My spiritual exercises
subota, 29.04.2017.
EUCHARIST – OLD MYSTIC RITE
In the earlier ages of the Christian church there existed a mystic secret worship, from which a part of congregation was peremptorily excluded, as 'Encyclopedia of Freemasonry' states. Congregation was divided into three ranks. The lowest were Catechumens, who were occupied in elementary principles of the Christian religion. The next degree were called Competentes. The highest degree of Fideles were made complete and perfect Christians , and were dignified with several titles of honor. So, they were also called Iluminati (because they had been enlightened as to those secrets which were concealed from the inferior orders) or Initiati (because they were admitted to a knowledge of the
sacred mysteries).
The mysteries of the church were divided, like the Ancient Mysteries, into the lesser and the
greater. To receive greater Mysteries, was allowed just to The Fideles. The following rites have been concealed from the Catechumens, and entrusted, as the sacred mysteries, only to the Faithful [Fideles]: the manner of receiving baptism; the ceremony of confirmation; the ordination of priests; the mode of celebrating the Eucharist; the Liturgy, or Divine Service; and the doctrine of the Trinity, the Creed, and the Lord's Prayer.
No trace of this, so called Discipline of the Secret, however, is to be found after the end of the 6th century, says Mackay's 'Encyclopedia of Freemasonry'.
Corroboration for this secret teaching of the early Christians, can be traced also in New Testament, Matthew, chapter 13.
The early Christians also believed in the doctrine of re-incarnation. As author E.D. Walker states in his book 'Re-incarnation': „...Origen refers to preexistence as the general opinion. Clemens Alexandrinus taught it as a divine traditions authorized by St. Paul hinself in Romans v. 12, 14-19. Ruffinus in his letter to Anastasius says that 'This opinion was common among the primitive fathers.' Later, Jerome relates that the doctrine of transmigration was taught as an esoteric one communicated to only a select few. But Nemesius emphatically declared that all the Greeks who believed in immortality believed also in metempsychosis. Delitzsch says 'It had its advocates in the synagogues as in the church.' „
„Although Origen's teaching was condemned by the Council of Constantinople in 551, it permanently colored the stream of Chritian theology, not only in many scholastics and medieval heterodoxies, but through the all later course of religious thought, in many isolated individuals and groups.“
