Word of the Day · Archive
The Hawaiian word for September 23, 2026
Archive · September 23, 2026
KAULIKE
say it: kow-LEE-keh
Equal, fair, just, balanced — literally, to hang even.
What it means
Kaulike is equality, equity, justice — and also the plain physical act of balancing. Pukui and Elbert give it as a noun, verb, and stative all at once: equality, equation, equity, justice; equal, impartial, just, mutual, parallel; to balance evenly, make alike, be in a similar situation, treat fairly and impartially, dispense justice. They even record a sense of two things arriving at the same time.
Andrews (1865) spells out where it comes from: kau and like, alike — “to balance or hang even.” Picture something hung so that neither side dips. From that image the word stretches to fairness between people, to impartial judgment, and in law, to deciding what is just and right rather than only what the letter of a statute says.
Modern Hawaiian (Māmaka Kaiao) keeps all of it working: kaulike is “balanced” in science, “even” in math, and “fair, just, equitable” everywhere else. One word covers the scale, the number line, and the courtroom.
How to use it
Kaulike shows up in the dictionary record in a handful of compact, well-documented phrases — from civil rights to geometry class.
Pono kaulike
“Equal rights and justice for all” — Pukui-Elbert’s gloss. Māmaka Kaiao renders it as justice, the quality of being impartial or fair. Pono (what is right) made even-handed.
Kaulike ʻole
“Unjust, unreasonable, uneven” (Pukui-Elbert). Add ʻole (not, without) and the balance tips — the everyday way to say something isn’t fair.
Helu kaulike · Kaha kaulike
“Even number” and “parallel line” (Pukui-Elbert; Māmaka Kaiao). The same word that means justice also means a number that splits evenly in two, and two lines that never lean toward each other.
Hoʻokaulike
“To equalize, balance” — the causative form, with the hoʻo- prefix: to make something even. Pukui-Elbert gives hoʻokaulike hoʻokaʻa, equalization of payments.
Why this word matters
This week the sun crossed the equator for the September equinox — the moment in the year when day and night come closest to even. It is a good week for a word whose root image is something hanging in balance.
Justice, in Hawaiian, starts as a thing that hangs even.
What makes kaulike worth learning is that it refuses to separate the physical from the moral. English keeps “balanced,” “even,” “parallel,” “fair,” and “just” in different drawers. Kaulike keeps them in one, which quietly suggests that fairness is not an abstract ideal — it is something you can see, like a load that doesn’t tip.
Andrews’ legal sense is worth sitting with too: kaulike as judging by what is just and right, not only by the letter of the rule. It is a standard you measure by, not a box you check.
Use it small. Splitting the last musubi, taking turns on the good wave, dividing the chores — that is kaulike at the scale most of us live.
Sources
Kaulike — nvi., equality, equation, equity, justice; equal, impartial, just, mutual, parallel; to balance evenly, make alike, be in a similar situation, treat fairly and impartially, dispense justice; to arrive at the same time — together with pono kaulike, kaha kaulike, helu kaulike, kaulike ʻole, and hoʻokaulike (with hoʻokaulike hoʻokaʻa), is from the Hawaiian Dictionary (Pukui & Elbert, 1986). The etymology (kau + like, “to balance or hang even”) and the legal sense are Andrews (1865), carried forward in Parker (1922). The modern senses (balanced, even, fair, equitable) are from Māmaka Kaiao. Pōʻakolu, Wednesday, is Pukui-Elbert (1986). All entries consulted via Wehewehe Wikiwiki (wehe.hilo.hawaii.edu) and wehewehe.org.