The ancient Mysteries have long attracted the interest of scholars, an interest that goes back at least to the time of the Reformation. After a period of interest around the turn of the twentieth century, recent decades have seen an important study of Walter Burkert (1987). Yet his thematic approach makes it hard to see how the actual initiation into the Mysteries took place. To do precisely that is the aim of this book. It gives a ‘thick description’ of the major Mysteries, not only of the famous Eleusinian Mysteries, but also those located at the interface of Greece and Anatolia: the Mysteries of Samothrace, Imbros and Lemnos as well as those of the Corybants. It then proceeds to look at the Orphic-Bacchic Mysteries, which have become increasingly better understood due to the many discoveries of new texts in the recent times. Having looked at classical Greece we move on to the Roman Empire, where we study not only the lesser Mysteries, which we know especially from Pausanias, but also the new ones of Isis and Mithras. We conclude our book with a discussion of the possible influence of the Mysteries on emerging Christianity. Its detailed references and up-to-date bibliography will make this book indispensable for any scholar interested in the Mysteries and ancient religion, but also for those scholars who work on initiation or esoteric rituals, which were often inspired by the ancient Mysteries.

This book’s primary focus is an understanding of the change to the formulas of Initiation brought about by the advent of the New Aeon—the Aeon of the Child—in 1904. It draws deeply from Jungian psychology, world mythology and religion, the teachings of Aleister Crowley, and the doctrines of the Mystery traditions. It explains how the revelations unique to this stage of human evolution impact the work of the individual aspirant. Much of what is written here is revealed for the first time, with every attempt to do so in clear and precise language.

This Is A New Release Of The Original 1922 Edition.

Organizing data from cultures the world over, Mircea Eliade, one ofthe preeminent interpreters of world religion in the twentieth century, lays out the basic patterns of initiation: group puberty rites, entranceinto secret cults, shamanic instruction, individual visions, and heroicrites of passage. The vast information assembled here transcendsusual scholarship. Eliade always affirms the greater experience in allinitiation - the indissoluble tie between humans and the cosmos ofgods, spirits, animals, ancestors, and nature.As Michael Meade writes in his foreword, Eliade "fervently workedat keeping the doors of perception open to the world of sacred symbolsand creative ritual. Through his insistence that we are each thenecessary inheritors of a vast sacred heritage, he has acted as a spiritualelder and distant mentor to me and many students of myth andritual. Like an archeologist of symbols, he has unearthed, preserved, and found new meanings in the rites of our ancestors."