What is a Mystery School?
Ancient Mystery School
Most people love a good mystery, as it is stimulating to the brain centres; those communities of intelligence that inhabit the physical brain. One indication of this fact is the tremendous sale of novels that deal with mystery, fantasy or science fiction, and lately the books on spiritual mysteries. Believe it or not, detective stories the best sellers of fiction. This is not particularly a present-day tendency. The great mysteries of literature have continued to be popular since their original writing. Today, even Sherlock Holmes has been modernized and made into a film.
What is the psychological reason for the appeal of the mysterious tale? Why does the average person give more attention to a mystery thriller than to any other type of tale? There must be a relationship between the impulses of life itself and the gaining of the knowledge that is necessary to solve the mystery. In the last fifty years or so there has been a literal explosion of knowledge on the planet, and of course, this has created even more mysteries.
Throughout the history of consciousness, humans have been aware that curiosity is a response that is even apparent in the infant. From the earliest conscious state, a little one is concerned and intrigued by anything that attracts his attention, even his hands and toes. As the child grows, he wants to know what makes a clock tick, or how a light appears in an electric bulb, or how sound and pictures come from a television. Many other similar questions are immediately brought to the attention of consciousness when a particular phenomenon is observed. And when the question has been answered, the following question from the child is always, “Why?” ‘But why?”
Not all of these mysteries are solved in the mind of every adult. Very few can explain in detail how light comes to be in an electric light bulb when the current is turned on. However, that mystery does not intrigue an adult as much as it does a child or one who has never seen an electric light globe for the simple reason that he has come to accept that phenomenon as a part of his environment and so its mystery has been lost on him.
Even if the average individual cannot explain the complexities of electric light, he is generally familiar with electricity. If something takes place that is entirely beyond his comprehension, its cause and manifestations being a mystery to him, the mystery is lessened if someone can explain to him exactly what is going on. However, when in one’s experience a phenomenon takes place, the cause and manifestation of which are entirely outside his experience or the experience of others whom he knows, he is at a loss for an explanation. Sometimes, he will search, particularly now because of the Internet, and easily find the answer. But at other times, the answer will elude him.
The mystery is enhanced when no one is able to give a better explanation than his own. Mystery, then, has its appeal because it is applicable to the unknown. It is not so much the particular manifestation that is of concern as it is the occurrence of something completely unknown. Man seeks an explanation for those things that are not understood, and he tries to change the unknown into the known. The instinct of curiosity becomes stimulated when he is approached or brought face to face with any kind of unknown.
Thus, a well-written mystery novel in its first few pages will produce an unexplainable situation which one tries to analyze by following the author’s story. What has primarily attracted one is the mystery of the unknown and the desire for the knowledge that will make the unknown factor known.
This desire for knowledge is closely related to the manifestation of life itself. Life is a never-ceasing manifestation of activity. It is the strand, or connection, which exists between a human and the great unknown, which lies on
the outside of his experience. Life itself is the only thread or attachment, by which one has consciousness and awareness of his contact with the Creator and everything he has created. Even if we lived a thousand years, we would never see all the creations of the Almighty.
Therefore, it may be rightly thought that within this manifestation of ceaseless life energy lies the source of man’s quest for the unknown, and this, in turn, is the reason why any unknown factor is the beginning of a mystery which no one tries to leave unsolved.
In the early history of humanity, the philosophies and religions of many races and groups of people became closely related to the great mysteries of birth,life, and death. It was unexplainable at first, either philosophically or physiologically, how birth could take place; that is, how a new life could manifest in an apparently new body and how that life, although subject to many conditions that might end its existence at any moment, could continue and still meet and overcome many difficult problems and survive. The wonder of the phenomenon of birth is still present today. Even though we know how it happens, because it does happen so often, a lot of the mystery is taken away. But when you stop to think about exactly how two cells divide to ultimately form another human being, the mind boggles.
Then there was the last of these great mysteries to solve: Why was it that life could cease as suddenly as it had begun insofar as this physical manifestation was concerned? Many religions in their doctrines and practices are closely related to the mysteries of birth, life, and death. The birth, life, and death of a saviour, or master teacher are among the common doctrines and rituals of almost every religion. Also , we see God’s handiwork in the heavens. Just how vast is the universe? How many other universes are there?
It was from the contemplation of these great mysteries that groups of individuals who studied them from the philosophical and religious approach began to set up schools of thought known as mystery schools. These schools were closed to all but the true seeker of wisdom and truth.
From them, in turn have sprung the philosophies, philosophical schools, and
much of the foundation of the science of the present day. In the philosophy and religion of humans to date, however, the final solutions to these mysteries have not yet been written. But our great thinkers and scientists are getting much closer to amazing discoveries all the time.
When humans no longer contemplate the unknown, when all that is now unknown is known, then humanity will have advanced to a different level of comprehension and development and will live in a different dimension. Until that state is reached, much that is still a mystery will remain a mystery to the ordinary person, perhaps not the thinker, though.
When man sees clearly the solution to these problems, he will have advanced to a point where possibly other mysteries will take the place of those that he now endeavors to solve. And so he will continue in his growth by solving one mystery after another until the mystery of the Logos becomes comprehensible and he is actually absorbed as a part thereof, and becomes one with the source of his being.
