Revitalizing the Ghost

This rite, according to Black Elk, was one of two that were conducted by Lakotans prior to the gift of the Buffalo Calf Pipe. It is the “oldest and most revered ceremony.”

Inikagha renews a person’s vitality. In traditional Lakotan thought, ‘ni’ is breath, and ‘niya’ is the ghost that is given to a person at birth and causes or animates ni. The strength of a person’s ghost fluctuates. When the ghost is so weak that it cannot cause breath, the person is dead. Inikaga revitalizes a person’s ghost.

Water is life. To release its breath, water is poured over heated rocks to create steam. This is done inside an initi, a low, domed structure of bent willows that are covered by blankets to contain the steam. One or more persons may be inside an initi. The rocks are heated in a fire outside of the initi, and then carried and placed into a hole in the ground at the center of the structure. Then the blankets are closed tight and water is poured over the hot rocks. A person inside the initi inhales the water’s breath, thereby strengthening her or his ghost so it can expel any impurities that make one tired or cause one to be sick or to think wrong. These impurities appear as sweat, and can either be wiped off while inside the initi, or rinsed off after the blankets are opened and the person crawls out of the structure.

Black Elk. Inipi: The Rite of Purification. In The Sacred Pipe: Black Elk’s Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux (Brown, Joseph E., ed.), 31-43. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1953, 1989.

Sword, George. Foundations. In Walker, James R., Lakota Belief and Ritual (DeMallie, Raymond J. and Jahner, Elaine A., eds.), 74-80. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980, 1991.

Sword, George. Life and Visions. In Walker, James R., Lakota Belief and Ritual (DeMallie, Raymond J. and Jahner, Elaine A., eds.), 83-84. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980, 1991.

Sword, George. Ni, Ini, and Initi. In Walker, James R., Lakota Belief and Ritual (DeMallie, Raymond J. and Jahner, Elaine A., eds.), 100. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980, 1991.

Tyon, Thomas, William Garnett, Thunder Bear, George Sword and John Blunt Horn. Foundations. In Walker, James R., Lakota Belief and Ritual (DeMallie, Raymond J. and Jahner, Elaine A., eds.), 100-109. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980, 1991.