Greco-Roman mysteries
As a mystery cult or mystery religion, a cult or a religion is called, whose religious teachings and rituals are kept secret from outsiders. The inclusion in such a community of worship is usually done by special initiation rites.
The word mystery comes from the Greek Mysterion and this in turn " close " on myein, back. For the uninitiated the mystery cult was "closed". The initiated members were called mystics.
Factually, a definition is difficult because the mystery cults have their secret broadly maintained. Their myths and rituals can usually be reconstructed only with a large uncertainty factor, and many conjectures based on ancient writings and archaeological finds.
Mystery cults of the ancient world
The best-known mystery cults of the ancient world are the mysteries of Eleusis, Samothrace the mysteries of Dionysus cult, the cult of Liber Pater in Rome and southern Italy, the cult of Mithras, Cybele and Attiskult, of Isis and Osiris. Some of these cults were obviously created from the Orient; if they are all of Oriental origin, as is sometimes claimed, but is uncertain. The Eleusinian mysteries, the mysteries of Samothrace and the cult of Dionysus are widely regarded more as a national Greek.
Large parts of the Greek and later the Roman population were followers of the mystery cults. The common ancestor worship (ie the fictitious descent from ancient gods ) is no longer enough. In the mystery cults who worshiped deities were not divine from birth; they had like a human experience pain and death, and these be overcome. This made them closer to humans than the gods of the ancient polis religion.
Common features
On the general nature of the mystery cults include:
- The dying and rising god
- The cult of motherhood
- The rebirth and immortality.
They have brought these three phenomena in a system in which you have explained the mysteries of God as one with the seasons dying and rising god of vegetation. The god of vegetation is of course closely connected with Mother Earth, less obvious, however, is of the opinion that in the cycle of existence, the promise of an eternal life in the hereafter is to be recognizable. Certainly, in any case, that the dying and rising god and the Great Mother created the current in the circles of life and have set in motion.