Mystery religion

	Email		Print
	Bookmark		Link

Mystery religion

Mystery Religions, Sacred Mysteries or simply Mysteries, were "religious cults

Cult (religious practice)

In traditional usage, the cult of a religion, quite apart from its sacred writings , its theology or mythologys, or the personal faith of its believers, is the totality of external religious practice and observance, the neglect of which is the definition of impiety....
of the Graeco-Roman world, full admission to which was restricted to those who had gone through certain secret initiation rites."

term "Mystery" derives from Latin mysterium, from Greek musterion (usually as the plural musteria µ?st???a), in this context meaning "secret rite or doctrine." An individual who followed such a "Mystery" was a mystes "one who has been initiated," from myein "to close, shut," a reference to secrecy (closure of "the eyes and mouth") or that only initiates were allowed to observe and participate in rituals.

Discussion

Ask a question about 'Mystery religion'

Start a new discussion about 'Mystery religion'

Answer questions from other users

Full Discussion Forum

Definition

The term "Mystery" derives from Latin mysterium, from Greek musterion (usually as the plural musteria µ?st???a), in this context meaning "secret rite or doctrine." An individual who followed such a "Mystery" was a mystes "one who has been initiated," from myein "to close, shut," a reference to secrecy (closure of "the eyes and mouth") or that only initiates were allowed to observe and participate in rituals. Mysteries were often supplements to civil religion

Civil religion

The intended meaning of the term civil religion often varies according to whether one is a sociologist of religion or a professional political commentator....
, rather than competing alternatives of such, and that is the reason these are referred by many scholars as "mystery cults" rather than religions. The Mysteries were thus cults in which all religious functions were closed to the non-inducted and for which the inner-working of the cult were kept secret from the general public. Although there are no other formal qualifications, mystery cults were also characterized by their lack of an orthodoxy and scripture. Religions that were practiced in secret only in order to avoid religious persecution are not by default Mysteries.
The Mysteries are frequently confused with Gnosticism

Gnosticism

Gnosticism refers to diverse, syncretistic religious movements in antiquity consisting of various belief systems generally united in the teaching that humans are divine souls trapped in a Nature created by an imperfect god, the demiurge; this being is frequently identified with the Abrahamic God, and is contrasted with a superior entity, ref...
, perhaps in part because Greek gnosis
Gnosis

Gnosis is the spiritual knowledge of a saint or mysticism human being. In the cultures of the term gnosis was a special knowledge or insight into the infinite, divine and uncreated in all and above all, rather than knowledge strictly into the finite, natural or material world which is called Epistemological knowledge....
means "knowledge." The gnosis of Gnosticism is however distinct from the arcanum, the "secret wisdom" of the Mysteries: while the Gnostics hoped to acquire knowledge through divine revelation, the mystery religions presumed to have it, with mystes of high rank revealing the possessed wisdom to acolytes of lower rank.

Mystery cults classified as such

The term 'mystery cult' applies to a few of the numerous religious rituals of the eastern Mediterranean of late classical antiquity

Classical antiquity

Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome....
, including the Eleusinian Mysteries

Eleusinian Mysteries

The Eleusinian Mysteries were initiation ceremony held every year for the Cult of Demeter and Persephone based at Eleusis in ancient Greece. Of all the mysteries celebrated in ancient times, these were held to be the ones of greatest importance....
, the Dionysian Mysteries

Dionysian Mysteries

The Dionysian Mysteries probably began as an ancient initiation society, or family of similar societies, centred on a primeval nature god , apparently associated with horned animals, serpents and solitary predators , later known to the Greeks in the eclectic figure of Dionysus....
, the Orphic Mysteries and the Mithraic Mysteries. Some of the many divinities that the Romans nominally adopted from other cultures also came to be worshipped in Mysteries, so for instance Egyptian Isis

ISIS

ISIS is an industry standard interface for technologies, developed by Pixel Translations in 1990 .ISIS is an open standard for scanner control and a complete image-processing framework....
, Thracian/Phrygian Sabazius and Phrygian Cybele

Cybele

Cybele , was the Phrygian deification of the Earth Mother. As with Greek Gaia , or her Minoan civilization equivalent Rhea , Cybele embodies the fertile Earth, a goddess of caverns and mountains, walls and fortresses, nature, wild animals ....
.

"Plato

Plato

Plato , was a Classical Greece Greeks philosopher, mathematician, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Platonic Academy in Ancient Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the western world....
, an initiate of one of these sacred orders, was severely criticized because in his writings he revealed to the public many of the secret philosophic principles of the Mysteries."

Mystery religion

Definition

Mystery cults classified as such

See also

Further reading