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Live4Him said:
I'm going to try to avoid this website for most of the day, so, for now, I'll simply suggest to you that you might want to gain a better understanding of Paul's use of the word "mystery" in his epistles.
Paul used that word, mystērion in the underlying Greek, with "mystery religions" in mind.
In regard to the same, although things truly are a "mystery" to those who have not been initiated into the same, there's no "mystery" to the initiates themselves.
Somebody will get it...
Paul used that word, mystērion in the underlying Greek, with "mystery religions" in mind.
In regard to the same, although things truly are a "mystery" to those who have not been initiated into the same, there's no "mystery" to the initiates themselves.
Somebody will get it...
Isn't this gnosctism?
Are you asking if what I said is Gnosticism or if Gnosticism itself is a "mystery religion"?
In either case, something like the following is what I was referring to:
Mark chapter 4
[10] And when he was alone, they that were about him with the twelve asked of him the parable.
[11] And he said unto them, Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables:
[12] That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them.
My point is that, in scripture, a "mystery" isn't something that nobody knows about.
Today, we might see something like an unsolved murder, and say, "It's a mystery as to who committed the crime" because NOBODY KNOWS who did it, but that is not the way that the word "mystery" is used in scripture.
Instead, as we just saw in Jesus' exchange with "they that were about him with the twelve", Jesus said "UNTO YOU IT IS GIVEN TO KNOW THE MYSTERY OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables".
THIS is basically what a "mystery religion" is.
A religion in which THE INITIATES know things that those who are not initiated into the same don't know.
https://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Mystery+Religion
Mystery Religion (religion, spiritualism, and occult)
Witchcraft/Wicca is a mystery religion similar to the ancient Greek mysteries. A mystery in this sense is a rite or religion that is kept secret from all but its initiates, who have been trained, prior to the revelations of the rite, by a heirophant, or "revealer of holy things."