The 46,000 Muslims in New Zealand make up just 1 percent of the population, and they have not traditionally been represented in politics or public life. That has made the inquiry even more critical — and more challenging to conduct, as officials try to work out how to communicate with people who speak more than half a dozen languages and come from dozens of cultural backgrounds.

In a statement, a spokeswoman for the inquiry, Sia Aston, said the inquiry, known as a royal commission, wanted to hear from any member of the Muslim community who wished to offer input. She welcomed “victims and their families to meet with us on their terms at a place and time that is convenient to them.”

The Muslim advisory group, she had said earlier, was just one way the commission was consulting with the community. Memos released by the commission show that the inquiry has heard from few Muslim organizations. The list of those interviewed is otherwise made up almost entirely of government officials, security figures and academics.

Sondos Qur’aan, a law student who is a member of the advisory group, said the commission should have come to the broader Muslim community first.

“They keep telling us that this is for us, but I haven’t seen that yet,” she said. “We’re doing this as people who went through this, who know what’s going on, and who have questions that need to be asked of the government agencies.”

Ms. Qur’aan was among the 35 Muslims who gathered for the first time on a winter morning in late July at a traditional meeting house in Christchurch associated with the Maori Indigenous group. After a customary Maori welcome, the Muslim panelists asked the officials convening the meeting to leave the room so they could talk in private.