After Waitangi Day and maybe Anzac, Matariki is our first truly indigenous celebration. It is the Māori name for a cluster of nine stars, known also as Pleiades, that rises around the winter solstice – June 21st. On this shortest day of the year, heading into the depth of winter, signals for Māori the start of their new year. A time to open the food stores and relax around the fire. Whānau who’d spent the summer dispersed across harvesting camps would return home bringing news of life, births and deaths. It was a time to rest, celebrate and feast, to remember those who had died in the previous year, and anticipate the bounty of the year to come.
So what should be our Christian response to Matariki? Should we see it as a pagan festival to be resisted, or is it something else – something maybe to be celebrated and taken on board? Let’s take a look.
In Genesis 1:14 God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years.”
Clearly in God’s mind part of the purpose of the stars, sun and moon was to mark the passage of time and seasons so that our forbears had a way of knowing when to plant, when to harvest, the best time to fish, when to celebrate and so on.
Before the arrival of accurate time pieces, calendars and Google, all people had to mark the passage of time was the movement of the celestial bodies which God knowingly ordained for that purpose.
The rising of Matariki, marking the shortest day of the year and the onset of winter, is a clear example of God’s providence through this mechanism. From that moment on, while it would still remain cold for a time, the days would be getting longer marking the beginning of a new cycle of seasonal life on our planet. So technically Matariki and the Māori observance of it is simply an example of what God described in Genesis. It’s nothing to worry about.
For Māori, each star in the cluster has a particular meaning that connects it with that cycle of seasonal life and what sustains it. Like beads on a rosary, or the boxes on our prayer calendar, they serve as reminders or markers about what is important to be remembered, reflected on and prayed for.
The main star, Matariki, signifies our connection to the environment and the gathering, health and well being of people and a time to reflect on the past year.
Waitī, Waitā, Waipunarangi, Tipuānuku, Tipuārangi and Ururangi are the stars associated with God’s providence in nature: crops, rain, wind, fish, berries, roots, and so on. All that sustains life, things to give thanks for.
Pōhutukawa is the star associated with those that have passed on and Hiwa-i-te-rangi is the star connected with our aspirations for the coming year.
Churches in rural parishes would celebrate something known as a “harvest festival”. This is less common today, especially in urban settings. The harvest in earlier times was a key moment in the year for everyone. A good and bountiful harvest meant a secured food supply for the year ahead. People would not go hungry and so, very naturally, as the harvest went underway, the church would celebrate and give thanks for God’s providence in the ability to grow and store food. People would bring their first gatherings of the harvest to the church, much like the people of Israel did during the “Feast of Firstfruits”, and everyone would celebrate and give thanks with the produce being distributed to those in need.
Today this cycle has all but disappeared, with global trade, year round growing in greenhouses, and supermarkets meaning we have very little perception of the cycle of food production. Food is there on the supermarket shelves and we buy it when we need it.
In Western society, we have lost that sense of life’s rhythm.
One day often blends into the next, year after year, with brief breaks for holidays to recharge before we head frantically into the next period. Our technology means we have light and warmth all year round so life loses something of the seasonal rhythms our forbears enjoyed, and the times of respite, rest and celebration which they gave us, and we are the poorer for it.
Matariki, like the Christian celebration of Easter with its reflective period of Lent and the celebration of new life in the resurrection, encourages us to pause, take stock, to recharge and enjoy what we have in family and community and to ponder what we might do with the time that lies ahead.
I would encourage us all to use Matariki as a time to reflect on the year past, to remember, to maybe in a tangible way acknowledge and give thanks for the key moments and losses of the previous year.
You might, at a family dinner, go around the table and ask each person to express something of what the previous year meant for them, to share a highlight and a challenge or sadness from the year past. You might pause to acknowledge those things and lost loved ones, calling out their names one more time, and then gather it all in prayer, encouraging folk to lay down burdens they have been carrying and acknowledging the successes. You might finish by going around the table once more, asking people to say something about what they hope to achieve during the coming year, and then offer those aspirations up to God in prayer as well.
So let’s celebrate Matariki as it was intended.
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We have invited these writers to share their experiences, ideas and opinions in the hope that these will provoke thought, challenge you to go deeper and inspire you to put your faith into action. These articles should not be taken as the official view of the Nelson Diocese on any particular matter.
After Waitangi Day and maybe Anzac, Matariki is our first truly indigenous celebration. It is the Māori name for a cluster of nine stars, known also as Pleiades, that rises around the winter solstice – June 21st. On this shortest day of the year, heading into the depth of winter, signals for Māori the start of their new year. A time to open the food stores and relax around the fire. Whānau who’d spent the summer dispersed across harvesting camps would return home bringing news of life, births and deaths. It was a time to rest, celebrate and feast, to remember those who had died in the previous year, and anticipate the bounty of the year to come.
So what should be our Christian response to Matariki? Should we see it as a pagan festival to be resisted, or is it something else – something maybe to be celebrated and taken on board? Let’s take a look.
In Genesis 1:14 God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years.”
Clearly in God’s mind part of the purpose of the stars, sun and moon was to mark the passage of time and seasons so that our forbears had a way of knowing when to plant, when to harvest, the best time to fish, when to celebrate and so on.
Before the arrival of accurate time pieces, calendars and Google, all people had to mark the passage of time was the movement of the celestial bodies which God knowingly ordained for that purpose.
The rising of Matariki, marking the shortest day of the year and the onset of winter, is a clear example of God’s providence through this mechanism. From that moment on, while it would still remain cold for a time, the days would be getting longer marking the beginning of a new cycle of seasonal life on our planet. So technically Matariki and the Māori observance of it is simply an example of what God described in Genesis. It’s nothing to worry about.
For Māori, each star in the cluster has a particular meaning that connects it with that cycle of seasonal life and what sustains it. Like beads on a rosary, or the boxes on our prayer calendar, they serve as reminders or markers about what is important to be remembered, reflected on and prayed for.
The main star, Matariki, signifies our connection to the environment and the gathering, health and well being of people and a time to reflect on the past year.
Waitī, Waitā, Waipunarangi, Tipuānuku, Tipuārangi and Ururangi are the stars associated with God’s providence in nature: crops, rain, wind, fish, berries, roots, and so on. All that sustains life, things to give thanks for.
Pōhutukawa is the star associated with those that have passed on and Hiwa-i-te-rangi is the star connected with our aspirations for the coming year.
Churches in rural parishes would celebrate something known as a “harvest festival”. This is less common today, especially in urban settings. The harvest in earlier times was a key moment in the year for everyone. A good and bountiful harvest meant a secured food supply for the year ahead. People would not go hungry and so, very naturally, as the harvest went underway, the church would celebrate and give thanks for God’s providence in the ability to grow and store food. People would bring their first gatherings of the harvest to the church, much like the people of Israel did during the “Feast of Firstfruits”, and everyone would celebrate and give thanks with the produce being distributed to those in need.
Today this cycle has all but disappeared, with global trade, year round growing in greenhouses, and supermarkets meaning we have very little perception of the cycle of food production. Food is there on the supermarket shelves and we buy it when we need it.
In Western society, we have lost that sense of life’s rhythm.
One day often blends into the next, year after year, with brief breaks for holidays to recharge before we head frantically into the next period. Our technology means we have light and warmth all year round so life loses something of the seasonal rhythms our forbears enjoyed, and the times of respite, rest and celebration which they gave us, and we are the poorer for it.
Matariki, like the Christian celebration of Easter with its reflective period of Lent and the celebration of new life in the resurrection, encourages us to pause, take stock, to recharge and enjoy what we have in family and community and to ponder what we might do with the time that lies ahead.
I would encourage us all to use Matariki as a time to reflect on the year past, to remember, to maybe in a tangible way acknowledge and give thanks for the key moments and losses of the previous year.
You might, at a family dinner, go around the table and ask each person to express something of what the previous year meant for them, to share a highlight and a challenge or sadness from the year past. You might pause to acknowledge those things and lost loved ones, calling out their names one more time, and then gather it all in prayer, encouraging folk to lay down burdens they have been carrying and acknowledging the successes. You might finish by going around the table once more, asking people to say something about what they hope to achieve during the coming year, and then offer those aspirations up to God in prayer as well.
So let’s celebrate Matariki as it was intended.
Check out other articles in the
series below.
More articles in the
series are to come.
