An Introduction into The Old Ways of the Traditional Cherokee Spirituality, Culture, and Practices
By Dr. Jody E Noé, MS, ND (U-yo-i wa-ya, Crazy Wolf) Eastern Cherokee Southern Iroquois United Tribe of South Carolina May 6, 2023
The purpose of the exposure to this ethnomedical botanical information is not for further wild crafting and harvesting…BUT to save our plants and their medicines that they so generously provide for us. If we lose our medicines we may loose our eventual cure! Please help save our medicines by preserving this information and not harvesting our endangered or at risk wild plants Cultivating these plant medicines is how the indigenous Southeastern Native Americans provided for generations, these precious plants for the future medicines Granny always had her own ‘sang’ patch!
MEDICINE
The word medicine to the Cherokee, in a traditional sense, means the way you approach your daily life: The Sacred you practice daily that connects you to your source The way you show devotion and humility to your higher power and extend your hand in kindness to others Healing and the connection with Spirit
These traditional values are the backbone of our Tribal Culture. Before we learn how to become Medicine People and Healers, all the women learn the first line of Medicine, the Household Medicine. But before we make medicine there are several cultural rituals that we observe in our daily lives that must happen first. This is a little introduction into those daily practices.
Going To Water
Getting up every morning before sunrise and going to a living branch of water (river, creek, stream, pond) and completely washing the water over yourself and over your head 7 times is one of our traditional daily practices of purification.
There are many ways to cleanse yourself, or purify. Smudges made from sacred plants: Sage, Tobacco, Cedar, Pine. Prayer and contemplation to your Higher Power or the Great Spirit/Mother Earth. Use your inner wisdom, your inner voice, the Voice within to Guide you
Rule of Fours
The Rule of Fours, where one must pass the plant that she is looking for, four times before gathering Also saying specific prayers of thanks for the Plant’s gift of medicine to the people. This is a standard practice for gathering all foods, plant or animal.
The Good Mind
Change your thinking! By using the ancient limbic parts of your brain you can change the patterning of your thoughts. Setting the tone before you go to gather to be in the “Good Mind”. In my training I had days where I could not speak, just witness the day, which taught me how to change my thinking over time
Talk to the Plants
Before leaving to gather set the Good Mind in motion. The Good Mind allows you to hear the voice of the Plants. Even a Plant that is not well known to you for its use can call to the seeker for a specific use for a specific person. This Traditional Plant medicine practice is always dynamic. It is never stagnant because different Plants may tell you different uses for individual treatments. Allowing the use of all Plants as directed by Spirit with continual conservation in action. Primary Medicine for many in the Tribes! Many Traditional Cherokee choose to practice traditional Plant medicine as their primary healthcare. Seen as a viable, functioning alternative to allopathic medicine throughout Indian Country: Decolonized Medicine! Indian Hospitals honor the cultural tradition by allowing medicine people to visit their clients
DAILY HOUSEHOLD MEDICINE
Always practiced by the women of the house. Matrilineal society where the women own the property, keep the money and carry the name. Part of Cherokee women’s medicine is to keep Harmony in the . household. Strawberry Plant is essential part of this medicine. Colds, Flues and other physical ailments where more likely treated by the women of the house. The medicine people or priests function at a higher level in the society. Eclectic practice that includes prayers, rituals, cleanings and ceremonies
Spirit, Mind, Body Medicine
Addresses everything from each sphere of a person that may be the cofactor in the stress that causes the illness: Physiological, Psychological, Financial, Spiritual ,Whatever the Spirit, Mind and Body needs
The practice is not just Plants as phytotherapeutic agents to healing In the cultural tradition the Plants are part of the delivery of the ritual of healing Prayers and their delivery helps to stimulate the person’s whole healing No matter what the etiology of the person’s affliction may be Thus people may come for a physical remedy People may come for a psychological remedy People may come for a spiritual remedy Or to ask counsel for finances Or bless their tobacco to make it safe for smoking or use in prayer
Why the wholistic approach taken by the medicine people works! Simple yet complex belief system with many of the original elements remain intact today Integral part of day to day life to reflect, give thanks and extend a hand of courtesy to your neighbor
Traditional Numerology
Certain numbers play an important role in Cherokee ceremony: Fours and Sevens repeat throughout myths, legends and ritual. Seven Spiritual directions, Seven Clans of the Cherokee. Four Cardinal directions
FOUR: Four represents all the familiar forces. Four Cardinal directions, East, North, West and South Colors of the Four Directions: East, red ; West, black (eastern) or yellow (western); North, blue; South, white (eastern) or black (western)
SEVEN: Seven the three spiritual directions + the four cardinal directions. Interdimensional number associated with infinity in relation to the Four Cardinal directions. Three other directions exist besides the Four. Up (Upper World, Heaven, Universal male). Down (Mother Earth, Red Lady in the Fire Dancing, Universal female). Center (your heart, your ancestors, where we live and where ‘you’ always are)
Also represents the height of purity and sacredness, a difficult level to attain. Seven levels of Heaven where only those highest of beings can exist in the seventh layer. Rebirth and reincarnation to reach the highest levels of being. Pine, Cedar, Spruce, Holly and Laurel also have attained this seventh level and are important to Cherokee ritual and ceremony
SACRED PLANTS
Cedar, Spruce, Pine, Holly and Laurel stayed awake seven nights during Creation. That is why they have their leaves all year long. Because they stayed awake they have special power and are among some of the most important in Traditional ritual and ceremony
The Circle
The Circle represents the Circle of Life. The multidimensional aspect of a Circle is the symbol of infinity! The Stomp Dance and other ceremonies involve movements in a circular pattern. In ancient times the fire in the council house was built by arranging the wood in continuous “X” so that the fire would burn in a circular path
The Water
The River waters were always believed to be sacred: For the water to be Living Water it must be moving and alive! Water is Life, without water there is no life! “Going to Water” is practiced for purification and spiritual awakening Often times a physical illness will not be healed without a spiritual washing Going to Water is an ancient tradition that is still practiced today
The Fire or Heat
Heat and Fire are an integral part of the ceremonies and customs of the Cherokee. The Sacred Fire is a part of the Stomp Dance and one of the highest regarded positions in the Cherokee is Fire Keeper Heat is used as an element in physical as well as spiritual healing By warming the hands the medicine person can apply the heat safely to any part of the persons body or aura
Tobacco
Tobacco is the vehicle in which the prayers of the humans can be carried to the Great Spirit. Sacred Smoke, or Holy Smoke. Also the Smoke of the Sacred Fire is Holy Smoke that can carry the prayers of the people. Tobacco is not to be inhaled during ceremony, or you will inhale the prayers. Protective herb Spiritually and used in ceremony and ritual for that purpose
Traditional Medicine Training
An apprenticeship takes decades of training. Usually, apprentices must be at least 30 years old, and can not begin their own traditional practice until they reach 50! Years of committing to memory the many formulas, rituals and ceremonies of the Medicine.
Traditional Practices
The Words of the chants - prayers can be sung or spoken. Usually accompanied by a physical procedure. Specialty herbal preparation. Tobacco smoke or prepared tobacco. Use of Living Water. Heat applications. Saliva or Breath. The Southeastern Woodland Natives continue to utilize their surrounding flora as primary medicines. For the sake of brevity we will look at only a few specimen in this presentation that represent well known plants as well as obscure plants
PLANT MEDICINES
Jack in the Pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum) Do ya tse /Indian Turnip: Used by many tribes as a bitter tasting stimulant, carminative, expectorant, and diaphoretic. Used topically by pounding the fresh root and mixing with other ingredients to form an ointment. Fresh roots powdered and mixed with honey and taken by the teaspoon was a traditional treatment for whooping cough and consumption (TB and cancer). Named for its tuberous root system. Traditionally used as an eclectic liniment of the beaten and then boiled roots. Also used as a poultice for boils and headaches. Ointment used topically for ringworm (Tinea corporis), tetterworm and other fungal dermatophytes
Sassafras (Sassafras albidum) Ka na s da tsi a di ta s di/Leaves that look like a shoe
Traditional Cherokee Plant that was adopted by the English settlers, the Thompsonians, and the Eclectics Used as tea for purifying the blood Eastern Cherokee use the tea today for the same reason but it is especially indicated for; Skin disease, Venereal disease, Ague, Rheumatism. Sassafras was a traditional ingredient in Root Beer: the bark steeped and used as a beverage; used for diarrhea, colds and flues, appetite suppressant, Lyme treatment, topical vulnerary wash and poultice. Western Cherokee use it as a tea to enhance other herbal formulas. Used as a blood purifier and tonic (often cancer traditionally seen as a “blood toxin”). Traditionally use only the ‘red’ sassafras and not the ‘white’ sassafras. Only young red plants are used. White young plants are considered poisonous! When in the field it can be observed that the stems of the sassafras are differently colored on individual plants. Some are red and some are white. It is said by Traditional people that the red stemmed plants are the medicinal and that the white stemmed plants are the poison
Traditionally used by the Eastern Cherokee as an astringent and tonic root tea Used for piles Used for cramps Nervine Poultice for sore eyes Ashes burnt for greenswitch for cancer Used traditionally by the Western Cherokee to treat thrush, vaginal candidiasis Topical antibiotic Digestive bitter Liver tonic Aperient. The Cherokee used this instead of Goldenseal
Passion Flower (Passiflora incarnata) U wa ga/ May Pops, Old Field Apricot
The plant was largely ignored in conventional North American medicine until the late 1800s, when it became a popular nineteenth-century remedy for insomnia. It finally received official recognition in the United States National Formulary from 1916 to 1936, and the aerial parts of the plant are used in herbal medicine. Passion Flower may be a useful bridge between traditional herbal medicine and the treatment of modern ills, especially in cases of anxious states, depression and patients trying to wean themselves from synthetic sleeping pills and tranquilizers.
The Houma tribe added it to drinking water as a tonic, and in the Yucatan, it was a remedy for insomnia, hysteria and convulsions in children. Other tribes used it in poultices to heal bruises, and the early Algonquians brewed Passion Flower in a tea to soothe their nerves. In 1783, a visiting European doctor described its use as a remedy for epilepsy, and other early physicians prescribed the fruit juice as a wash for sore and tired eyes.
Traditional Cherokee Used Ripe fruits used as kidney and bladder tonic tea or eaten as a fruit Also a social drink is made of the fruit and the fruit is also eaten as a food Root used as a beverage or taken as a tonic for the liver or pounded root tea used in ears as drops for earaches Taken internally to help with boils and skin conditions Topically the root is pounded and used as an anti-inflammatory applied as vulnerary Sedative nervine Anxiolytic and antispasmodic Useful for anxiety, nervousness tension, stress, nervous tension around menses, nervous headache, neuralgia, muscular nerve pain, teething in children, facial tics and insomnia (especially if mind racing) Vitalistic herbal guide for spiritual awakening
Spice Bush (Lindera benzoin) No da tsi a di ta s di/ Tea that Makes Friends out of Enemies
If we use the ‘old way’ of making peace within ourselves and our environment then the state of health is established because we are living in a disease free state As long as we have destruction of our Planet the Mother of us All, EARTH As long as we have War, Poverty, Discrimination amongst the peoples of the Earth We can never have true health and be disease free…Unless we make friends out of our Enemies!
Traditional Cherokee used a Tea beverage made from twigs and bark that is used as a ‘peace treaty’ inducing tea Beverage used to start negotiations with enemies as a token of friendship and peace Translation from Cherokee name literally means “Tea that makes friends out of enemies” Cherokee used any part of the plant is diaphoretic Used for colds, coughs, phthisis, croup Used for female obstructions (abortifacient) Bark steeped and used with pine needles and witch hazel as diaphoretic Spring tonic tea Used for hives Used to flavor possum and ground hog
Acts as a preventative for initial onset of an infective event (important in an immune compromised cancer patient) Expectorates and diaphoretic which helps to ‘clean out’ an infection through the respiratory and perspiratory functions has its own anti-microbial function too!
