Posted by Lani on October 22, 2000 at 07:22:07:
Firewalk #1
Aloha kakou,
Well I'm back from the Firewalk Initiation. I return well, as does Kahuna Keonaona who accompanied me. She is such a trooper. I present her with such unusual vacation opportunities.
There are lingering effects. Some kind of secret cognitive dissonance going on in my mind. Mostly I notice it when I am falling to sleep listening to the TV news. I sort of jar awake over and over as the subject turns (in my mind alone) into Firewalking. Then I say suddenly, for example, "what does the trouble in Palestine have to do with the Firewalk?" then I turn over and slip into the arms of Morpheous once again.
There is far too much to try to remember and post all at once, so I'll post a number of little posts on what happened.
Closure # 1
You have to understand about dogs. Each breed is made for a specific purpose.
The most ancient lineage of the Dog beings are the Lhasa Apsos of Tibet. They were bred to be sacred. To do exorcisms on their own. To telepathically sense danger to their Lama from hidden bandits, etc.
They are fellow participants with humans in some Buddhist religious ceremonies.
It is they who decided to join the Huna Heiau. My little guardian and companion is "Buxton", my little, shaggy, Lhasa Apso.
Our kumu, Kahuna I Ke Umu Ki, Michael McDermott, DD, told us about the only animal he had ever seen do a Firewalk.
A lady had been coming to several Firewalks he led or was at. She walked and was healed of her partial paralysis.
At one point, her little dog, quite independent of her, walked the glowing embers. No blisters, no rush, his hair which he dragged thorough the embers wasn't even singed. That little dog was a type of Lhasa Apso, called a Shi-Tsu!
Of course …
That was the only time he ever saw or heard of an animal do a sacred Firewalk.
Closure #2
During the initiatory week we were shown David Wiley's video on Firewalking. In it he, the world's leading "antichrist" of Firewalking or "debunker" starts off with showing a photo of a Firewalking event.
His assertion is that glowing embers have "low conductivity", hence, fire doesn't burn. When I showed him photos of Firewalking burns, he just slid over the material.
In 1949 the Kahuna I Ke Umu Ki, Tu-nui Arii-peu came to Honolulu and put on several Firewalks. This was attended with many HRAs (Huna Research Associates).
This wasn't an "American" style Firewalk, but an "Umu" style Firewalk. Done on large stones heated until they are white hot. The stones are very heat conductive. If there is an Umu style Firewalk, then David Wiley's thesis is blown to pieces, and remains where it started. It is a lie. Designed to prevent people from experiencing this sacred, and frequently life-transforming event.
Now, one of the HRA was chosen to return the sentient Fire to Huna, and started to be initiated, but the Kahuna died before he could complete the training.
He put together a little book on the Firewalk and put in it eight photos from the Firewalk he had taken.
Now bear in mind that David Wiley's thesis depends on the idea that no one walks on hot stones. When I put this in an e-mail to him, he denied that it was possible. I didn't pursue it. After all I didn't know. HRA Charlie Kenn's little book was published by my religion, the Huna Press in 1949. It was never reprinted. It is a little obscure publication produced by a little religion many years ago. But in it are photographs which disprove the entire "Scientific debunking" of the Firewalk.
Can you imagine my befuddlement when upon starting the David Wiley video, he starts off with one of the photographs from that very same book!?
Then the slime and spin starts. There is no attribution or credits given to the source of that photograph, which is us. It is never derscribed nor explained. David Wiley merely ignores it. Ignores a photograph which discounts all of what follows!
How bizarre, unwholesome and arrogant. To spin your story to pretend that you are being confirmed by that which would in fact debunk YOU if the audience only knew the story behind the photograph!
So much for Science and its Scientists …
The Spirit Dancers
It was the last Firewalk of our long week of experiences which seemed to place us all in some kind of borderland between mundane reality and sacred reality.
It was Kahuna Keonaona's turn to make the fire bed. It was to be a big fire. The stack of firewood became smaller as each night's Firewalk took its toll on it. But there was still a lot of wood there. More than we had ever burned before. Our kumu didn't want to haul it back from the hideaway we were doing these things at, so he decided we would use all that was left.
I had wanted to blow a firebreath on the fire to start it, but when time ran out, we just used a Butane lighter.
Once it was started, Kahuna Keonaona made the `Awa for us. I had created a simplified yet still formal ceremony to take it.
We drank the `Awa, and made the formal claps and oblations to the fire.
Keonaona and I chanted.
Then the "spirit dancers" came. I was the first one to see them. I asked another haumana there, Ed, who had walked about two dozen times if he had ever seen such a thing. But he had not, and was full of wonder too.
Our kumu has done many hundreds of Firewalks in the last decade and more. But he had never seen anything like it before either.
It was a big bonfire. There was little smoke, but what there was would collect at the edge of the bonfire and go downhill to the earth.
Arriving at the earth, it would collect and rise as a pillar of smoke, bending and dancing all around the fine. Mostly one at a time, but sometimes two or three.
They would circle around the fire. It was beautiful. Keonaona tried to get a photo of them, but I don't think those kinds of things photograph. If they come out, I'll post them.
Then Keonaona raked out the coal bed. Man what a job that is! And this was by far the largest and hottest fire we had had.
It was viciously hot. It was the second deepest bed of glowing heat, about six inches deep. About four feet wide and about fifteen feet long.
It was shaped sort of like a Kidney bean (which is sort of shaped like a Kidney, I suppose).
It was scary. Really scary. When I looked at the shimmering glow, there was a face clearly to be seen looking at me. When I reached my mind into the fire, I could feel the same challenge I had faced all week, it seemed to say, "Try to pet me if you can. See if I love you and accept you, or tear you to pieces. Maybe I'll protect you from harm. Maybe I won't. You have to be a man here. it isn't safe."
Our kumu announced that to honor the fire, this was to be a nude Firewalk, for those who decided to go without any pretense of artificial protection. Most of the haumana got nude, I wasn't so disposed. My loss. But I just don't feel that I'm that decorative in the buff.
I walked through the fire. It was my only walk that night. I was accepted, but the fire also bit me several times in a playful way. I'm not sure now, I might have walked twice. After a time of fright, day after day, they all begin to concatenate.
There was the supernatural protection, and the blisters was completely healed by morning, and no residual tenderness remained.
One of the nude haumana ladies slowed down on her walk, then simply stopped and stood in the fire. She walked three times that night and there were no symptoms. In fact on that night, I was the only one whom the fire had kissed (other people may remember things with small differences).
One of the major sources of peace, Ed, a nude Firewalker that night, slowed his walked until it looked like he was in slow motion. No symptoms.
Our kumu stood in the fire too. The fire accepted him for a minute, then got tired of the game and bit him a little to get him off the firebed.
One of the finest things was that every night he faced the sentient fire he was scared. Boy did I feel at home with that!
Whatever else you may hear about it, don't ever take it for granted! It isn't safe! People who are scarred stiff usually do just fine. Those who believe that fire doesn't burn, the fire enjoys teaching them something new.
It isn't safe. But it is sacred, and many if not most enjoy the acceptance and supernatural protection of the goddess Wahinenuiho`alani, through their own Aumakua.
A hui hou,
Kahuna Ho`anoiwahinenuiho`aLani