TE UA HAUMENE, or HOROPAPERA, the founder of the Pai-marire religion, belonged to the Taranaki tribe. Born at Waiaua, the son of Tutawake and Paihaka, he was called 'Te Ua Tuwhakararo'. He was an infant when his father died, and at the age of three he was captured with his mother at the fall of the pa of Rimupiko and carried off to Kawhia, where he was brought up as a slave. He did not attend the mission schools, but from his Maori protectors he learned to read and write and could understand the New Testament. On the declaration of British sovereignty the released slaves returned to Taranaki, where Te Ua found that his brother and sister were dead and that the Wesleyan missionaries Creed and Skevington had commenced work. He became an assistant monitor under them, was baptised by Whiteley with the name of 'Tamati Horopapera' (Zerubbabel), and studied the Bible diligently. He acted for some time as a kai karakia, occasionally conducting service when the missionaries were absent.

Through the early land feuds in Taranaki Te Ua lived quietly, taking no part in the hostilities though he was later an adherent of the King movement. When Te Rangitake (q.v.) was attacked he and his fellow teachers went into the field, and continued their preaching with the warriors. He took up arms only when Wi Kingi was finally engaged with the soldiers.

When the Lord Worsley was wrecked Te Ua tried to persuade the natives not to plunder. Depressed by his lack of success, he became ill and saw visions. Parris, who met him a few months later, considered he was definitely insane. Having violently assaulted a woman of his own tribe, he was beaten and tied up by the husband. While in this position the angel Gabriel appeared again to him and ordered him to break his bonds, which unaccountably he managed to do. He now studied deeply the Revelations, and developed therefrom the Paimarire cult, which swept the tribes in the King confederation and even spread to friendly districts. He himself was the high priest, with Hepanaia and Rangitauria as assistants. His ritual and observances, half-heathen and half-Christian, and the sign of the raised hand (Ringatu) were symbolic of the religion, which survived the disastrous war in Waikato and has continued to the present day to influence certain sections of the Maori people. The Atua Pai-marire was a peaceful god who eschewed violence; but the apostles who carried the creed to distant tribes counselled and practised violence and revolting brutality, which revived some of the worst features of pristine barbarism. After the wreck of the Lord Worsley one of her masts was used as a niu pole, as enjoined by Gabriel. Thenceforward these symbols of the Hauhau cult spread from pa to pa. The new religion made great headway during 1862 and 1863 amongst the despondent adherents of the King movement in the Waikato, so that when the war broke out the purely political King movement vied with the religious upheaval of Pai-marire. Until the battle of Ahuahu (Apr 1864), in which the Hauhau first met the pakeha, Te Ua's influence had been mainly pacific. From that field the heads of the slain soldiers were borne by Hauhau prophets from tribe to tribe, with messages from Te Ua embodying promises believed to have been made to the Maori people by the angel Gabriel. By thus inflaming the warlike spirits of his followers, Te Ua destroyed his gospel of peace and from that time he lapsed into comparative obscurity. Other leaders, like Titokowaru and Te Kooti, adopted his mystical extravagances for the furtherance of their political policy. Shortly after Ahuahu, Hauhau soldiers were led into action by one of Te Ua's own prophets, Hepanaia Kapewhiti, who was shot dead. The leader himself moved from point to point in the next few years, generally avoiding the neighbourhood of the fighting. He was at headquarters at Weraroa when Hewett was murdered. Though Te Ua sent his emissaries of peace to outlying tribes, they were men of no standing, and their advent invariably inflamed the fighting spirit of the tribes with a dangerous fanaticism and encouraged the belief that the pakeha would be driven into the sea.

Early in 1865 Kereopate-Rau (or Tuwhawhe) and Patara Raukatauri made their advent amongst the Tauranga people in circumstances which led inevitably to the murder of Volkner and the dangerous excitation of the whole of the Urewera and the East Coast. In Sep 1865 Parris, by permission of the Governor, removed Te Ua from the rebels and settled him with Arama Karaka at his own place Matakaha near Opunake. There he lived quietly, and Parris suggested that he should be sent back to help pacify the district. He welcomed the arrival of troops at Opunake and took the oath, living on good terms with the soldiers and being frequently in the redoubt until deterred by his fear of Heremaia. At this juncture he was captured by General Chute and taken to Wellington (1866). His early release and return to his people created the impression that peace would soon be offered on the Hauhau terms.

Te Ua was a man of middle height, stout, with heavy features untattooed and a slight squint. The Rev R. Taylor says that he had had lessons in mesmerism while in Sydney, and this enabled him to mystify his followers and exaggerate his powers. On the ritual of Paimarire he stood at the foot of the niu reciting his incantations in a quaint jargon of English and Maori, with many Biblical allusions, while his followers ran round the pole giving the responses. These were generously interspersed with the exclamation 'hau', from which they derived their name. Mutilation of the dead and sacrifices to propitiate the gods of war harked back to the pre-pakeha days.

App. H.R., 1864 E8, E8a; 1865 E5; 1866 A8 p. 9; 1868 A4, p. 26; Buller; Cowan, Sketches (p); W. J. Williams; Southern Cross, 16 Mar 1866; Wanganui Chronicle, 21 Mar 1866.

Reference: Volume 2, page 209

🌳 Further sources