Cherokee Ancestors

Straight from the Cherokee Nation Click for in depth parallels between ancient Cherokee religion and Christianity by Chief Jahtlohi Rogers

'Jesus Before Columbus Time'
A Cherokee story by Edna Chekelelee!

A story from,
"Living Stories of the Cherokee"
By Barbara R. Duncan

"Before the Columbus time" we lived in log houses, we never did live in Tipis. And on each end of the Indian Village where we lived would be one of these crosses would sit on each corner of the village, and it's much bigger than this.

I carry this to show you what I'm talking about. This is a circle meaning four corners of the world. We live, we're sitting on four corners of the world. And right in the middle is the cross where Jesus died.

And Columbus came, he said, "What's that?"

We said, "Well, this is what represents what we believe in. What was our hearts. And this is where Jesus died on the cross."

And each color represents something. Red is purest blood, and that's East and means success. And White is peace. Jesus has made peace for us where it was rough before. And we got punished before. Nowadays it's so much easier, all we have to do is believe in him in our hearts as we walk "close to Thee."

Red-East, White-South and West is Black - and honor the dead. And the North is Blue. And Green, Green is our Mother Earth which we walk on.

When you're walking on the Mother Earth and see trash, pick it up, keep your Mother Earth Clean, by doing that you keep her clean.

All right, we go on down, and this Yellow, which is sunrise and someday we're going to see sunrise and God's son will be coming. So I thought we'd pass that on.

And Columbus say "How did you know that?"

"We always knew it; we knew that God was in our hearts, and He always told us what was right and wrong. When we go and do something wrong, we always knew it was going to be wrong. So we always have to keep our hearts clean by believing in Him and as He died for us, for our sins."