Ratana The Man, the Church, the Political Movement. by J. M. Henderson.
Ratana The Man, the Church, the Political Movement. by J. M. Henderson.
Publisher: Reed 1972, 2nd edition. SCARCE.
Very good hardback with fair jacket. Red cloth boards have some marks, some compression and fading to spine ends and top edges. Inscription to ffep. Pages very good with some light foxing. Jacket is marked, rubbed and chipped with some repaired tears.
The Ratana church was a 20th-century religious awakening among the New Zealand Maoris and a national political influence, especially during the period 1943 63, when its members held all four Maori parliamentary seats in the national capital. It was founded by Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana, a Methodist Maori farmer who acquired a reputation as a visionary and faith healer. News of his extraordinary gifts drew Maoris (and some whites) from all parts of New Zealand, who came to hear him preach his doctrine of moral reform under the one God of the Bible. In 1920 he established an interdenominational church at the village of Ratana Pa. Ratana s movement gave new hope and a transtribal unity to the Maoris, who had many grievances against the New Zealand government. By 1920 they had lost most of their lands and had been devastated by disease and by the adverse moral and economic effects of World War I. A subject of particular bitterness was the failure of the government to fulfill its several promises to the Maoris in the Treaty of Waitangi. The association of Ratana s movement with other Christian denominations ended in 1925. The self-proclaimed Ratana church had developed a syncretic Maori Christianity, marked by heterodox rituals and an elaborate hierarchy of religious officials; hymns and prayers glorified Ratana as God s mangai ( mouth-piece ). Displeased by these developments, several of New Zealand
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