Kahuna Bodywork, Kahuna
Massage Articles
Excerpts from articles by Ki'a'i
Ho'okahi Weber
Kahuna Bodywork and Training - An Ancient Hawaiian tradition steeped in mystery?
Researching the net for the history of Kahuna Bodywork brings up some interesting timelines, romantic explanations of something so great we are lost for words. Is its histrory whispered through the winds of time and only a few can know?
You have heard Kahuna Bodywork is 'yet another massage modality'? You have read it has been around in Hawaii for thousands of years and has been performed in temples? There are many names for it and there are many schools?
Kahu Abraham Kawai'i, the Kahuna who developed this style of bodywork in the 80s, came to visit and teach in Australia for the first time in March 1998, at the old Mount Warning Lodge. Then the 'massage' was just part of Kahuna training, one of the mediums Kahu used to teach people Kahuna perspectives.
Primarily he wanted to teach people to broaden their understanding, to stretch their conceptual boundaries, to align body movement, breath and heartbeat. Master skills achievable by learning respect, dignity, hmbleness, posture, sensitivity, by saying 'yes' to everything life offers, good, bad or ugly.
The Kahuna gave us Ancient Universal Principles to deal with any life situation, where only one thing is essential: to recognise the Principle at work, above all, the 'Principle of Family'.
I was attending this workshop at Mt. Warning in 1989, and without knowing it then, started to walk the Sacred Path of the Kahuna.
In my 16 years of training in the Kahuna's house in Hawai'i. I witnessed the development of what is now called Kahuna Bodywork. It is hard for people to imagine that this magical massage has been 'invented' and conceived during our lifetime, not thousands of years ago.
The only thing Ancient about it is the fact that its source is Ancient Principle. The only thing that's Hawaiian about it is that it has been invented by one of the greatest Hawaiian Kahuna, and that it uses concepts and moves of Hawaiian martial art.
Sacred temple bodywork? Yes, a Kahuna student learns to recognise the body as a temple, a sacred place where one can touch eternity, where the spirit is prepared to fly. It is interesting to note that people not Kahuna trained piece together history by literally interpreting what has been said or written in 'Kahuna story' language, and presume that if it is so great, so mysterious, so encompassing, so sacred, it must be centuries old.
Kahu has left this realm in 2004, but all sanctioned teachers today still had years of training with him. There has not been another Kahuna to teach this work, and there will most likely never be, as no native Hawaiian has studied with Kahu to this extent.
I was permitted to teach Ka'aleleau in 1991, and I was granted permission to teach Kahuna Bodywork in 2001 as the first certified master, after 12 years of intense training.
Kahu never wanted his students to take on Hawaiian culture or customs, but encouraged them to recognise within themselves the wisdom of their own ancestors via Kahuna navigator exercises called Ka'aleleau. If you want to Kahuna bodywork other people you have to understand, manage and expand upon your own space of existence first. Yes, there have been Kahuna in Ancient times to advise, initiate and heal Hawaiian royalty, but this has been individual and according to that Kahuna's skill and profession.
Kahuna Bodywork is a rite of passage, a way to help clients understand themselves and change their lives. Beyond 'yummy massage' it is profound work, where clients get moved to take responsibility for their own physical, emotional and spiritual wellbeing by increasing their range of movement. It challenges you to journey to your centre, while possibly getting catapulted into that place wher spirits meet.
Out of humbleness a Kahuna Bodyworker will never promise a certain outcome of a session. Indeed, this work cannot be done with intent. All one gets is 'the next' necessary to move on, regardless of what the bodyworker or the client think what this next 'should' be.
"It is when you are the giver, the receiver and that which is given in One".
The Australian College of Kahuna Sciences is the school sanctioned by the Kahuna.
Here the teaching lineage of Kahu Abraham Kawai'i is respectfully maintained.
History
Kahuna
Bodywork/massage is adapted from a style of bodywork that in
ancient times was reserved for Hawaiian Royalty. Performed
only by the Kahuna, this has been a ‘rite of
passage’ and
an initiation into greater responsibilities.
The arrival of Western people and missionaries however, introduced
laws in 1920 which forbid ancient native Hawaiian practices,
dances, chants, and language. This included the ancient initiations
in the temples, because only Christian churches were acceptable.
The Kahuna, a highly trained expert in one or more fields, was deemed to be a sorcerer.
Until the United States federal government passed the Native
American Religious Freedoms Act in 1979, the Hawaiian people
were forbidden all their cultural practices.
"'Section
1034: Sorcery -- Penalty, Any person who shall attempt the
cure of another by the practice of sorcery, witchcraft, ananna
(sic), hoopiopio, hoounauna, or hoomanamana, or other superstitious
or deceitful methods, shall, upon conviction thereof, be
fined in a sum not less than one hundred dollars or be imprisoned
not to exceed six months at hard labor.'
There
is also another section of the law which classes the kahuna
with bunco men and defines him as one posing as a kahuna,
taking money under pretense of having magical power, or admitting
he is a kahuna. For this the fine went up to a thousand dollars
and a year in prison." -- Long, 1948
Kahuna
Training, if it occurred at all, had to happen secretly within
the family. Kahu Abraham Kawai’i for example, was
trained in several Kahuna skills within his culture, and eventually
by retrieving knowledge from ancestral memory and applying Kahuna
Principles to modern life, he was able to create Kahuna Bodywork
suitable for the Western World.
What is Kahuna Bodywork / Massage?
Kahuna Bodywork comes from Hawaii, but by Principle does not
teach something Hawaiian. Instead it teaches people to access
their own inherited genetic wisdom. It shows students how to
access pathways to physically, mentally or spiritually unexplored
areas within the Self. The result of these explorations is multilevel
and can be subtle or foundationally life changing, for both the
giver and the receiver of the bodywork.
Kahuna
Bodywork is not a form of massage. Rather, it works like a
dynamic re-patterning process on body, mind and spirit that
gives clients the opportunity to realign themselves and change
old non-contributing patterns within their bodies. Apart from
the possible therapeutic effect the major benefit of Kahuna
Bodywork lies in the client’s
greater sensitivity and understanding of his/her own body.
Kahuna
Bodywork requires great sensitivity and an wisdom and experience
of physical human movement. All bodywork techniques and moves
are applied with Ki energy through the bodyworker’s
own body movement.
Kahuna Bodywork is based on movement.
Compassion, and the required motion, positioning, leverage, posture,
and focus in performance of bodywork is taught through an ancient
precisely patterned movement, called Ka’alele
au. By constantly refining his/her own Ka’alele
au movements, the student learns to design technique sequences
appropriate for the individual.
The
first aim for Kahuna Bodywork is to use stroking techniques
to relax and reassure the client. Once relaxation is achieved,
specific deeper work can be commenced. It is important that
a relaxed and pain-free state is maintained throughout the
entire session. (Pain free does of course not mean ‘without sensation’.)
Deeper work may involve specific Ka’alele au movement
techniques, and deep point pressure using leverage and focus
to release muscles, tendons, and ligaments, and joint movement
techniques.
Stroke movements and specific patterns
are initiated through the Ka’alele au movement,
encouraging improved cell communication, and synchronisation
of the heart beat and breath in the client almost immediately.
To achieve this state of communication, the bodyworker has to
work entirely without intent, which makes this work very different
to other modalities in its foundation.
A Kahuna Evolution Bodyworker (Advanced
Diploma level in Australia) understands the ancient concept of
movement induced acceleration of molecular communication, and
is able to assist in advancing and strengthening the perception
of Self.
It is interesting to note that many websites claim that this Kahuna Bodywork has been around for thousands of years, or has been performed in ancient Hawaiian temples. The creation and timeline of this intriguing form of bodywork is foundationally different!
When a Kahuna speaks about the temple, where would this be?
The Western mind adopts all information literally, and by repeating it out of context the history of Kahuna Bodywork gets ever more diffused, as are the skills and the training.
Anybody interested in learning Kahuna Bodywork should study with someone who has trained with Kahu Abraham Kawai'i over many years and is a sanctioned and certified teacher. This way the training pathways will be preserved and can further develop.
The Kahuna
The
first Hawaiians (Kanaka Maoli) arrived after traveling in great
double hulled ocean going migration canoes called Wa'a Kaulua. Traveling some 2500 nautical miles from various
parts of the south pacific. They were guided by Kahuna
Navigators who followed ancient prophecy, chants and dream messages
that told the story of a mystic island in the middle of the sea.
The overseer of the structure of
Hawaiian (Kanaka Maoli)
life was the ‘professional’‚ known as the ‘Kahuna’.
The Kahuna were the keepers of ancient knowledge, the keeper
of wisdom and understanding, the professors and the skilled ones. (Kahuna
translated literally means ‘Keeper of the Secret, the Hidden’).
The
Kahuna was the Navigator, Healer, Master Builder, Architect,
Teacher, Counsellor, the Keeper of Things Sacred, Meteorologist
(Weatherman), Geomancer, the Keeper of Genealogy, Tactical Advisor,
Strategist, Priest, Astronomer, Astrologer, Scientist, Psychic,
and Divinator. In all levels of Hawaiian (Kanaka Maoli)
life, the counsel and services of the Kahuna were continuously
sought after.
Children of any sex or class were selected for Kahuna Training
to learn and recognise the Principle in how everything relates
to everything in the Universe - when they showed talent, discipline
and knowledge of Self and nature. This was basic training, and
they were primarily groomed to understand the Principle of genealogy
and family, in all life.
Today,
the few Kahuna left living are the preservers of the ancient
Hawaiians’ (Kanaka Maoli) soul and heart,
the preservers of the culture, and the keepers of the Principle.
Genealogy
The
holding fast to Genealogy was the ancient’s
way of maintaining the divinity of genetic resource; power
generated by ancestors, wisdom, and knowledge achieved, heights
of love and compassion, and of spirituality. These were great
building blocks for an emotionally stable individual, and an
emotionally stable nation.
Modern genealogical research, such as the Human Genome Project
and its findings, concur with the ancient principle (living concept)
of total inter-connectedness. Finding that the human genome contains
genetic sequences of all other living organisms, we are standing
at the top of the evolutionary ladder. Therefore within ourselves
through our genetic heritage we can find and relate to everything
that has been, is now and forever will be.
The Kahuna understanding is that, "our
space of existence is a magnitude that is our closest most
loyal, most loving friend that we have”.
Integrating Kahuna principles is a way of life, and although
we cannot be Kahuna, we can still achieve the level of knowledge
and power of the Kahuna for ourselves and be successful and bring
out the best in our own genetic line.
Striving for reality, presence
and excellence in the Here and Now, there is no need to cry for
our own lost culture. Via Hawaiian culture these ancient Kahuna
exercises enable us to find our own genetic knowledge and power.
Exercises from the ancient past, almost but not yet forgotten,
adapted and made available to us by one of the last real Kahuna.
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