Kanaloa: Hawaiian High God of the Ocean, the Underworld and Healing

Kanaloa belongs to the four high gods of Hawai’i, who were systematically venerated in official temple liturgies. The other three are Ku (war, comparable to Tu Matauenga), Lono (peace and fertility, see Lono), Kane (creation and light, comparable to Tane).

Valeri (Kingship and Sacrifice, 1985) analysed this fourfold structure systematically. From a religious-studies perspective it becomes clear that the Hawaiian system was more strongly institutionalised than the Maori system: there were fixed temples (Heiau), fixed priests (Kahuna), fixed rites and a strong connection between religion and royal house.

Even though Kanaloa belongs to the four institutionally venerated high gods of Hawai’i, the underlying theology, comparable to the Maori tradition, remains without a closed system of doctrine.

There is no fixed doctrine; whatever reality the atua possess, they prove in performance: in the Karakia, in the gatherings on the Marae, in the Whakapapa recitations.

This practice-based theology is valued by religious studies as a contribution to the field in its own right; Mary Ann Boord and Edward Tregear set it out systematically in their religious-ethnographic studies of Polynesia.

The study of Polynesian atua such as Kanaloa runs into a fundamental difficulty: many sources originate from the colonial 19th century and are coloured by the perspective of missionaries and ethnologists.

More recent research therefore pursues an ongoing decolonisation of these holdings by placing Polynesian voices at the centre and subjecting Western categories to critical examination.

If one compares Polynesian religion with other indigenous religions of Oceania, Australia and Southeast Asia, a twofold characteristic emerges: in its basic motifs it remains remarkably constant, yet at the same time it adapts locally.

The fact that Kanaloa, as a pan-Polynesian figure, presents himself differently from region to region is one example of this. This tension between universality and locality forms an important object of study in Pacific religious ethnology.

The name Kanaloa corresponds etymologically to Tangaroa (Maori, Tahiti), Tagaloa (Samoa), Tangaloa (Tonga). The phonetic shift from t to k is a typical feature of Hawaiian. The proto-Polynesian root is *Ta(n)galoa, whose exact meaning has not been securely reconstructed.

In Hawai’i, Kanaloa is not as frequently depicted as the main god of a narrative as Kane or Ku. He often appears as Kane’s companion on creation wanderings. This position as a “co-creator” is a specific feature of the Hawaiian form.

The fact that a god appears under numerous epithets points, in terms of language history, to an oral tradition that has branched out richly from region to region. With Kanaloa, whose name changes across the Polynesian languages, this can be observed well.

The linguistic depth of the Maori and Hawaiian theonyms is recorded in the lexicographical works of Bruce Biggs and Hugh Clarke, research that is at the same time fundamental for grasping the kinship of the Polynesian languages.

Epithets are often more than decorative adornment. They encode particular ritual functions and are fixed in the Karakia formulas. The Tohunga, the ritual experts, knew precisely which epithet was to be invoked in which situation. This precisely regulated liturgical practice is studied by Charles Royal and Pou Temara.

What original meaning belongs to the epithets is often disputed; with Kanaloa, whose proto-Polynesian root itself is not securely reconstructed, this is especially true. In many cases, competing etymological proposals stand side by side without secured sources allowing a decision. Modern religious studies values this diversity as a richness, not as a deficiency.

In the Hawaiian tradition, Kanaloa is often depicted as a tall, calm god. His symbols are: the octopus (he’e), certain fish, the deep water. In Heiau complexes, particular stones or posts connected with sea rituals may be assigned to him.

Beckwith describes that there are fewer narrative accounts comparable to those of Pele or Kane in which Kanaloa appears as a hero. Instead, he acts primarily through ritual presence. This “quiet” mode of action is interesting from a religious-studies perspective.

The carving art of the Maori and Hawaiians has undergone an impressive renaissance over the past five decades. Artists such as Cliff Whiting, Robyn Kahukiwa, Wright Bowman and Sam Ka’ai cultivated both traditional forms and modern adaptations.

The atua, among them Kanaloa, emerge in their works in many ways; their iconographic presence thus extends into contemporary art.

Polynesian art cannot be separated from its cosmological meaning. A spiral (koru), an ornament, a line: each of these elements carries religious-phenomenological meaning, including in the posts and stones that may be assigned to Kanaloa. Roger Neich, Damian Skinner and other art historians have systematically unlocked these layers of meaning.

The iconographic tradition is supplemented by a rich poetic tradition (mele, waiata) in which the divine is manifested through language and sound. From a religious-studies perspective, this practice corresponds to the concept of the “verbal icon”.

An important narrative tells how Kanaloa and Kane wander together across the islands. They travel, create water sources, introduce Awa (Kava), establish ritual places.

Kane is the initiating, creative god; Kanaloa is his companion, who often represents the darker or more problematic side. In some versions they try to drink Awa but find no water; Kane strikes the ground with his staff, and a spring wells up.

From a religious-studies perspective, this narrative is a classic creation myth with two gods who complement one another. It recalls Mesopotamian and West Semitic dual-god structures. Beckwith emphasises that Kanaloa is not the “evil one” here (unlike in some post-missionary reinterpretations), but the necessary other pole.

The narratives in which Kanaloa appears at Kane’s side are likewise not, from a religious-studies perspective, to be read as a self-contained narrative. They form a web of narratives that explain one another and are accented differently in the individual tribal traditions.

This rhizomatic, network-like structure makes research methodologically demanding, yet at the same time opens up hermeneutic depth. Versions of a story that differ from one another are not regarded as “false” or “corrupted”, but as regional forms of equal standing.

The narratives surrounding Kanaloa and Kane are not merely remembered but actively passed on: in Karakia, in the speeches on the Marae and in teaching. They are thus living practice and not a static archive. The language programmes for Te Reo Maori and Olelo Hawai’i have considerably strengthened this vitality over the last thirty years.

In some traditions, Kanaloa is connected with the underworld (Po). This connection was often misunderstood by Christian missionaries from the 19th century onward, and Kanaloa was reinterpreted as the “Hawaiian Satan”. This reinterpretation is distorting in terms of religious history and is today rejected by Hawaiian scholars.

In the original context, Kanaloa’s relation to the underworld is not morally negative but cosmological: he stands for the depth, the night, the oceanic unconscious. The Po is not “hell” but primordial ground. Mary Kawena Pukui and Lilikala Kame’eleihiwa open up the correct reading.

The fact that Kanaloa is assigned both to the deep water and to the underworld fits into a basic feature of the religion of the Maori and Hawaiians: rite and everyday activity interlock.

While other religious systems sharply separate the sacred from the profane, here the references to the atua pervade the whole of life. This religiosity, anchored in the lifeworld itself, is the object of religious-phenomenological studies by Mason Durie, Charles Royal, Lilikala Kame’eleihiwa and other Polynesian scholars of the present generation.

How closely ritual practice and everyday life are connected is also shown by language: terms such as mana, tapu, aroha or hauora belong today to the general English of Aotearoa and are also used in non-religious contexts. That Maori theology has thus inscribed itself into linguistic usage documents its deep cultural impact.

Kanaloa was venerated in particular Heiau, often near the coast. Fishermen invoked him before setting out, similar to the way Maori fishermen invoked Tangaroa. Kanaloa was also present in healing rituals: some Kahuna La’au Lapa’au invoked Kanaloa as the source of their healing knowledge.

Within the framework of the Makahiki festival, which was primarily dedicated to Lono, Kanaloa likewise had a role. Valeri describes the system of calendrical assignments of the gods.

Polynesian religion remains alive above all at Marae and Heiau, those places that are at once gathering and cult site; the Hawaiian Heiau in particular could assign Kanaloa his own stones and posts. Every Marae and every Heiau has its own Whakapapa, its own traditions and its own atua references.

A Marae visit begins with the Powhiri, the ritual in which the Tangata Whenua solemnly receive their guests. It is not ceremonial folklore but lived religious practice, which counts among the best-documented Polynesian greeting rituals in religious studies.

In the 20th and 21st centuries, cult practice has shifted noticeably. Whereas the Tohunga formerly carried the rite, this task today often lies with the Kaumatua, the elders, and with the Marae committees.

From the perspective of the sociology of religion, this shift is of interest; Manuka Henare and Mason Durie discuss it in their works.

In the Hawaiian tradition, Kanaloa is invoked as a protecting god in sea voyages, in illness and in healing contexts. Those who went to sea brought offerings on a coast, spoke Pule and had certain rites performed by a Kahuna. This practice is today partly alive again within the framework of the Hawaiian renaissance.

Healing rituals in the Kanaloa sphere know plants such as Awa, whose use in ritual contexts is documented (Pukui). Here too it applies that the effect is not “magical” in the Western pharmacological sense, but integrated in the ritual-religious sense.

On the theme of protection, a religious-studies distinction must be made: Western thought proceeds from the effective amulet, the Polynesian from the cultivated relationship. Protection here does not rest on a magical-causal effect but is constituted relationally and ritually.

Whoever stands in relationship with an atua such as Kanaloa and maintains this relationship is considered “protected”, not because an object exerts power, but because an existing relation is cosmologically binding. In the anthropology of religion, this is treated under the heading of “relational ontology”.

The practice of protection is also a field on which tradition and modernity meet. Smartphone applications with Karakia, online guides to protective rituals and virtual Marae visits show that Polynesian religion takes up new media for its practice. This modernisation is not to be interpreted as a flattening, but as an adaptable further development.

Within Polynesia, Kanaloa corresponds to Tangaroa, Ta’aroa, Tagaloa, Tangaloa. In comparative religion he can be linked with Poseidon (Greek), Neptune (Roman), Varuna (Vedic), Njörd (Norse). The specific feature of Kanaloa is his position as a high god of equal standing alongside Kane and his connection with the underworld.

Compared with Tangaroa of the Maori tradition, Kanaloa is more institutionalised and more ritually embedded. This difference is explained by the different social structure of Hawai’i.

Universal structures of religious experience were studied systematically by Joseph Campbell and Mircea Eliade. As fundamental as their works are, they must nonetheless be rethought for the concrete Polynesian contexts, without lapsing into a pan-globalising simplification. More recent Polynesian research places great value on this context-sensitive interpretation.

Global indigenous-studies research systematically works out the parallels between Polynesian and other indigenous religions. With Decolonizing Methodologies (1999), Linda Tuhiwai Smith set methodological standards whose impact reaches internationally.

Kanaloa is less visible in the Hawaiian renaissance than Pele or Hi’iaka, but present nonetheless. Movements to revive the Heiau, the Kahuna tradition and the traditional healing art refer to Kanaloa. Hawaiian voyaging initiatives such as the Polynesian Voyaging Society (Hokule’a) integrate references to Kanaloa into their Pule before voyages.

In academic research, Lilikala Kame’eleihiwa and Marie Alohalani Brown have critically deconstructed the Christian-missionary distortion of Kanaloa. This opens up a more appropriate reading in terms of religious history.

In the international debate, Polynesian religion is increasingly recognised as an independent religious system and no longer devalued as mere “mythology” or “folklore“.

That terms such as mana, tapu, mauri and whakapapa have been taken up into the technical vocabulary of religious studies documents this recognition. Their use, however, requires a contextual sensitivity that is not to be had without preconditions.

The incorporation of Polynesian religions into popular culture, through Disney productions, tourism and esoteric literature, is the object of critical debate. Where does an appropriate mediation occur, and where is it flattened or distorted? These questions are discussed emphatically and publicly in Aotearoa and Hawai’i.

Important contributions on Kanaloa come from Martha Beckwith, Mary Kawena Pukui, Valerio Valeri, Lilikala Kame’eleihiwa and Marie Alohalani Brown. Beckwith’s Hawaiian Mythology remains fundamental; Valeri’s Kingship and Sacrifice offers the structural analysis.

A deeper classification within the Polynesian family of religions shows the close kinship of Kanaloa with Tangaroa and the specifically Hawaiian form. Both gods share a common proto-Polynesian root.

Several institutions today carry the dialogue between the Polynesian-internal knowledge traditions and academic research: the Royal Society of New Zealand, Te Aparangi, the Maori Studies Department of Auckland University, the University of Hawai’i at Manoa and the Te Punga Tipu foundation.

Their institutional framework ensures that Polynesian research does not merely take place about Polynesia but is also conducted from Polynesia.

The connection to global religious studies is established by studies that use Polynesian theology as an example case of a non-Western religiosity. This comparative work is methodologically demanding, yet it opens up new perspectives on how religion can be understood as a cultural phenomenon.