Native American culture
This book is an elegy to a lost way of life, told in part by a curious narrator who serves as an interviewer, and told in part by the subject of that interview: Black Elk. Black Elk's role in his culture is helpful in recreating the imagery of the past because he is so vocal about the Native way of life. He celebrates culture as a literal day-by-day way of life to which he commits to the end. That is a vastly different portrait of culture than the white-washed and sanitized history that is often handed down in books.
Nature and spirits
A big part of what makes Native American religion unpalatable to modern American tastes is the pantheistic appreciation of nature. Different priests and shamans have different theologies, but in Black Elk's theology, the land is a visible component of a reality which is half visible and half invisible, but by shamanic insight he is able to discern the spirits from whatever evidence the universe manifests around him. In truth, this is not so different from certain kinds of Christianity, but in general this imagery is often misunderstood or lost in translation. The imagery is completed by the belief that instead of being one solitary individual, each individual is part of an interconnected web of life.
Gods and ancestors
When Black Elk starts to talk about his fate, he tips his hand and reveals some of the basic frameworks of his religious point of view. This involves a discussion of the gods. He goes by the will of the gods to the land where his forefathers are, and he meets six of his ancestors. He is the seventh, and he is allowed to possess the holy ring (in the vision) which symbolizes his divinity, because he is part of an infinite rebirth cycle that is evidenced in the vision by his ancestors. The imagery suggests that the journey of human life has something to do with attaining deity upon death. Black Elk expresses his opinion that he is not eligible because he failed to succeed in his (self-imposed!) duty.
Ecstasy and vision
From the sidelines, what would it look like for Black Elk to prophecy or summon the spirits of the earth? This kind of spirituality belongs to the category of religious experience called ecstasy. He experiences euphoric moments of transcendence, attaining spiritual visions that carry emotional significance through his entire life. The visions serve as pillars in his understanding of self, so that as he expresses the concrete imagery of his dreams, he also accidentally reveals the abstract imagery of his own self.
