Max Freedom Long - The Teachings of Huna

To summarize, the kahuna idea of the conscious and subconscious seems to be, judging from the root meanings of the names given them, a pair of spirits closely joined in a body which is controlled by the subconscious and used to cover and hide them both. The conscious spirit is more human and possesses the ability to talk. The grieving subconscious weeps tears, dribbles water and otherwise handles the vital force of the body. It does its work with secrecy and silent care, but it is stubborn and disposed to refuse to obey. It refuses to do things when it fears the gods (holds a complex or fixation of ideas), and it intermingles or tinctures the conscious spirit to give the impression of being one with it. (The use made in magic of the "sticky" element as a symbol, and the ability to "protrude" or to "draw something out of something else" will become clear later.)

Given this certainty that the kahunas had known for thousands of years all the psychology we had come to know in the last few years, I became quite sure that their ability to perform feats of magic stemmed from their knowledge of important psychological factors not yet discovered by us.

It soon became apparent that, in naming the elements of psychology and placing in their word roots symbol meanings to point to related elements, the kahunas of the dawn days had done a superb job. The only great stumbling block was the fact that the symbol words stood for elements whose nature I could not imagine.

Searching feverishly for the meanings of these symbols, I returned to the reports on Psychic Phenomena and, as I checked each type of phenomena in turn, endeavored to locate its counterpart symbol in the roots of the terms used by the kahunas.

After a few months it became plain that I had gone as far as I could in the first work of matching the more complete psychology with the external rites of kahuna magic. I decided that what I had found was too valuable to keep from the world, and forthwith wrote a report on my findings and the kahuna lore in general. 2

The English publication brought me many letters. I had placed my name and address in the back of the report and had requested any reader who could offer pertinent information for the study to write to me. Almost no really helpful information arrived, although hundreds of letters contained speculative material and guesses.

Then, over a year after the publication of that book, there came a letter from a retired English journalist. His name was William Reginald Stewart, and what he had to say was very much to the point.

In my report, he had been greatly interested to find that I was describing the same magic that he, in his younger days, had found being used by a certain Berber tribe in the Atlas Mountains of North Africa. Also, to his surprise, he had found that the Hawaiian words

used by the kahunas were the same, except for dialect differences, as those which had been used to describe the magic in Africa. He had, after reading my book, hunted up his yellowed notes and compared words which he had been told belonged to a secret magical language. The Hawaiian word kahuna appeared as quahuna among the Berbers, and the Hawaiian term for woman kahuna was changed from kahuna wahini to quahini . The word for a god was nearly the same in both languages— akua and atua —as were a number of other words we checked.

As the Berber tribes spoke a language not at all related to the Polynesian dialects, the discovery of the similarity of the magic and the language used to describe it offered definite proof that the two peoples had either come from the same original stock or had been in contact with each other in ancient times.

Stewart had heard tales of this Berber tribe and their magician while exploring for oil signs for a Dutch company, and corresponding for the Christian Science Monitor as a free lance writer and authority on North Africa. Taking a vacation, he hired guides and set out to find the tribe. Eventually he did find it and met the magician, a woman. By dint of much persuasion he got himself adopted and made her blood son so that he could become eligible to receive training in the secret magic. The magician, whose name was Lucchi, had a daughter aged seventeen who was just beginning to take the training, so Stewart was allowed to join in.

The training began with her explanations of legendary tribal history, in which it was related that twelve tribes of the people having kahunas, once lived in the Sahara Desert when it was still a green and fertile land of flowing rivers. The rivers dried up, and the tribes moved into the valley of the Nile. While there they used their magic to help cut, carry and place the building stones of the Great Pyramid. At that time they were rulers in Egypt and topped all others because of their magic.

The account continued with the recital of how it was foreseen that a time of intellectual darkness was due in the world, and that the secret of their magic was in danger of being lost. To preserve it, for it was as precious as it was secret, the twelve tribes decided to hunt for isolated lands to which they might go to preserve the "Secret" ( Huna ) until the time was ripe for its return to the world. Eleven of the tribes, after making a psychic exploration and finding the islands of the Pacific empty and waiting, moved off by way of a canal to the Red Sea, and thence along either the African coast or over to India and thence into the Pacific. After many years they became "lost" in so far as the twelfth tribe was concerned. This twelfth tribe had, for some unstated reason, decided to go north and settle in the Atlas Mountain fastnesses. They had lived there for centuries, always preserving the Secret and using its magic, but as modern times arrived, the kahunas had died out until only one remained. She was the teacher, Lucchi.

Stewart found the Berber tribe hospitable, clean, very intelligent, and in possession of a fine old culture. They spoke a conglomerate language peculiar to the Berber tribes, but when it came to teaching the ancient lore of magic, another language had to be employed because in it alone could be found the proper words to name the elements in man which made magic possible.

The young Englishman was already hampered by language difficulties, having to match his French with that of some of the Berbers, and having to delve endlessly to arrive at a proper understanding of what words in the so-called "Secret" language might mean.

Little by little he learned the basic philosophy of magic. His teacher made many demonstrations of her magic in healing and in the control of birds, beasts, serpents and weather. All was going well indeed, and the theoretical work had been covered and its practical application was about to follow. Then, on a misty afternoon, two raiding parties in the valley below the Berber camp began shooting at each other. A stray bullet struck Lucchi over the heart and she died almost instantly.

Left without a teacher, and with Lucchi's daughter knowing no more than he did, Stewart's training came to an abrupt end. He gathered up his notes, took leave of his blood brothers and sisters, and returned to his old rounds.

It was thirty years later that he read my report and recognized the Hawaiian words I mentioned as the same words–aside from dialect changes—which he had preserved so long in his notes.

This linked up the Hawaiian kahunas with North Africa and possibly with Egypt. Hawaiian legends contained the oral history of the people. In these it is told that the Hawaiians once lived in a home land far away. They saw by psychic sight the land of Hawaii and set out to find it. Their journey commenced at the "Red Sea of Kane," which fits neatly into the idea that they came from Egypt by way of the Red Sea, as it is called to this day in at least three languages. The history gives few details of the journey from that place on, except to tell how progress was made from land to land in large double canoes. When the eight unoccupied islands of Hawaii were found by the scouts who went ahead, they returned to the nearest islands to the west to fetch the others of the tribe who had remained there to rest. Trees, plants and animals were brought on subsequent voyages as the tribe moved in and took up its home in Hawaii. The voyages to the outside islands stopped for a long time and complete isolation reigned. Then the royal blood ran out and a voyage to the other islands was made to find and bring back a prince of the high blood. He brought with him his favorites and a kahuna. This kahuna, if we can credit the account, introduced into Hawaii a contaminated form of kahunaism which contained little magic, and commanded idol worship and temple building. This contamination remained, with its idols and temples, even though kahunas possessing knowledge of the workable and practical magic continued their work and preserved the Secret in almost uncontaminated form.