Black Elk

Black Elk was an Oglala Lakota holy man and healer whose account of his life became one of the best-known works of Native American spirituality. At nine he fell ill and received a great vision of the Six Grandfathers, the powers of the world, and at about twelve he was present at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. He went to Europe with Buffalo Bill's Wild West in 1887, stayed until 1889, and survived the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890. In 1904 he became a Catholic and served for decades as a catechist while keeping Lakota ceremonial knowledge alive. Black Elk Speaks (1932), shaped from his interviews with the poet John G. Neihardt, and The Sacred Pipe (1953), recorded by Joseph Epes Brown, describe a world in which all living things are related and held within a sacred hoop.

Key ideas

• All living things are relatives, children of one mother earth and one father sky.
• The sacred hoop of a people, and the circle found throughout nature, express the unity and renewal of life.
• A vision brings a duty: whoever receives power must use it for the good of the people.
• His later life suggests that Lakota ritual and Christian faith could be held together, a point scholars still debate.

Major works

• Black Elk Speaks (with John G. Neihardt, 1932)
• The Sacred Pipe (with Joseph Epes Brown, 1953)
• The Sixth Grandfather (Neihardt's interview transcripts, edited by Raymond J. DeMallie, 1984)

In the conversation

No topics yet. Start one about this thinker.