Not only were these harsh requirements put on the common people but they were constantly drafted into armies to fight when the ali'i wanted more power. Captured commoners were used as slaves or for sacrifice. The Hawaiian people were also decimated by these wars. By the time of Kamehameha, there had been some 300 years of nearly constant warfare.

John Young, Kamehameha's trusted foreign advisor, said in 1826 of the conditions he had observed during his forty-nine years in Hawaii, "I have known thousands of defenseless human beings cruelly massacred in their exterminating wars. I have seen multitudes . . . offered in sacrifice to their idol gods . . . "

The god Ku, and the new system, had severely oppressed the Hawaiian people.

Through all this oppression, the common people, the maka'ainana, retained great Aloha in their hearts. Their time of freedom from this oppressive system and cruel gods was soon to come.

A young warrior named Kamehameha rose from the ranks of the ali'i. He used the technology of the white man to conquer and unify the islands of Hawai'i. By unifying the Hawaiian Islands, King Kamehameha played a vital role in the maka'ainanas' coming freedom from the kapu system.

Finally, on October 3, 1819, six months after the death of Kamehameha the Great, the bondage of the kapu system was broken. This day was the first kapu day announcing the coming Makahiki, the sacred days of Lono, the God of Peace. Two brave women, wives of Kamehameha the Great, Ka'ahumanu and Ke'opuolani, and the new king, Liholiho (Kamehameha II), openly broke the kapu by eating together at a formal state occasion.

The Hawaiian people were in a state of shock! This was an undeniable public act of defiance. It sent an unmistakable message; the kapu system was no longer honored by the king and the highest ali'i in the land.

These three highest ali'i were supported by Kamehameha's prime minister, Kalaimoku, and also the highest kahuna in the land, Hewahewa, who was a direct descendant of Pa'an. Hewahewa was the first one to set torch to a heiau! Hewahewa also stated, "I knew the wooden images of deities, carved by our own hands, could not supply our wants, but worshipped them because it was a custom of our fathers . . . My thought has always been, there is one only great God, dwelling in the heavens." Ke'opyolani, the highest ali'i in the land said, "Our gods have done us no good, they are cruel."

Liholiho sent messengers to all the districts of Hawai'i ordering the heiaus desecrated and the images of the gods overthrown.

Contrary to popular belief, the missionaries did not force the Hawaiian people to desecrate their heiaus and destroy the images of their gods. The Hawaiian people, following the lead of the ali'i, rose up and broke the bondage of that evil system on their own.! The overthrow of the kapu system happened six month before the missionaries arrived!

The One True God, whom the Hawaiian people had worshiped before the coming of Pa'ao and the kapu system, was sovereignly preparing his people to return to Him!

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