Psalm 23 : The North American Plains Indian Version

Psalm 23 : The North American Plains Indian Version
August 19, 2012

From their first encounters with Christian missionaries, the North American Plains Indians used universal sign language to communicate  Psalm 23  among tribes who spoke different oral languages.

In 1894, Isabel Crawford, a Baptist missionary to the Kiowa Indians in Oklahoma, translated the Sign Version into literal English. Here is the  Psalm 23 translation:

The Great Father above is a shepherd Chief.
I am His and with Him I want not. 
He throws out to me a rope and
the name of the rope is love and
He draws me to where the grass is green
and the water not dangerous,
and I eat and lie down and am satisfied. 

Sometimes my heart is very weak and falls down but 
He lifts me up again and draws me into a good road. 
His name is WONDERFUL. 

Sometime, it may be very soon,
it may be a long, long time. 
He will draw me into a valley. 
It is dark there, but I’ll be afraid not,
for it is in between those mountains
that the Shepherd Christ will meet me
and the hunger that I have in my heart
all through this life will be satisfied.

He gives me a staff to lean upon.  
He spreads a table before me
with all kinds of foods. 
He puts His hand upon my head
and all the “tired” is gone. 
My cup He fills till it runs over. 

What I tell is true.
I lie not. 
These roads that are “away ahead”
will stay with me through this life and after;
and afterwards I will go to live
in the great house and sit down
with the Shepherd Chief forever.

~ Isabel Crawford (Missionary to the Indians of the plains)

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