Visions and vision quests (Native American culture)
Visions and vision quests are significant spiritual practices within Native American culture, traditionally undertaken by individuals seeking personal and communal guidance. Primarily conducted by men, though sometimes by women, these quests typically involve fasting in isolation for several days, during which the seeker humbles themselves before a higher power, referred to as the Great Mystery. The aim is to receive spiritual insight, courage, or health—either for themselves or their families. This process often leads to profound personal revelations, which are later interpreted by a holy person.
The term "vision quest" stems from the Sioux language, meaning "to go out lamenting" or "crying for a dream." Each tribe may have its unique customs surrounding this practice, such as the Arapaho, who involve both men and women in their quests. Common outcomes of vision quests include receiving instructions for rituals, discovering healing herbs, or connecting with animal spirits that can aid the seeker. In contemporary settings, the vision quest has gained popularity but is often misunderstood and commercialized, which can detract from its original spiritual intentions. Overall, the vision quest remains a deeply personal journey meant to foster humility and community service through shared spiritual knowledge.
On this Page
Subject Terms
Visions and vision quests (Native American culture)
Tribes affected: Pantribal
Significance: In the vision quest, an individual fasts in a secluded place, seeking knowledge or help from the spiritual world
The vision quest is a ritual conducted traditionally by Native American men, but occasionally by Native American women, seeking spiritual help. The vision quest is a personal experience. In an isolated place—sometimes a secluded place away from the village, sometimes a confined space such as a pit—a man fasts, avoiding food and water, commonly for a period of four days. The man humbles himself before the Great Mystery and seeks health or help for himself or his family. For example, a man might seek the courage needed to undergo a Sun Dance, seek protection before going to war, or pray for the health of a sick relative. He might go on a vision quest in thanksgiving because a great gift has been bestowed, or he might simply seek help in providing food and shelter for his family. Afterward, a holy man interprets the dream or spiritual instruction that has been received during the fast. Personal visions are kept in confidence.
“Vision question” is an American term for the process. Nicholas Black Elk called it “to go out lamenting,” a translation of the Sioux word hanbleceya. Hanbleceya has also been translated as “crying for a dream,” or “night journey.”
To understand the purpose of a vision quest, the spiritual difference between “being called” and “having a calling” must first be understood. Among Indian nations it was not uncommon for young men, usually before they reached puberty, to have a profound religious experience in the form of a vision. The vision or dream involved one or more of the archetypal spirit masks of the tribe. A spiritual teacher would instruct a young man on how to use his visionary experience for the good of the people, since spiritual gifts were useless if not shared. The process of instruction about how to use the spiritual knowledge invariably involved fasting and sacrifice, the experience that in modern times has become known as the vision quest.
Whether men only or both men and women can seek visions is particular to each tribe. The fasting experience of the Arapaho involves teams of men and women chosen by elders, and it is sacred to that culture that sharing the experience with non-Arapahos is out of the question. Those in the Plains area, Eastern Woodland area, Southeast culture area, Great Southwest area, and Northwest Coast culture area trained their medicine people in very different ways, but in each case fasting and personal sacrifice were involved.
Traditionally, vision quests commonly resulted in instructions on how to use power from the spiritual world in the course of conducting tribal rituals and ceremonies, dreams of where to find curative herbs for the health of the people, or dreams of animals—these animals might help the seeker feed his family, help a warrior in battle, or help a scout in pursuit of the enemy. Animal visions often gave the seeker a song which would call that animal helper in the future.
Nearly all tribes shared the belief that anyone could have a personal, unique religious experience, one which was also sent for the good of all the people. Those with similar visions would form dream societies that might be dedicated to healing or to dancing—even sacred clown societies were formed. Spiritual gifts humble the gifted; in humility the power is enhanced. Thomas Mails’s Fools Crow: Wisdom and Power (1989) discusses Fools Crow becoming a “hollow bone” through which spiritual power flowed.
Today, if a man or a woman chooses to undertake a night journey to discover his or her calling or purpose in life, the person will usually present a gift and a cultural instrument of prayer (those from the Plains cultures use a stone pipe) to a respected holy person and ask for guidance and help in the undertaking. A purification rite is performed in a sweatlodge preceding the quest. The seeker is then taken to an isolated place by the holy man. The faster is told to stay in that place “no matter what happens” until the holy man returns. The vision circle in which the seekers stays is often a pit, but it does not have to be. When a pit is not used, prayer flags (colored cloth symbolizing the four directions, with tobacco offerings bundled into them and tobacco ties attached to a string) create a circle around the seeker. As described in Black Elk Speaks (1932): “Within the circle thus formed, two paths are created, one running north and south, the other east and west. The seeker walks these paths, praying and weeping.”
Finally, it should be noted that in recent years the vision quest has become widely known (as well as widely misunderstood) and commercialized; commercialization of vision questing disregards the original purpose of the rite: the channeling of spiritual healing or instructional power through an individual (a humble servant) to then be shared for the good of the people.
Bibliography
Brown, Joseph Epes, ed. The Sacred Pipe: Black Elk’s Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989.
Mails, Thomas E. Fools Crow: Wisdom and Power. Tulsa, Okla.: Live Oak Press, 1989.