The Saturday Star Bulletin. Honolulu, T.H., January 26, 1957 - Tales about Hawaii, Clarice B. Taylor
Before the Iliili-opae Heiau at Mapulehu on Molokai could be dedicated, the land in which it was situated and people had to be purified.
The priests and king went about the district holding services and collecting offerings for the temple.
Other priests and the people decorated the temple. They gathered the ie-ie vine, lace fern, ti leaves, lama and ohia branches to decorate all the images and houses.
They spread freshly woven mats of lauhala on the altar pavements.
The services lasted about a month. On each required night, some one article or thing was dedicated: that is each house and god required a different service as did the aha from the sea, the drums, etc.
The offerings of the human sacrifices culminated the whole and the people believed that they had prayed the spirit of the gods into their images.
A great kapu was placed on the people and the land on the night the services began.
Its purpose was to keep the people from sin and to secure absolute silence so that the voice of the priests would "rise beyond the clouds and reach the ears of the gods."
All the men and boys of the community were commanded to attend the ceremonies. If the men were "religious," they went inside the heiau and sat on the pavement in front of the altar.
If the men and boys were afraid of the severities of the service, they gathered outside the heiau and on the high places about it, where they were subject to the rigors of the required etiquette.
The women and children were forbidden to leave their houses.
Silence was secured by binding the snouts of the pigs and dogs and placing the chickens under calabshes.
The men could not leave the temple and the women and children could not leave their houses to attend the toilet needs.
The success of the service depended upon its conduct without the interruption of a cry of a wild bird, the squeak of a rat, twisting clouds, thunder or lightening or the cry of a human being.
To enforce this silence, priests sent a special order of the priests, men called Mu, to go about and listen to fringements.
Anyone who made a noise was subject to death.
Next: The Priests
Note: The words, "severities" and "fringements" are original to this text.
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