} As the Oceanic-speaking peoples spread eastward, the word started to refer instead to unseen supernatural powers.

{{anchor|In Polynesian culture}}Polynesian culture

Mana is a foundation of Polynesian theology, a spiritual quality with a supernatural origin and a sacred, impersonal force. To have mana implies influence, authority, and efficacy: the ability to perform in a given situation. The quality of mana is not limited to individuals; peoples, governments, places, and inanimate objects may also possess mana, and its possessors are accorded respect. Mana protects its protector and they depend on each other for growth, both positive and negative. It depends on the person where he takes his mana.{{cn|date=May 2023}}

In Polynesia, mana was traditionally seen as a "transcendent power that blesses" that can "express itself directly" through various ways, but most often shows itself through the speech, movement, or traditional ritual of a "prophet, priest, or king."{{Cite book |last1=Carlson |first1=Kathie |title=The Book of Symbols: Reflections on Archetypal Images |last2=Flanagin |first2=Michael N. |last3=Martin |first3=Kathleen |last4=Martin |first4=Mary E. |last5=Mendelsohn |first5=John |last6=Rodgers |first6=Priscilla Young |last7=Ronnberg |first7=Ami |last8=Salman |first8=Sherry |last9=Wesley |first9=Deborah A. |publisher=Taschen |year=2010 |isbn=978-3-8365-1448-4 |editor-last=Arm |editor-first=Karen |location=Köln |page=730 |editor-last2=Ueda |editor-first2=Kako |editor-last3=Thulin |editor-first3=Anne |editor-last4=Langerak |editor-first4=Allison |editor-last5=Kiley |editor-first5=Timothy Gus |editor-last6=Wolff |editor-first6=Mary}}

={{anchor|In Hawaiian and Tahitian culture}}Hawaiian and Tahitian culture=

In Hawaiian and Tahitian culture, mana is a spiritual energy and healing power which can exist in places, objects, and persons. Hawaiians believe that mana may be gained or lost by actions, and Hawaiians and Tahitians believe that mana is both external and internal. Sites on the Hawaiian Islands and in French Polynesia are believed to possess mana—for example, the top rim of the Haleakalā volcano on the island of Maui and the Taputapuatea marae on the island of Raʻiātea in the Society Islands.{{cn|date=May 2023}}

Ancient Hawaiians also believed that the island of Molokaʻi possessed mana compared with its neighboring islands. Before the unification of the Hawaiian Kingdom by King Kamehameha I, battles were fought for possession of the island and its south shore fish ponds, which existed until the late 19th century.{{cn|date=May 2023}}

A person may gain mana by pono "right actions". In ancient Hawaii, there were two paths to mana: sexual means or violence. In at least this tradition, nature is seen as dualistic, and everything has a counterpart. A balance between the gods Kū and Lono formed, through whom are the two paths to mana (ʻimihaku, or the search for mana). Kū, the god of war and politics, offers mana through violence; this was how Kamehameha gained his mana. Lono, the god of peace and fertility, offers mana through sexuality.{{citation needed|date=September 2017}} Prayers were believed to have mana, which was sent to the akua at the end when the priest usually said "amama ua noa," meaning "the prayer is now free or flown."{{Cite book|author=Cunningham, Scott|title=Hawaiian religion and magic|date=1995|publisher=Llewellyn Publications|isbn=1-56718-199-6|page=15|oclc=663898381}}

= {{anchor|In New Zealand culture}}Māori (New Zealand) culture =

=={{anchor|In Māori usage}}Māori use==

In Māori culture, there are two essential aspects of a person's mana: mana tangata, authority derived from whakapapa (genealogy) and mana huaanga, defined as "authority derived from having a wealth of resources to gift to others to bind them into reciprocal obligations".{{cite book|title=The Whanganui River report (Wai 167).|date=1999|publisher=GP Publications|location=Wellington, New Zealand|isbn=1-86956-250-X|page=35 |url=https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/WT/wt_DOC_68450539/Whanganui%20River%20Report%201999.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160914150131/https://forms.justice.govt.nz/search/Documents/WT/wt_DOC_68450539/Whanganui%20River%20Report%201999.pdf |archive-date=2016-09-14 |url-status=live|access-date=31 December 2016}} Hemopereki Simon, from Ngāti Tūwharetoa, asserts that there are many forms of mana in Maori beliefs.{{cite journal|url=https://ojs.aut.ac.nz/te-kaharoa/index.php/tekaharoa/article/view/6/4 |title=View of Te Arewhana Kei Roto i Te Rūma: An Indigenous Neo-Disputatio on Settler Society, Nullifying Te Tiriti, 'Natural Resources' and Our Collective Future in New Zealand|journal=Te Kaharoa|date=2 February 2016 |volume=9|issue=1 |doi=10.24135/tekaharoa.v9i1.6|access-date=11 October 2018|doi-access=free}} The indigenous word reflects a non-Western view of reality, complicating translation.{{cite web|url=http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/reports/viewchapter.asp?reportID=469d396b-ce85-4e30-b04f-a39dc8d03f38&chapter=36 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071020102335/http://www.waitangi-tribunal.govt.nz/reports/viewchapter.asp?reportID=469D396B-CE85-4E30-B04F-A39DC8D03F38&chapter=36 |archive-date=20 October 2007 |title=The Ngāi Tahu Sea Fisheries Report 1992 |publisher=Waitangi Tribunal |access-date=26 January 2015}} This is confirmed by the definition of mana provided by Māori Marsden who states that mana is:

Spiritual power and authority as opposed to the purely psychic and natural force — ihi.{{Cite book|title=Te Ao Hurihuri: The World Moves |last=Marsden|first=Māori|publisher=Hicks Smith|year=1975|editor-last=King|editor-first=Michael |location=Wellington|page=145 |chapter=God, Man, and the Universe}}

According to Margaret Mutu, mana in its traditional sense means:

Power, authority, ownership, status, influence, dignity, respect derived from the atua.{{Cite book|title=State of Māori Rights|last=Mutu|first=Margaret|publisher=Huia|year=2011|location=Wellington|page=213}}

In terms of leadership, Ngāti Kahungunu legal scholar Carwyn Jones comments: "Mana is the central concept that underlies Māori leadership and accountability." He also considers mana as a fundamental aspect of the constitutional traditions of Māori society.{{Cite journal|last=Jones|first=Carwyn|date=2014|title=A Māori Constitutional Tradition |url=https://www.victoria.ac.nz/law/centres/nzcpl/publications/nz-journal-of-public-and-international-law/previous-issues/volume-121,-september-2014/Jones.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180222085535/https://www.victoria.ac.nz/law/centres/nzcpl/publications/nz-journal-of-public-and-international-law/previous-issues/volume-121,-september-2014/Jones.pdf |archive-date=2018-02-22 |url-status=live|journal=New Zealand Journal of Public and International Law|volume=11|issue=3 |pages=187–204}}

According to the New Zealand Ministry of Justice:

{{blockquote|Mana and tapu are concepts which have both been attributed single-worded definitions by contemporary writers. As concepts, especially Maori concepts they can not easily be translated into a single English definition. Both mana and tapu take on a whole range of related meanings depending on their association and the context in which they are being used.{{cite web|url=http://justice.govt.nz/publications/global-publications/h/he-hinatore-ki-te-ao-maori-a-glimpse-into-the-maori-world/part-1-traditional-maori-concepts/mana-and-tapu |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100522222543/http://www.justice.govt.nz/publications/global-publications/h/he-hinatore-ki-te-ao-maori-a-glimpse-into-the-maori-world/part-1-traditional-maori-concepts/mana-and-tapu |archive-date=2010-05-22 |title=Mana and Tapu |publisher=Ministry of Justice, New Zealand |access-date=2015-01-26}}}}

A tribe with mana whenua must have demonstrated their authority over a territory.

=={{anchor|General English usage}}General English usage==

In contemporary New Zealand English, the word "mana" refers to a person or organisation of people of great personal prestige and character.{{cite web|url=http://www.newzealandatoz.com/index.php?pageid=357 |title=Kiwi (NZ) to English Dictionary |publisher=New Zealand A to Z |access-date=26 January 2015}}

{{anchor|The academic study of mana}}Academic study

File:StateLibQld 1 116272 Southern Cross (ship).jpg, one of the ships at Norfolk Island's Melanesian Mission where Codrington taught and worked]]

Missionary Robert Henry Codrington traveled widely in Melanesia, publishing several studies of its language and culture. His 1891 book The Melanesians: Studies in their Anthropology and Folk-Lore contains the first detailed description of mana in English. Codrington defines it as "a force altogether distinct from physical power, which acts in all kinds of ways for good and evil, and which it is of the greatest advantage to possess or control".

={{anchor|Pre-animistic phase of religion}}Pre-animism=

Describing pre-animism, Robert Ranulph Marett cited the Melanesian mana (primarily with Codrington's work): "When the science of Comparative Religion employs a native expression such as mana, it is obliged to disregard to some extent its original or local meaning. Science, then, may adopt mana as a general category ... ".{{cite book |last1=Marett |first1=Robert Randolph |title=Threshold of Religion |date=2013 |publisher=Hardpress Ltd |isbn=978-1-313-15196-2}}{{rp|99}} In Melanesia, "animae" are the souls of living men, the ghosts of deceased men, and spirits "of ghost-like appearance" or imitating living people. Spirits can inhabit other objects, such as animals or stones.{{rp|115–120}}

The most significant property of mana is that it is distinct from, and exists independently of, its source. Animae act only through mana. It is impersonal, undistinguished, and (like energy) transmissible between objects, which can have more or less of it. Mana is perceptible, appearing as a "Power of awfulness" (in the sense of awe or wonder).{{rp|12–13}} Objects possessing it impress an observer with "respect, veneration, propitiation, service" emanating from the mana's power. Marett lists several objects habitually possessing mana: "startling manifestations of nature", "curious stones", animals, "human remains", blood,{{rp|2}} thunderstorms, eclipses, eruptions, glaciers, and the sound of a bullroarer.{{rp|14–17}}

If mana is a distinct power, it may be treated distinctly. Marett distinguishes spells, which treat mana quasi-objectively, and prayers, which address the animae. An anima may have departed, leaving mana in the form of a spell which can be addressed by magic. Although Marett postulates an earlier pre-animistic phase, a "rudimentary religion" or "magico-religious" phase in which the mana figures without animae, "no island of pure 'pre-animism' is to be found."{{rp|xxvi}} Like Tylor, he theorizes a thread of commonality between animism and pre-animism identified with the supernatural—the "mysterious", as opposed to the reasonable.{{rp|22}}

=Durkheim's totemism=

In 1912, French sociologist Émile Durkheim examined totemism, the religion of the Aboriginal Australians, from a sociological and theological point of view, describing collective effervescence as originating in the idea of the totemic principle or mana.{{cn|date=May 2023}}

={{anchor|Criticisms}}Criticism=

In 1936, Ian Hogbin criticised the universality of Marett's pre-animism: "Mana is by no means universal and, consequently, to adopt it as a basis on which to build up a general theory of primitive religion is not only erroneous but indeed fallacious".{{cite journal|last1=Hogbin|first1=H. Ian|title=Mana |journal=Oceania|date=March 1936|volume=6|issue=3|pages=241–274|doi=10.1002/j.1834-4461.1936.tb00187.x}} However, Marett intended the concept as an abstraction.{{rp|99}} Spells, for example, may be found "from Central Australia to Scotland."{{rp|55}}

Early 20th-century scholars also saw mana as a universal concept, found in all human cultures and expressing fundamental human awareness of a sacred life energy. In his 1904 essay, "Outline of a General Theory of Magic", Marcel Mauss drew on the writings of Codrington and others to paint a picture of mana as "power par excellence, the genuine effectiveness of things which corroborates their practical actions without annihilating them".{{cite book|last1=Mauss|first1=Marcel|title=A General Theory of Magic|date=2007|publisher=Routledge|location=London|isbn=978-0-415-25396-3|edition=Reprint}}{{rp|111}} Mauss pointed out the similarity of mana to the Iroquois orenda and the Algonquian manitou, convinced of the "universality of the institution";{{rp|116}} "a concept, encompassing the idea of magical power, was once found everywhere".{{rp|117}}

Mauss and his collaborator, Henri Hubert, were criticised for this position when their 1904 Outline of a General Theory of Magic was published. "No one questioned the existence of the notion of mana", wrote Mauss's biographer Marcel Fournier, "but Hubert and Mauss were criticized for giving it a universal dimension".{{cite book|last1=Fournier|first1=Marcel|title=Marcel Mauss: A Biography|date=2006|publisher=Princeton University Press|location=Princeton, New Jersey|isbn=978-0-691-11777-5|page=[https://archive.org/details/marcelmaussbiogr0000four/page/138 138]|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/marcelmaussbiogr0000four/page/138}} Criticism of mana as an archetype of life energy increased. According to Mircea Eliade, the idea of mana is not universal; in places where it is believed, not everyone has it, and "even among the varying formulae (mana, wakan, orenda, etc.) there are, if not glaring differences, certainly nuances not sufficiently observed in the early studies".{{cite book|last1=Eliade|first1=Mircea|title=Patterns in Comparative Religion|date=1996|publisher=University of Nebraska Press|location=Lincoln|isbn=978-0-8032-6733-6|page=22|edition=2nd}} "With regard to these theories founded upon the primordial and universal character of mana, we must say without delay that they have been invalidated by later research".{{cite book|last1=Eliade|first1=Mircea|title=Myths, Dreams and Mysteries: The Encounter Between Contemporary Faiths and Archaic Realities|date=1992|publisher=Peter Smith|location=Magnolia, Massachusetts|isbn=978-0-8446-6625-9|page=127}}

HolbraadHolbraad, M. (2007). "The power of powder: multiplicity and motion in the divinatory cosmology of Cuban Ifá (or mana again)" In Thinking Through Things: Theorising Artefacts Ethnographically, Henare, A. Holbraad, M. and Wastell, S. London: Routledge. pp. 199–235 argued in a paper included in the volume "Thinking Through Things: Theorising Artefacts Ethnographically" that the concept of mana highlights a significant theoretical assumption in anthropology: that matter and meaning are separate. A hotly debated issue, Holbraad suggests that mana provides motive to re-evaluate the division assumed between matter and meaning in social research. His work is part of the ontological turn in anthropology, a paradigm shift that aims to take seriously the ontology of other cultures.Heywood, P. (2017). "[https://www.anthroencyclopedia.com/entry/ontological-turn Ontological Turn, The]" in The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Anthropology. (Accessed: 7/11/2021)

Notes

References

External links

[http://www.allenvarney.com/av_mana.html Allen Varney: Mana in the Real World]
[http://www.maoridictionary.co.nz/index.cfm?wordID=3424 mana, Te Aka Māori–English, English–Māori Dictionary]

Category:Anthropology of religion

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Category:Māori mythology

Category:Māori society

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