A start note, Maori Paganism is my heritage. Please do not slander it, it is very personal to me.
I will be doing these out of order so do stay tuned for more Articles. Also to know Maori Paganism you need to know the stories since they are how we communicated through Dance and Singing.
First we shall start with the "Hero" for the Mythologies who is Maui Tikitiki-a-Taranga
Which Translates into Maui Hair Knot of his Mother.
Maui was the youngest child of 5, When he was born there are two interpretations to why he is called Tikitiki-a-Taranga one the Original island where Maui was born was over populated so his father the chief threw him into the Ocean. Another telling says that his mother thought he was 'Still-Born" in other words dead so in her grief she tied him up in a knot of her own hair and tossed him into the Ocean. Where his Tupuna (Father or Foster Father) Tamanui-ki-te-rangi the sky father and the Husband/Lover of Papatuanuku the Earth Mother.
Rangi the Sky father raised Maui as his own since Rangi was separated from his children and wife because his children wanted to be free, but that is another story.
So technically Maui became a Demi-God and grew up to be a strong young man, but he was always a little prankster. He loved to play games and trick people. But he was still Heroic and Brave, he caught the sun, fished up New Zealand, played with fire and survived and tried to conquer death.
The Myth I wanted to share with you all was Maui and Fire because it teaches us an important lesson, respect your elders and don't be an idiot. This is one of my favourite myths and is very important, especially if you want to Work with the Goddess of Fire
It started out in the village where Maui and his people lived, every night they left the campfires going to keep them warm and to light the way at night. Maui decided to be silly and put out the fires, he did this and the Tribe found out, his real father the Chief was furious at Maui and told him to visit his Aunt Mahuika the Goddess of Fire to collect more Fire for the Village. With this Assumption since the Maori people had some form of Magick they must have invoked Mahuika to light their campfires and or journeyed to her to get fire.
So Maui went on his way to visit Mahuika, she approached her and asked "Aunty, may I please have some Fire to take back to my village, we have run out" so Mahuika plucked a Nail from her hand and gave it to Maui. So Maui travelled back to his village on the way he thought he could be sneaky and piss of his Aunt, since he couldn't really be punished because of his Tupuna Rangi the Sky Father. So he dropped the Burning nail into the fire (In other tellings he did it by accident) into the river.
He went back to his Aunt and asked for a new nail because he dropped the last one, so he repeated this over and over until Mahuika found out what he was doing. so he told him
"You want fire, have fire!" she took all her remaining nails and set the forest ablaze. Trees Burned, Animals Died. Maui escaped by using his Magic Jawbone to turn into a Fantail to fly away. Ruaumoko the Unborn the last child of Papa and Rangi opened the earth and swallowed the fire to save the forest.
Afterwards Maui found the last flame in the forest and took it back to his Village after learning his lesson.
A thing about this story is that technically he angered Two Gods at once. Mahuika the Goddess of Fire and Tane Mahuta God of the Forest.
So essentially if you wished to Invoke/Pray these two you never ever mention Maui because of what he did.
Maui almost lost his life in his little stunt so it shows the important message of "Respecting your elders" and "If you play with fire you will get burned" Literally.
Anyways that is my little post. It may not seem like it has tangible information for Rites Etc but you can't really get a band of traditional Dances and do a video of special haka's etc anymore because we just don't do those sorts of rites anymore.
Here are my resources.
http://www.maori.info/maori_history.htm
http://www.deeknow.com/notes/maori/maui.html#fire
http://whanaushow.co.nz/index.php/maui-and-fire
http://history-nz.org/maori9.html
Some information is different based on resources, but this is an ancient tribal story shown through song and dance so there will be different interpretations.
