Secrecy is the most famous and constant characteristic of mystery cults, from which the modern meaning of the word mystery develops.

But secrecy was not characteristic of mystery cults alone in the ancient world. The details of some adolescent rites of passage and many other gender-specific rites were kept secret both from the young people who had not yet been initiated and from all members of the opposite sex. In ancient Sparta, in fact, the name for male rites of passage was Krypteia (The Hidden Ritual). Guild initiations were kept secret as well.

Moving outside of these two phenomena, we find plenty of others: in some societies, only the king or a certain priest might know, for example, where a particular sacred place was situated and how to tend it, or how to use and interpret the secrets in a sacred book. In Egypt, for instance, the priestly "overseer of secrets" alone knew where certain figurines were buried, and only the pharaoh, in his role as chief priest of the sun-god, had access to certain mortuary texts. In Athens, only one family, the Gephyraioi, had access to a special temple of Demeter Achaia. In Mesopotamia as we have seen, the crafts of writing and reading-and, therefore access to sacred documents-were closely guarded not only by limiting access to the academy but by employing cryptographic writing in some cases. Throughout the Mediterranean, practitioners of magic possessed secret methods of accomplishing remarkable things by trickery, and guarded them well.

But all forms of secrecy are not the same. We must distinguish between "absolute" secrecy-that is, a situation in which the very existence of something is unknown to outsiders-and "relative" secrecy-a situation in which outsiders know that something exists but do not know all of its details (mysteries are an example of the latter). Absolute secrecy, in fact, is uncommon in religious systems that do not embrace concepts of orthodoxy and heresy for two reasons.

First, absolute secrecy is uncommon because unless a given practice or belief is outlawed, there is no need to hide it. Outside of Christianity and Judaism, concepts of orthodoxy and heresy were virtually unknown in ancient religions and so, therefore, was the need for absolute secrecy. A partial exception is the covert practice, for strategic or social reasons, of acts that are otherwise well known and accepted. For example, silent prayer was unusual in the ancient Mediterranean; when people prayed silently, this usually meant that they were asking for something they did not want others to know about. A charioteer might pray silently when asking a god to hobble his opponent's horses so that the opponent would not hear the prayer and counteract it with one of his own. The would-be adulterer might pray silently for help in seducing a married woman. The technique (prayer) is socially accepted even if the ends to which it is directed must be hidden.

Second, absolute secrecy is uncommon because religious systems, or cults within religious systems, need to advertise themselves and their advantages, both in order to gain converts or initiates and in order to win prestige (the two goals are closely linked). And here, ironically, secrecy helps: nothing appeals to human nature more than something that is described as secret, as contemporary advertisers know well. The appeal lies partially in the promise that those who join will garner special advantages (i.e., that the secrets are valuable) but partially in the sheer fact that in learning them one becomes part of a special group, be it the group of Bacchic initiates, adult men, stonecutters, caretakers of the hero's secret cult, or something else.

Of course, these remarks look at matters from the outside; members of secret groups have other explanations for their secrecy, such as the need to protect gender-exclusive knowledge from the potentially ruinous interference of the other gender or the need to shield a divinity's benefits from those who had not been properly prepared to receive them. Hekhalot mystics, for example, avoided discussing what they knew outside of their own circle, claiming that it could cause damage in the hands of the uninitiated; mystics in Egypt and Mesopotamia made similar statements. But this is not to say that all ancient individuals looked at mysteries from the inside; Plato and others remarked on the way in which itinerant priests of the mysteries used their claims of secret knowledge to line their own pockets. Other ancient outsiders, particularly the early Christian writers, attacked the mysteries' claim to secrecy from a different direction, charging that it cloaked behavior that was not only heretical by Christian standards, but illegal and inhuman, such as cannibalism and human sacrifice; the Romans who opposed the Bacchanalia in 186 BCE used a similar argument. This is an old trick, but a perennially effective one: those who share a secret that has been attacked cannot defend it without betraying it.

A final observation about secrecy in mystery cults takes us back to the issue of community. Most groups that share secrets share other characteristics as well: adolescents who undergo a rite of passage share not only the secrets they learn in the process but the preexisting fact that they are male (or female) and of a certain age. Guild initiates share their intention to pursue a certain craft and, typically, also share membership in the same socioeconomic class. Most mystery cults, in contrast, drew initiates from a broad socioeconomic spectrum, from both genders, and from all age groups. Mithraism is an exception, insofar as it was restricted to males. The Eleusinian mysteries are another partial exception, insofar as they did not allow the initiation of children (except for one special child initiated each year on behalf of the city), but otherwise they were markedly catholic: so long as a person had the ability to understand Greek and did not carry the stain of murder on his or her hands, he or she was welcome at Eleusis. The lack of other unifying characteristics among initiates in most mystery cults makes the demand for secrecy-and whatever it was that the demand for secrecy shielded-all the more important in defining the initiates' identities as members of the cult. This identity did not extend very far into life outside of the cult, but the very pledge that initiates gave to guard the secret for the rest of their lives (and, as far as we can tell, almost all initiates kept to this promise) would have worked to remind them thereafter of the group that they had joined and what they had gained in doing so.

Meaning and Community.

Mystery initiation has a great deal in common with Mediterranean rites of passage. The adolescent undergoes a rite from which he or she emerges as an adult; the unmarried woman emerges from the wedding ceremony not only as a married woman in the sense of having a husband, but in the sense of being, in the eyes of her society, a different sort of woman altogether, with new responsibilities and rights. Some scholars have even suggested that the Eleusinian mysteries, and perhaps other early Greek mysteries, developed out of clan-based adolescent initiation rites: the Eleusinian priesthood was controlled by two Athenian clans, the Eumolpidai and the Kerykes, and in the myths connected with some mysteries, an adolescent or child (Persephone, Dionysus) experiences the sorts of transitions that are often associated with rites of passage in myth, such as death, marriage, and rebirth. Iconography and myth, moreover, associate Demeter (and sometimes Persephone) with the care and maturation of children, both at Eleusis and elsewhere.

But the mysteries' broader similarity to rites of passage, as procedures that process individuals and enable them to emerge as something new, prompts another observation: most parts of Greece (including Athens, home of the Eleusinian mysteries) had no rites of passage that formally and explicitly changed adolescents into adults, at least during historical times; what we find instead in some places are optional rites that celebrate the maturation of a few individuals (which usually meant the children of the noble and the wealthy). Why earlier, more-widespread rites of passage died out (if they ever existed at all) is a question we cannot consider here, but we can at least ponder the striking correlation: it was precisely in a culture from which rites of passage were missing that mysteries developed. Rome, which eagerly adopted Greek mystery cults and then went on to create some of its own, similarly shows few traces of adolescent rites of passage after the 3rd century BCE. It is tempting to see mysteries, which promised to "complete" or "perfect" (telein) individuals, as developing to fill a gap.

Another sort of ritual in which individuals undergo experiences and then emerge with a new status are initiations into professions, such as blacksmithing, or into roles, such as priest or king. Egyptian artisans of many sorts were initiated into their professions, and Mesopotamian priests were initiated into the priesthoods of Nanna and of Enlil and Ninlil, for example. Like adolescent rites of passage, these sorts of rituals can be glimpsed behind some mysteries. The Samothracian mysteries preserve traces of blacksmiths' guild initiations (e.g., the iron rings that initiates wear and the worship of artisan divinities called Kabeiroi). The predilection of soldiers for the Mithraic mysteries may also point toward a group with guildlike bonds, and the seven grades of Mithraic initiation suggest an interest in delineation and assumption of hierarchical roles.

One possible link between guild initiations and mysteries is that both promise to let the individual in on valuable secrets-secrets that will en¬able them, in the case of guilds, to prosper in their profession and, in the case of mysteries, to prosper in life more generally-or prosper after death. Not so long ago, indeed, the English word mystery could be used to refer to one's trade or occupation. Although linguists tell us that this use really derives from the Latin word ministerium (service, work), its development was influenced by the Greek mysteria and its connotations: an apprentice was understood to be initiated into the secrets of his craft by his master. Masonic mysteries straddle the two significations.

Even when contextualized within these other forms of initiations, however, one strikingly unusual characteristic of the mysteries still sets them apart: they were not mutually exclusive. One could be initiated into as many mystery cults as one desired and could afford; during the imperial period, wealthy individuals made a "grand tour" of them. Into some mysteries, moreover, one might be initiated more than once. This is different from adolescent initiations, for example, in which the transition from child to adult is singular, irreversible, and without any need (or, usually, possibility) of supplementation. It is also different from initiation into guilds insofar as individuals seldom had more than one profession and therefore more than one guild membership. By the same token, mystery initiation is different from initiation into a position such as kingship, which usually is held exclusively of other such positions.

One reason that mystery cults may have tolerated and even supported multiple memberships among initiates was that the benefits they promised were garnered not so much by entering into a community of people who would support one another (as in the case of an adolescent entering the adult community or an apprentice entering a guild) as by making the personal acquaintance of one or more gods. In a polytheistic system, the more gods one knew, the better, and particularly in a polytheistic system such as the Greeks had, where there was no concept of dualism or of orthodoxy and heresy, there was no need to avoid one god in order to please another.

Mystery initiations, then, in contrast to other forms of initiation, focused more closely on the individual as an individual than they did on the individual as a new member of a group. Even at Eleusis, where hundreds or thousands were initiated on the same night, each initiate had to have his or her own mystagôgos who performed the salient acts constituting initiation, whatever they were. Other mysteries, such as those of Dionysus or Meter, were promulgated partly by independent practitioners who initiated one or a few people at a time. If we believe Apuleius's account, Isiac initiation was individualized as well.

This is not to say that there was no concept of community at all among initiates: Dionysiac initiates might celebrate the god within a thiasos of participants that remained the same and called each other symmystai (fellow initiates). At some point during many mysteries, there was communal feasting most notably in the cult of Mithras, whose places of worship included dining couches-and after death, initiates might expect to continue feasting and rejoicing with others of their kind. There is evidence for Dionysiac initiates helping to ensure that their fellows were properly buried and that the celebrations of the thiasos were well funded. But by and large, we lack indications that initiates felt an obligation to one another; the bond forged among them was not one of codependence, but rather of shared privilege. Plato mentions that common initiation into mysteries contributed to building a friendship, but he also makes it clear that this was just one among many other social ties that the two friends shared-it was the sort of thing that men of their stature did (Letters 7.333 e). them, in the case of guilds, to prosper in their profession and, in the case of mysteries, to prosper in life more generally-or prosper after death. Not so long ago, indeed, the English word mystery could be used to refer to one's trade or occupation. Although linguists tell us that this use really derives from the Latin word ministerium (service, work), its development was influenced by the Greek mysteria and its connotations: an apprentice was understood to be initiated into the secrets of his craft by his master. Masonic mysteries straddle the two significations.

Even when contextualized within these other forms of initiations, however, one strikingly unusual characteristic of the mysteries still sets them apart: they were not mutually exclusive. One could be initiated into as many mystery cults as one desired and could afford; during the imperial period, wealthy individuals made a "grand tour" of them. Into some mysteries, moreover, one might be initiated more than once. This is different from adolescent initiations, for example, in which the transition from child to adult is singular, irreversible, and without any need (or, usually, possibility) of supplementation. It is also different from initiation into guilds insofar as individuals seldom had more than one profession and therefore more than one guild membership. By the same token, mystery initiation is different from initiation into a position such as kingship, which usually is held exclusively of other such positions.

One reason that mystery cults may have tolerated and even supported multiple memberships among initiates was that the benefits they promised were garnered not so much by entering into a community of people who would support one another (as in the case of an adolescent entering the adult community or an apprentice entering a guild) as by making the personal acquaintance of one or more gods. In a polytheistic system, the more gods one knew, the better, and particularly in a polytheistic system such as the Greeks had, where there was no concept of dualism or of orthodoxy and heresy, there was no need to avoid one god in order to please another.

Mystery initiations, then, in contrast to other forms of initiation, focused more closely on the individual as an individual than they did on the individual as a new member of a group. Even at Eleusis, where hundreds or thousands were initiated on the same night, each initiate had to have his or her own mystagôgos who performed the salient acts constituting initiation, whatever they were. Other mysteries, such as those of Dionysus or Meter, were promulgated partly by independent practitioners who initiated one or a few people at a time. If we believe Apuleius's account, Isiac initiation was individualized as well.

This is not to say that there was no concept of community at all among initiates: Dionysiac initiates might celebrate the god within a thiasos of participants that remained the same and called each other symmystai (fellow initiates). At some point during many mysteries, there was communal feasting most notably in the cult of Mithras, whose places of worship included dining couches-and after death, initiates might expect to continue feasting and rejoicing with others of their kind. There is evidence for Dionysiac initiates helping to ensure that their fellows were properly buried and that the celebrations of the thiasos were well funded. But by and large, we lack indications that initi¬ates felt an obligation to one another; the bond forged among them was not one of codependence, but rather of shared privilege. Plato mentions that common initiation into mysteries contributed to building a friendship, but he also makes it clear that this was just one among many other social ties that the two friends shared-it was the sort of thing that men of their stature did (Letters 7.333 e).

Later developments.

Already in the classical period, mystéria and cognates such as mystés (initiate) could be used metaphorically to refer to matters that were difficult to grasp but important for a person's welfare. Plato, for example, often uses them to describe the process of learning philosophy (e.g., Menexenus 76e). Philosophical metaphor became reality in later antiquity, however, when some Platonists used mysteria, mystés, and other terms to refer both to varieties of Platonic philosophy that emphasized spiritual development through the acquisition of esoteric knowledge and to rituals that brought the philosophers into close contact with the gods (Chaldaean Oracles, frag. 132). Interaction with the gods was expected to purify the philosopher's soul, enabling it to ascend into the divine realm and eventually, after death, escape the circle of reincarnation to which other souls were condemned.

Meanwhile, a singular form of the word mystéria (mysterion) came to denote simply a secret in the sense of something an individual wanted to keep hidden from others; we encounter this meaning frequently in the Jewish Apocrypha (e.g., Jdt. 2,2, Sir. 27,17). Partaking of all these meanings were ancient magicians' uses of the words: a "mystery" could be a special tool or technique that a magician might wish to keep hidden from other magicians in order to preserve his competitive edge; a technique that the gods had given the magician; a procedure into which one magician had to initiate another-or several of these things at the same time, as a single spell from a single magical papyrus demonstrates (PGM IV.723, 732-50, 794).

Lingering behind some of these uses, both philosophical and magical, was the concept of ineffability-that is, the idea that something remained hidden because its divine nature simply could not be expressed by human words. To understand a mystery, one had to experience it oneself or learn it directly from the gods.

Some early Christian uses of mystery align with the developments that we have just reviewed: for instance, God's mysteries were made known to humans by divine revelation (Eph. 3.3) or by special instructions that only an inner circle would understand (Matt. 13 . II); God's mysteries promised salvation to the individual soul, particularly eschatological salvation; certain aspects of God's plan for humans were ineffable mysteries (Col. 1.27). But the word developed in an interesting new direction as well and took the idea of mystery religions along with it. Christ's disciples proclaimed themselves to be eager to reveal God's mysteries to anyone who would listen; they erased any division between initiate and noninitiate and rejected the need to undergo special rituals before receiving valuable information (i Cor. 15.5 1; Eph. 3.9). As Paul and Timothy said: "pray for us also, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ ... that I [Paul] may make it clear" (Col. 4.3-4). The use of mystery to mean a secret that must be kept, as we see it used in the Jewish Apocrypha, for example, is absent. As a proselytizing religion that aimed to build the largest possible community as quickly as possible, Christianity used the lure implicit in the word mystery more boldly than anyone pre viously had and in doing so turned one of the best-known qualities of mystery religions-privilege through exclusivity-upside down.

It is in part their air of exclusivity-and correlatively, the tantalizing chance that we might conquer exclusivity and seize knowledge that the Greeks and Romans (unlike Paul and Timothy) strove to keep hidden-that makes ancient mystery religions so attractive even now. For some, attaining that knowledge promises the same sort of spiritual benefits that it promised two thousand years ago, as a search of "mysteries" on the internet will demonstrate: throughout the world, neopagan groups busily process new initiates. For others, it promises the same sort of satisfaction that one gets from solving other scholarly puzzles, only more so-after all, knowledge of the ancient mysteries has been occluded not only by the same intervening centuries that dim our knowledge of all aspects of ancient cultures, but also by deliberate concealment. Any scholar who turns up a new bit of evidence or provides a persuasive new interpretation shares the feeling of a master cryptographer who has cracked an enemy code. And this leaves us with an interesting question: if, some day, scholarship miraculously were to reveal all of the mysteries' secrets, would they still fascinate us? Luckily, perhaps, it is a situation that we are very unlikely to confront.
 

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