Word of the Day · Archive
The Hawaiian word for June 29, 2026
Archive · June 29, 2026
MANA
say it: MAH-nah
Spiritual power — the unseen force that moves through people, places, and words. Authority that is felt long before it is claimed.
What it means
Mana is one of the oldest and widest-reaching words in ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi. The Pukui-Elbert dictionary defines it as supernatural or divine power — the kind once understood as an attribute of the gods — together with strength, might, and authority. It is also given plainly as “energy of character”: the spiritual force that can dwell in a person, a name, a stone, or a place.
To have mana is to carry a power that is felt rather than announced. A leader earns it, an ancestor passes it down, a sacred place holds it. And the word is not only a noun — used as a verb, mana means to give power to, to make strong. Power, in this telling, is something shared and built, not only possessed.
How to use it
A few documented forms show how far the word reaches — from everyday speech to the sacred:
mana loa
Great power; almighty. The intensifier loa pushes mana to its fullest measure.
hoʻomana
To place in authority, to empower, to authorize — and also to worship. The causative hoʻo- turns mana into the act of empowering, and by extension it became the word for religion itself.
manaʻo
Thought, idea, belief — the everyday word for what is on your mind. It opens with the same mana, a fitting echo in a culture that treats words and thoughts as carriers of real power.
Why this word matters
Mana is not something you can buy or print. It gathers — through pono action, through care for the ʻāina, through the trust (hilinaʻi) of others, through a name carried well across generations. A place can build mana over time, and a careless act can diminish it.
That is why mana sits beneath so much Hawaiian practice. It is why certain places are approached with reverence, why genealogies are recited with care, why a name is given weight. To the old understanding, even speech carries mana: to say a name aloud is to call on its power, and so words are chosen, not spilled.
Mana is power that is felt before it is claimed — earned, shared, and built, never simply taken.
There is a kind of accountability in that. If power accumulates through right action and erodes through careless action, then how you carry yourself is never only your own business. It adds to, or takes from, the mana of the people and places around you.
For anything made and named in these islands, mana is a quiet standard to measure against. The question is not how loud a thing is, but whether it adds to the mana of what it touches — or quietly spends it.
Sources
The definition of mana (supernatural or divine power; strength, might, authority; energy of character; and, as a verb, to give power to) is confirmed in the Pukui-Elbert Hawaiian Dictionary via wehewehe.org (Nā Puke Wehewehe ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi). The compounds mana loa (great power, almighty) and hoʻomana (to empower, authorize; to worship; religion) are documented in the same source, as is manaʻo (thought, idea, belief).