Land Ideologies that Inform a Contextual Maori Theology of Land

Abstract

This paper is primarily concerned with a Maori theological perspective with regard to relationship to land. A series of traditional Maori concepts are employed to articulate this three-way relationship between God–Land–People. The ideolo-gies dealt with here were selected from a list of seven ideologies of land Maori identify with. The context is Aotearoa, the people referred to are the local indigenous people, namely Maori, also known as Tangata Whenua. To assist international readers some brief referencing to possible similarities and obvious differences with the Christian scriptural theological perspective have been applied. The paper seeks to share with the reader something of the depth of relationship Maori have to their environment generally and to land in particular.