They told me I had been sick twelve days, lying like dead all the while, and that Whirlwind Chaser, who was Standing Bear’s uncle and a medicine man, had brought me back to life.
BLACK ELKCrazy Horse dreamed and went into the world where there is nothing but the spirits of things. That is the real world that is behind this one, and everything we see here is something like a shadow from that world….
More Black Elk Quotes
-
-
You remember that my great vision came to me when I was only nine years old, and you have seen that I was not much good for anything until after I had performed the horse dance near the mouth of the Tongue River during my eighteenth summer.
BLACK ELK -
I might have been less good to the people than some man who had never dreamed at all, even with the memory of so great a vision in me.
BLACK ELK -
Behold this day. It is yours to make.
BLACK ELK -
Know the Power that is Peace.
BLACK ELK -
We should understand well that all things are the work of the Great Spirit. We should know the Great Spirit is within all things: the trees, the grasses, the rivers, the mountains, and the four-legged and winged peoples; and even more important.
BLACK ELK -
As you walk upon the sacred earth, treat each step as a prayer.
BLACK ELK -
Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were.
BLACK ELK -
I cured with the power that came through me. Of course, it was not I who cured,it was the power from the Outer World.
BLACK ELK -
When I got back to my father and mother and was sitting up there in our tepee, my face was still all puffed and my legs and arms were badly swollen; but I felt good all over and wanted to get right up and run around.
BLACK ELK -
The power of a thing or an act is in the meaning and the understanding.
BLACK ELK -
The Holy Land is everywhere.
BLACK ELK -
The center of the universe is everywhere.
BLACK ELK -
I looked below and saw my people there, and all were well and happy except one, and he was lying like the dead – and that one was myself.
BLACK ELK -
And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being.
BLACK ELK -
Sometimes dreams are wiser than waking.
BLACK ELK