Te Kopara 88
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Te Kopara, Number 88, Gisborne, 30 June, 1921.
‘Iti te Kopara, kai takirikiri ana i runga i te Kahikatea.’ Although the Bellbird is small, he plucks at the Kahikatea. [cf Nga Pepeha 908]
TE AUTE COLLEGE.
The Board of Management of Te Aute met at Napier on 2nd June. Here are some words from the Report of the Principal, Mr Loten. ‘I was delighted at the timely arrival of the returning pupils this year. On the first day the school was open 84 pupils arrived. I was sad that 14 pupils did not arrive on the day the College opened. Because they did not notify us that they would be late they have lost their places at the school. From the many children wishing to attend Te Aute we have been able to fill those places. There is now a total of 97 pupils at Te Aute.
Form Va (Matriculation) 5
Form Vb (Agriculture) 7
Form IV (Public Service) 29
Form III 31
Standard VI 12
Standard V 10
Standard IV 3
The Teachers.
Mr R Phelan teaches the lower classes; Mr Finch, Form III and Form Va; the Principal, Form IV and Form Vb. He also takes For III and Form Va for Science. Golan Maaka is the pupil teacher.
There are 3 Prefects and 5 Monitors. Their job is to see to the conduct of the pupils when there is no school. Each of them has taken different responsibilities and they are doing very well, and the conduct of all the pupils at the School is very good.
Three officers (NCOs) of the College Cadet Corps were sent to Trentham to have in-depth training in soldiering. The Instructors at Trentham had great praise for how well and how rapidly the Te Aute pupils learned.
Twenty-seven of the pupils have scholarships: Buller scholarships, 2; McLean scholarships, 6; Government scholarships, 19 – a total of 27.
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During the last days of May a camp was held for the Te Aute Cadets.That activity was under the direction of the Government War Office.
The provision of tools at the College for learning carpentry is inadequate. We need £40 to purchase the right tools.
Two Church Army tents have arrived at Te Aute. The tents have been erected. A floor has been constructed in one of them but there is not yet a floor in the other.
The pupils have been very well this year. They have suffered no sicknesses.
Otane charges the School 4½d a sheep. I believe it would be cheaper if the sheep were killed at the School. The pupils studying farming have learned how to kill sheep and pigs. They do it very well. Six sheep are eaten by the College each week.
We need books for the College Library so that books are available to children at times when there are no classes.’
OTHER ITEMS
The Report on Te Aute was excellent. We who visit Te Aute see how well your children are doing and the good administration of Te Aute. A total of 97 children are now at Te Aute. At last Te Aute has reached this number. Forty children are waiting for a place at Te Aute. Some are from Rarotonga. These are in addition to the 99 (sic) mentioned above. Te Aute is full of Maori children. There are five Pakeha children. The Managers have said that no new pupils will be accepted. It is difficult to find the money feed this large number.
The Board of Governors has moved that Te Aute and Hukarere are to have one month’s holiday during the winter. Te Aute’s holiday will be from 24th June to 23rd July.
On 22nd June the Te Aute pupils will go to Palmerston to play the Whanganui team. The match takes place on 23rd. From 10,000 to 15,000 gather to watch this match.
Take Woods’ Great Peppermint Cure for the Flu.
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WIREMU RATANA.
R T K
The fame of Wiremu Ratana has resounded to all parts of New Zealand and to places beyond New Zealand. It has been spread by word of mouth and by the Pakeha newspapers. The accounts say that Ratana has the power to heal, no matter what the illness, and people believe that his power is that of God. The Pakeha say that he is a miracle-worker and some of his remarkable doings have been made widely known. But despite those accounts I reserve my judgement until I have actually heard with my own ears and seen with my own eyes. It is not something new for people to talk about the wonderful deeds of Maori tohunga. For many years I have scrutinized carefully the activities of the tohunga and I continue to study them intently. One tohunga goes and another arises and I’ve not observed any difference between them, so who is going to grumble or get angry at my observations? The Pakeha have a saying, ‘Once bitten, twice shy.’ We have been bitten many times and therefore should be very cautious. It is only moths who fly for no good reason into the fire. Wereta was the tohunga whose fame spread to all parts and I said openly that Wereta was practising Ringatu worship and what I said was true. Many ministers of the Church supported the activities of Ratana therefore I remained silent to observe and to listen intently. I listened with my ears and I observed carefully with my eyes and I did not see any wonderful works.Therefore in my heart I asked, ‘Has Ratana’s power gone or are all the many stories passed on by word of mouth or the newspapers false?’ The embellishment of stories is a great habit of the Māori, and the newspapers publish fabricated stories. Ratana is not the first tohunga to pronounce the name of God to cure people’s sicknesses. The tohunga of these days [?panaia] the faith to cajole people – to cover up their works. I agree that people are healed through faith and prayer. The apostle James says, ‘The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.’ (James 5.16 AV) And Christ said to his disciples, ‘Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.’ (Matthew 17.21 AV) I saw Ratana trying to heal a man and he was not healed. He uttered the words of the faith but the important thing, prayer, I did not observe. In all of Ratana’s activities that I saw there was no prayer, but there were humorous sayings that made the whole place laugh, and he also puffed on his pipe. There was nothing sacred about the work of Ratana. He uttered the words, ‘The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit and the faithful angels,’ amidst clouds of tobacco smoke. There was no prayer, no fasting, and no-one was healed.
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Sometimes Ratana spoke English. Did Christ smoke a pipe, did he tell jokes, when he was healing people? To me healing people is a sacred work, an awesome work. When I met Ratana he had a huge entourage from the West, from Taranaki, and from Waikato. The main purpose of their travels was to heal people, but it appeared to me that there main desire was to get people to write their names in their book, their ‘Covenant.’ [Testament] I am not clear about the purpose of this Covenant. From the preaching of Ratana’s companions I gather that it effected the sealing of the people of God and that those who didn’t sign up to the Covenant would be left outside – perhaps for the devil. I was one who was left outside. I would dearly love to know what will be the outcome of Ratana’s work. He has raised many issues such as the Treaty of Waitangi and the breaking of that Treaty by the Pakeha. I was surprised at the inclusion of such issues in Ratana’s programme having thought that the only purpose of his travels was healing people. Many of Ratana’s speeches are not ordinary talks but rather children’s stories. One different thing that I have observed is Ratana’s fear that Pakeha may hear his speeches. Why is he afraid of the Pakeha? A noble work should be done in the sunlight. God does not distinguish between faces [God has no favourites] – a person is neither Maori or Pakeha to God. What is the real reason for the visit to the coastal areas of this land by Ratana and his entourage – women, children, elders, and old women? In Ratana’s party were chiefs from Taranaki, the place where Hauhauism began. The man who started the Hauhau religion was Te Ua. Opunake was his home. He was an unbalanced man, a tohunga. He said that he had the power to heal people. Patara was the Taranaki man who came to the Tai Rawhiti to urge Ngatiporou to join the king’s side. This brought about the division of Ngatiporou with one part fighting against the other and people were killed. These feelings were still warm when Ratana’s group appeared with their ‘covenant.’ This was something that my heart jumped at investigating. One of the first things that the Ratana party explained was that all Churches belonged to Ratana - the Roman Catholics, the Anglicans, the Wesleyans, the Mormons, the Ringatu. In my thinking the person who says that he belongs to all Churches is revealing that he doesn’t belong to any Church. It is good if Ratana preaches that all the Christian Churches should come together but I know very well that were all the Christian Churches to come together then the Mormon religion and the Ringatu religion would not agree to be part of it not being Christian Churches. Ringatu is the spiritual heir of the Hauhau religion in this world. To my way of thinking, Ratana’s movement is something [?to be disapproved of ?soiled]
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if a man is taught to say, ‘I give to the Father, to the Son, to the Holy Spirit, to the faithful angels, and to you also, the sins of my ancestors, those of my parents as well as my own, to be burned in the fire, to be turned to dust and ashes.’ Many people, caught up in the moment, said this, unaware of the meaning of what they were saying. Perhaps if Ratana had told them to stand on their heads they would have done so. An important part of Ratana’s teaching is his condemnation of native tohunga. I am not yet clear if Ratana is a native tohunga – perhaps he will be a tohunga presently. I wondered when I heard that Ratana is saying that some illnesses cannot be cured by the doctor; they are Maori illnesses. Christ did not separate illnesses into Pakeha illnesses and Maori illnesses. Anyone who divides illnesses into Pakeha illnesses and Maori illnesses is agreeing with the practices of the tohunga. It is true that there are illnesses that cannot be cured by the doctor but they are not Maori illnesses, rather they are illnesses that are still intractable. I think that these are the appropriate illnesses for Ratana to be curing and not the easy ones that can be cured by the doctor. Many illnesses are simply cured if the person follows the doctor’s prescriptions. But the best thing is to care for one’s body so that it is not susceptible to sickness. This is better than medicine or miracles, along with looking after one’s body and following the doctor’s guidance. Ratana’s miracle-working is vexatious. Is he [tere] or doing wonders? No. He is a pain in the neck. The Maori People will make progress by taking care and by taking guidance from the Pakeha, and not by the working of miracles. An elderly lady stood before Ratana. Here problem was that she was going blind though she could still see with one eye. Ratana worked on that old lady to restore her sight and she mistakenly thought she could see. Ratana asked if she could see the light and she said that she could. When Ratana hid the light under his had the woman said that the light had gone out. People were amazed but I was not because that old lady still had limited vision in one eye. It was perverse of Ratana to use a light as evidence that the old woman could see; light is something easily seen by people. If that woman were cured why did Ratana not ask her about the clothes he was wearing? That elderly lady is no different now – she is still blind, but word has gone out that she has been healed by Ratana. I did not like the language used by Ratana’s friends when they spoke of Ratana as being like God. It was said that Ratana was the spokesman of God and he had been given the task of dealing with sins. If this is not blasphemy, what is? These are my thoughts about Ratana having seen and heard him, they are not hearsay.
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People who believe in Ratana will not agree with what I have written. What then is to be done? They have their opinions and I have mine. They say that they are right, I say that I am right, so who is to judge? Time itself will declare who was right and who was wrong. Time sifts all matters.
A MEMORIAL AT TAUPO.
The Bishop of Waiapu visited Taupo during April. The gatherings were very good. There was a Confirmation service at Waipahihi on the morning of 17th April, at mid-day a Confirmation at Oraunui, and in the evening a Confirmation service at Mokai. On Tuesday the Bishop, Peneti, and Tamati, were taken to Tokaanu by car. The car was taken between Tauranga and Tokaanu because of the depth of the crossing. The Rev Manihera Tumatahi wass at Tokaanu when the arrived. The first business was an Unveiling Service at the memorial to Te Manihera and Kereopa. The memorial is a brass plate inscribed with the words, ‘To the glory of God’s Name, this is a memorial to Te Manihera and Kereopa of Ngati Ruanui, ambassadors of Christ to Taupo. They were killed on 12th March, 1847. They are buried at Waiariki. “They loved not their lives unto the death.” [Revelation 12.11 AV]’ It is remarkable that these men have been dead for 74 years and only now has a memorial been set up to them. This memorial is the gift of the Bishop of Waiapu. There are two remarkable things in the Tokaanu Church. (1) The brass plate to Te Manihera and Kereopa. (2) Mr Grace’s church bell. This bell was sent from England in 1853, a gift from Mr Grace’s friends to him and the Maori Church. During the time of fighting the Hauhau came to the area to the south of Taupo. They broke the bell. One side was broken. Because the bell was so heavy they left it where it was. It was retrieved by the Pakeha at the Tokaanu Hotel. It served as a dinner bell for many years. The Rev Peneti worked hard and the bell was returned. Now it is in the Tokaanu Church. The bell is large and makes a loud noise. It is said that if the bell is rung on a fine day it can be heard here in Taupo – a distance of 25 miles away. Although it is broken it is difficult for a man to lift it.
For Chest Complaints take Woods’ Great Peppermint Cure.
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PITA POIPOI
Pita Poipoi is not a famous person like Ratana; therefore the way in which these words are written is designed as a caution about the work of Pita Poipoi lest his fame spread and tribes far away mistakenly think that an important work is being done at Te Mahanga, Te Mahia. Pita Poipoi belongs to Te Mahia. He is a handsome man, he is a portly man which led to him being criticized, and he is a man who is not very keen on exercising his muscles. Pita went to the war. While he was in England he married an English woman and, when he returned home, he brought his wife with him. They have two or three children. Pita and his wife lived at first in Gisborne but because it was difficult to get a living there they moved to Te Mahia, his birthplace. When Pita arrived in Te Mahia he began the work he is doing now; that is, he began prophesying. This is a brief account of his work. He said that the Almighty had shown him a piece of gold; that gold is in the Te Mahia area. After receiving this revelation, Pita raised up a flax basket, one chain long and eight inches deep. There were seven loops on each side of the basket. The basket was suspended on some posts, seven on one side and seven on the other. The posts on the seaward side were the ‘Hokowhitu a Tu’ – ‘Tu’s Party’, those on the side facing the land were the ‘Hokowhitu a Uta’ – ‘The Inland Party.’ Under the basket was suspended a small basket. The long basket was made by Pita to contain the genealogies of people from Tumatauenga right down to himself; if a man did not know the sequence of marriages his genealogy was not placed in the basket. The genealogies were not visible in the basket but were there spiritually. The small basket is for the [panganga - ?contributions] of the ‘sevens’, by the people wanting shares in the gold discovered by Pita. A person may want one ‘seven’ share or two or even more. So one ‘seven’ cost seven shillings, two ‘sevens’, fourteen shillings, and three ‘sevens’, one pound and one shilling. Along with these there is a pole surmounted by a carved image in the village of Ngatirangi, Nuhaka, and on this pole are twelve mirrors. The pole is called Joseph and the mirrors are the twelve tribes of Israel. While a person is still far off he can be seen by Joseph, and while he is still far off the person can see Joseph looking at him. So much for my explanations. My friends, it will be obvious to you that this has to be one of the greatest humbugs under the sun. Because he was so lazy when it came to work, Pita Poipoi set about finding an easy way of getting money for himself. When he found one he told his tale
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to some foolish Maori who believed him and assisted him. Pita is making money without losing sweat or anything. And whether or not the gold appears in his time, what is that to him while the work of the ‘seven’ keeps coming into his bag? As a last word I must say that Pita’s activities are not supported by the farming people of Nuhaka and Te Mahia or by the chiefs. Therefore, should news of our prophet come to you, my friends, do not ‘turn’ your ears or your heart.
THE WORLD BOXING CHAMPION.
Dempsey, the world boxing champion, met Carpentier another fighter who was seeking to take from him the world title. Both are heavy-weights. Dempsey is an American and Carpentier is French. It was a very important fight but it did not last long. In the fourth round Carpentier was defeated. Two disasters happened to Carpentier in the fight – his thumb was broken and also his nose. When Carpentier’s girlfriend heard the news she beat him severely. Dempsey remains champion of the world.
A LETTER RECEIVED.
To the Editor of Te Kopara. Greetings. Please publish the following notice to all the members, the Chairmen and their Marae Committees, within the Horouta Council area. Friends, greetings to all of you, men, women, and children who live on your marae. May the love and peace of the Almighty rest upon you. Ratana says, ‘May your well-being increase.’ The word to you is that you have been appointed as guardians of the physical well-being of those within you Horouta Council area. Therefore I ask you to help and support this important treasure of the Maori People, Te Kopara, which carries information concerning the body as well as information concerning the soul. I urge all of you to take Te Kopara and collect names and shillings and send them to Te Kopara. I want all the Councils to support Te Kopara as a voice for all the Councils and for the people at large. Best wishes.
From your father,
Paratene Ngata.
Waiomatatini, 28/6/21.
AN APOLOGY.
The printer of our Bird wishes to apologize for omitting the letters of the name of R T K as the writer of his letter published in Number 87 of Te Kopara entitled ‘The Faults of the Pakeha.’ He suffered an illness at that time and therefore was unable to give adequate attention to the printing of that Edition.
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SOME OF THE MOTIONS PASSED AT THE HUI TOPU HELD AT MANUTUKE, APRIL 1921.
2. By Archdeacon H W Williams and Rev Hemi Huata.
‘That a committee be set up to discuss the matter of parish stipends and to report to the Hui.’ The Committee: Archdeacon W J Simkin, Canon H Pahewa, Rev H P Munro, Rev P Tamahori, Rev F A Bennett, and Tame Halbert.
3. By Archdeacon H W Williams and Rev F A Bennett.
‘That this Hui asks the Bishop to request the Government to amend the laws relating to the sale of liquor so that the people are freed from the evils of drink.’
4. By Rev F A Bennett and Rev Hemi Huata.
‘Because we are not clear about the situation of the Diocesan Board we ask the Church Secretary for clarification.’ The Secretary gave an explanation to the people and the people approved of the work of the Board.
7.By Rev F A Bennett and Rev H Huata.
(a) ‘That Te Kopara continue to be printed.’
By Rev Bennett and Archdeacon Williams.
(b) ‘That the management be handed over to the Standing Committee.’ (In the discussion of this motion, Archdeacon Williams said that he was placing the Te Rau Press under the management of the Standing Committee of the Synod. Bennett also pointed out that it was no good having the Editor living in one place and the Printer far away in another; both should live in the same place.)
10. By Archdeacon Williams and Rev W T Puha.
‘That Te Huinga (Lady Carroll) be thanked for her gracious gift of a section to support the Mission House here in Manutuke and to assist the work of Miss Newman.’
12. By Rev F A Bennett and Rev P Tamahori.
‘This Hui thanks Archdeacon Williams for his efforts in sustaining the Maori newspaper, now known as Te Kopara, for the past 25 years, and expresses the hope that he will continue to support this long-established paper in the Maori language.’
13. By Rev P Kohere and Rev H P Munro.
‘That this Hui approves of the work of the Government in censoring images appearing in the films and asks that they will increase their censorship as many films are teaching children wrong ways. We ask the President to pass this on to the Minister of Public Works.’
FOOD FOR TE KOPARA.
Name / Address / Payment / Subscription Expires
May
Rev H J Fletcher / Taupo / 15/- / April 1925
Piri Paraone / Farsertown / 5/- / April 1921
Hori Kaua / Kahukura / 5/- / January 1920
Peta Nepia / Nuhaka / 5/- / May 1921
July
Bryan McCarthy / 34 Homewood Road, Christchurch / 5/- / January 1922 [12]
RULES OF THE PAPER.
1. Te Kopara is published monthly.
2. The subscription for the paper is five shillings (5/-) a year paid by postal note or stamps.
3. Anyone wishing to take Te Kopara should send the money with the covering letter to Te Kopara, Te Rau Press, 6 Berry Street, Gisborne.
A NOTICE
Those wishing to purchase Prayer Books, Hymn Books or Testaments should send their request to Miss K Williams, P O Box 41, Hukarere, Napier. These are the prices. Large, soft cover 3/- Large, red cover 3/6 Large, hard cover 4/6 Large, superior cover 6/6 Hymns, 9d Prayer Book with Hymns, soft cover 1/6 Prayer Book with Hymns, red cover 3/- Prayer Book with Hymns, hard cover 5/6 Prayer Book, New Testament and Hymns, red cover, 4/6 Prayer Book, New Testament and Hymns, superior cover, 7/6
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