The Book of Heaven
The Nez Perces, a Native American people living in what is now Idaho, longed to read the Bible. Someone—perhaps a fur trapper, perhaps a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition—had told them of a book that would teach people how to better serve their Creator.
Six Nez Perces chiefs were sent east to find “the Book of Heaven.” Two died along the way and in 1831 four arrived in Saint Louis and were taken to meet the explorer General William Clark, who showed them the wonders of Saint Louis. While in the city, two of the four remaining chiefs died. Before going home to tell their people that they had not found the Book of Heaven, the last two chiefs were given a banquet in their honor by General Clark. One made this speech. My people sent me to get the white man's Book of Heaven. You took me where you allow your women to dance, as we do not ours, and the Book was not there. You took me where they worship the Great Spirit with candles, and the Book was not there. You showed me images of the good spirits and pictures of the good land beyond, but the Book was not among them to tell us the way. |
The Nez Perce chiefs walked nearly two thousand miles home and had to wait almost fifteen years. The first printing press in Idaho printed portions of “the Book of Heaven” in Nez Perce in the 1840s.
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