Maori Cosmology — Te Ao Maori

An icebreaker

As Te Ao Māori holds it, existence unfolds through three phases: Te Kore, Te Pō, and Te Ao Mārama, before the sky father Ranginui and earth mother Papatūānuku are separated by their own children, bringing light into the world.

Ask one of these · tap to take it

What comes before anything, in a tradition that starts with nothing?
Why would children need to separate their own parents?
What does it mean to read the stars as ancestors?
How does a tradition hold ecology and cosmology together?

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Worth knowing · 1 of 5

What are the three phases the tradition describes?

The tradition holds that existence unfolds through Te Kore, a state of potential before form; Te Pō, a long night in which the atua, or gods, take shape; and Te Ao Mārama, the world of light we now inhabit.

Worth knowing · 2 of 5

What is the story of Ranginui and Papatūānuku?

The tradition holds that the sky father and earth mother once lay locked together, their children living in darkness between them, until the children forced them apart, releasing light and giving rise to the visible world.

Worth knowing · 3 of 5

What is whakapapa?

It is genealogy in the widest sense: a way of tracing connection not only between people but between people, land, stars, and other living things, linking the present back through named ancestors to the origin itself.

Worth knowing · 4 of 5

How does the tradition read the night sky?

Star clusters such as Matariki are read as markers tied to harvest, remembrance, and the coming year, with named stars and their risings carrying seasonal meaning passed down through generations of dedicated observers.

Worth knowing · 5 of 5

Is this still a living framework today?

Yes. Mātauranga Māori, the wider body of traditional knowledge this cosmology sits within, continues to inform teaching, environmental practice, and public life in New Zealand, carried forward by tribal knowledge-holders and increasingly by universities.

Words to know

Te KoreThe primordial void or realm of pure potential preceding form, the first of three cosmological phases.

Te Ao MāramaThe world of light, the current phase of existence following the separation of sky and earth.

WhakapapaGenealogy in a broad sense, tracing connections between people, land, and other beings back to common origins.

More words

Mātauranga MāoriThe wider body of traditional Māori knowledge, encompassing this cosmology alongside ecological, medicinal, and social knowledge.

MatarikiA star cluster whose rising marks the Māori new year, tied to remembrance, harvest, and seasonal renewal.

A voice · 1 of 3

Te Ahukaramū Charles Royal · Māori scholar of mātauranga Māori

In his writing on Māori epistemology, he described Te Ao Mārama as the framework from which all traditional Māori knowledge develops, using it to describe both the creation narrative and the wider worldview it supports.

A voice · 2 of 3

Rangi Mātāmua · Professor of Mātauranga Māori, astronomer

Drawing on a 19th-century manuscript passed down through his own family, he has researched and published extensively on named stars and constellations, including the meaning and timing of Matariki, reviving practices nearly lost to written record.

A voice · 3 of 3

Māori Marsden · Tohunga, minister, and philosopher

In essays collected as The Woven Universe, he set out a Māori philosophical account of creation and the relationship between spirit and world, addressing how the tradition's concepts relate to Christian theology and Western physics.

A line to leave them with

Some traditions start with something. This one starts with pure potential.