This English term is often attributed to unnamed Native Americans of many tribes. The meaning in English may be different from the meaning in native languages. “Many” probably meant “more than could reasonably be expected.” “Smokes” probably meant campfires, although I have read that one or more of the half dozen tribes who inhabited what is now Yellowstone Park as hunter-gatherers referred to the collective plumes of steam from the geysers as “Many Smokes” in their mother tongue.

Hunter-gatherers were a nomadic tribal people who moved when their food source moved elsewhere. In the movie, “Dances with Wolves,” the Sioux were hunter-gatherers who followed buffalo. Buffalo, being large furry beasts, tended to move to higher ground during the summer to reach cooler ground temperatures when it got too hot. The foragers of the tribe were usually women and children who collected grains, roots, berries, nuts, small game, and fish when the tribe settled down for a time when the main game stopped moving. Also, they gathered opportunistically while traveling when they recognized edible plants.

Keep in mind that the Sioux, Crows, Cherokee, and other tribes did not just happen in one day. All of them were descendants of the earliest Paleo Indians (the Clovis People), who inhabited what is now the United States for 10,000 years or more. The name Clovis was attached to these earlier people by the first prospector for some of their arrowheads (Clovis Points) in Clovis, New Mexico. Later native tribes essentially engaged in gathering and hunting, as their long-ago ancestors did. Some of the tribes today have stories that specifically mention mastodons as the main food source that was followed and hunted.

Did the Paleo Indians and later Native American tribes know God? Yes. They knew what God allowed them to know. They were all descendants of Adam. The natural world in which they lived was the work of God. People today are confused about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. The natives attributed to the Great Father (God) that he had the form of a spirit. It was his way of saying what Christians say today, “God in three persons.”

They were not present on the continent where Jesus was sent as the Christ to bear all sin upon himself. But, that does not mean that they are not saved. Also does not mean that any people before the time of Jesus are not saved. Web search, “How do people who lived and died before Jesus get to heaven?” I like the way Pastor John MacArthur answers the question. Pastor MacArthur bases his answer on Christian biblical scriptures. Search the web for John 14:6-9 and Revelation 21:3.