Don, we had lots of "common garden spiders" on the Big Island. They are benign, but they sure don't look benign, especially when you come up on one at eye level. They all hang out in their webs with their legs paired off as in the picture, so they look like a big "X".

Aloha,
Mark

PS Hawaii has black widows and brown widows, but no brown recluse. But that doesn't stop lots of ER docs here from diagnosing brown recluse bites.