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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name

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Speaker 2: is Robert.

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Speaker 3: Lamba, and I am Joe McCormick, and we're back with

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Speaker 3: the fourth and final part in our discussion of the

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Speaker 3: mystery cults of the ancient Greco Roman world. We had

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Speaker 3: a break in the series on Tuesday of this week

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Speaker 3: to air a conversation that we had about Amphibians with

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Speaker 3: Mark Mandica of the Amphibian Foundation in Atlanta, and now

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Speaker 3: we're back to finish our business with the mysteries.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. By the way, we also aired the interview because

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Speaker 2: I was out of town to attend the iHeart Podcast

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Speaker 2: Awards in Austin at south By Southwest. We were nominated

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Speaker 2: for Best Science Podcast, which was awarded to Ali Ward's Ologies.

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Speaker 2: Well deserved and I got to chat with her briefly,

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Speaker 2: which was nice. But seeing is how our nomination might

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Speaker 2: have some new eyes on Stuff to Book Your Mind.

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Speaker 2: You might be wondering, well, why is a science podcast

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Speaker 2: talking about mystery cults and religion. Well, we talk about

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Speaker 2: a lot of things here on Stuff to Believe Your Mind.

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Speaker 2: We consider ourselves a science and culture podcast, with science

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Speaker 2: being the underlying bedrock, but we do explore topics that

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Speaker 2: veer into historical, philosophical, mythic, and folkloric areas as well.

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Speaker 2: And if you are new to the show, that's just

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Speaker 2: happens to be where you're coming in. We should also

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Speaker 2: let you know this is part four of a four

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Speaker 2: part series, so there's that as well.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, when this many syllables are allowed, I call us

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Speaker 3: an interdisciplinary science podcast. We try to bring most things

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Speaker 3: back to science in one way or another, but we

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Speaker 3: like to connect to lots of other topic domains.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but you know, if you ask me in an

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Speaker 2: elevator what I do for a living, and I say

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Speaker 2: podcast host, and you ask what kind of podcasts, I

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Speaker 2: may just go ahead and just say science podcast and

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Speaker 2: that is still accurate.

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Speaker 3: Now, I guess we should do a brief refresher on

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Speaker 3: the first three parts of this series, which in the

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Speaker 3: previous weeks. The subject once again is the mystery cults

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Speaker 3: of the ancient Mediterranean, which are defined primarily by their

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Speaker 3: emphasis on secret mystic rites of initiation. So whereas you'd

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Speaker 3: have the public cults of the Greco Roman world, they

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Speaker 3: would be mostly built around a transactional system of sacrifice

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Speaker 3: and rituals performed by people in the expectation that the

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Speaker 3: gods would give them blessings in return. I do sacrifices

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Speaker 3: and rituals for you. You give me blessings for the

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Speaker 3: for outcomes in war, for outcomes in health, for the harvest,

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Speaker 3: and so forth. And by contrast, the mystery cults seem

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Speaker 3: to be driven by the need to create intense, emotionally

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Speaker 3: powerful religious experiences. Experience is brought on by participation in

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Speaker 3: these occult initiation rituals, which are all the more fascinating

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Speaker 3: to us, certainly as consumers across the divide history, but

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Speaker 3: also fascinating to people even at the time, to outsiders

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Speaker 3: at the time, because these rites were kept secret from

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Speaker 3: non initiates. So in some cases historians have some strong

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Speaker 3: guesses about what went on in the mysteries, and in

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Speaker 3: other cases we really don't know much at all, and

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Speaker 3: that just makes it all the more fascinating now and

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Speaker 3: back then as well. So in Part one of this series,

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Speaker 3: we primarily talked about the social and religious context in

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Speaker 3: which the mystery cults existed, and many of the features

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Speaker 3: of the public cults of Greek and Roman polytheism and

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Speaker 3: how these public cults differed in general from the features

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Speaker 3: of mystery religions. In parts two and three, we talked

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Speaker 3: in detail about a couple of specific mystery cults, and

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Speaker 3: we talked first about mythraism, which flourished in the Roman

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Speaker 3: Empire from the first to the fourth century CE, and

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Speaker 3: then also we talked about the Elusinian mysteries based out

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Speaker 3: of the Sanctuary of Demeter and Corey at ill Uses,

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Speaker 3: a place just west of the city of Athens.

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Speaker 4: Now.

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Speaker 3: One of the best sources we have found on the subject,

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Speaker 3: which we've referred to throughout the series, is a book

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Speaker 3: by a historian named Hugh Boden called Mystery Cults in

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Speaker 3: the Ancient World and Huge Apologies. I think I've been

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Speaker 3: mispronouncing his last name. In the previous episodes. I was

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Speaker 3: calling him Hugh Bowden, but I listened to part of

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Speaker 3: the audio book and the reader there calls him Boden,

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Speaker 3: So apologies, Hugh Boden.

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Speaker 2: I also made the same mistake, though I think I

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Speaker 2: accidentally called him the correct name once, so I'll give

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Speaker 2: myself backwards congratulation for that one mess up.

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Speaker 3: If you want to go deep on the mystery cults,

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Speaker 3: I do recommend reading this book because there's so much

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Speaker 3: more interesting stuff the Boden discusses that we didn't even

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Speaker 3: have time to get into in any way here just

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Speaker 3: to touch on briefly some of the other things that

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Speaker 3: come up, but there are chapters on other specific mystery

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Speaker 3: cults in the ancient world, such as the cult of Isis,

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Speaker 3: the cult of Dayanai, the cults of nameless gods and

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Speaker 3: gods without myths, the cults of a figure known as

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Speaker 3: the Great Mother or the Mother of the Gods, and

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Speaker 3: there are just so many things. One thing that I

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Speaker 3: found really interesting in the book was there's a chapter

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Speaker 3: on what Boden calls the private initiator, is these sort

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Speaker 3: of religious professionals who would be It would be different

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Speaker 3: than say the example of the cult of ill Usus,

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Speaker 3: where there is a cult of these secret rights that

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Speaker 3: has a sort of specific home base and people come

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Speaker 3: to the temple to take part in the mysteries. This

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Speaker 3: instead would be versions of mystery cults that are sort

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Speaker 3: of purveyed by a person who goes around claiming to

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Speaker 3: be a religious expert who can teach you the secrets

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Speaker 3: or can initiate you, and this figure being treated by

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Speaker 3: some authors as a kind of con artist of the

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Speaker 3: ancient world, someone of ill repute who preyed on the gullible.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I found this really interesting as well, in part

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Speaker 2: because about the same time I was reading this, I

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Speaker 2: also watched the season four debut of The Righteous Gemstones,

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Speaker 2: which that episode features a Civil War flashback to a

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Speaker 2: robber turned fake pastor turned perhaps real pastor in some senses,

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Speaker 2: And of course the whole series comedically pokes at the

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Speaker 2: line between sincere religiosity and deception.

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Speaker 3: Right now, the book we're talking about, it's not making

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Speaker 3: the argument that all of these people in the ancient

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Speaker 3: world actually were necessarily con artists or deceivers. That's instead

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Speaker 3: that seems to be a common way they were portrayed

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Speaker 3: and say dramas of the time.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, now, and particularly these yeah, private initiators. They

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Speaker 2: come up a few different times in the book, and indeed,

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Speaker 2: as he points out, they are called out in Plato's

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Speaker 2: Republic as the sort that quote go to rich men's

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Speaker 2: doors and make them believe that they, by means of

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Speaker 2: sacrifices and incantations, have accumulated a treasure of power from

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Speaker 2: the gods that can expiate and cure with pleasurable festivals.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, they're going they're going door to door, they'reknocking

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Speaker 2: on the right doors and saying, hey, you interested in

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Speaker 2: that whole mystery cult thing, because I have it here

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Speaker 2: with me and we can get you where you need

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Speaker 2: to go. Or at least that's my interpretation of the

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Speaker 2: allegations that are made here.

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Speaker 3: Well, I mean, I feel like there's a thing that

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Speaker 3: still exists. I think a lot of quite wealthy people,

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Speaker 3: you know, there's the idea of they might have their

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Speaker 3: own personal spiritual advisor who's kind of you could say

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Speaker 3: in some cases that's well, that's great, that's something everybody

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Speaker 3: should have, you know, there's somebody who that can kind

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Speaker 3: of bounce ideas off of and find sacred ways of

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Speaker 3: looking at life. But then the more cynical way of

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Speaker 3: looking at it is they're they're just looking to pay

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Speaker 3: somebody money to make them feel good about themselves.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Now, in reading about this, I was also reminded

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Speaker 2: of another cult of deity that I don't believe Boden

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Speaker 2: gets into in this book, or perhaps I'm just not

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Speaker 2: remembering it, and that is the deity Glicon.

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Speaker 4: I don't remember that coming up in the book.

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Speaker 2: This is a snake god whose cult was popular during

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Speaker 2: the second and third century CE, so you know, similar

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Speaker 2: timeframe to some of these other cults we've been discussing.

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Speaker 2: He even pops up on some Roman coins. If you

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Speaker 2: look up at an image of Glicon, this deity tends

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Speaker 2: to look like a snake with like long hair and

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Speaker 2: maybe a slightly unserpentine head and face. It's an interesting look.

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Speaker 2: And you also might be familiar with Glicon due to

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Speaker 2: the fact that writer and comics legend Alan Moore has

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Speaker 2: I think maybe partially ingest sometimes it's kind of hard

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Speaker 2: to tell with more, but he has expressed his devotion

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Speaker 2: to Glicon as first of all, an obvious hoax and

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Speaker 2: secondly being a hoax less likely to become problematic and

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Speaker 2: dangerous in the way of other deities in religion. Mm.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, sorry, I looked up the statues of like On

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Speaker 3: with the hair and he looks like he's got rock

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Speaker 3: star hair.

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Speaker 2: Yeah he really does.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, lead singer snake.

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Speaker 2: So criticism of Glycan's cult as a hoax goes back

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Speaker 2: to the writings of the ancient world Lucian of Samosata,

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Speaker 2: who wrote scathingly of the cult as being a creation

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Speaker 2: of Greek mystic and oracle Alexander of Avenotitus, centered again,

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Speaker 2: centered around an enigmatic snake with human hair that allegedly

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Speaker 2: might have consisted of a live snake with like a

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Speaker 2: fake head or mask on, or perhaps a puppet of

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Speaker 2: some sort. And this cult did apparently engage in both

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Speaker 2: secrecy and overstimulating rituals. So it does seem like the

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Speaker 2: sort of cult you could loosely classify as a mystery cult,

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Speaker 2: or if you're leaning into the allegations of fraud here,

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Speaker 2: as a pseudo mystery cult. Yeah, and I think this

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Speaker 2: is all worth thinking about as we reflect on what

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Speaker 2: we've talked about in the previous episodes, Because, as we discussed,

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Speaker 2: theatrical effects were employed in the mystery cult initiations, it

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Speaker 2: would seem.

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Speaker 4: And strongly suspected.

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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, And for that matter, you know, if you're

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Speaker 2: to say, okay, theatrical effects are for fine, but no puppets,

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Speaker 2: pupp that's just a sception. Well then why shouldn't we

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Speaker 2: become complete iconoclasts and refuse religious imagery altogether? You know,

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Speaker 2: just say, well, likenesses, statues, altars. Arguments can be made

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Speaker 2: that all of that as well is part of a

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Speaker 2: theatrical effect to create a feeling of the sacred and

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Speaker 2: so forth.

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Speaker 3: I'd argue one of the most powerful special effects that

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Speaker 3: can be deployed by a religion is something a lot

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Speaker 3: of people wouldn't even think about as a special effect,

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Speaker 3: and that's music. Music has overwhelming emotional power and can

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Speaker 3: certainly cause people to get into ecstatic states even a

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Speaker 3: secular Even in a secular setting, you know, at concerts

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Speaker 3: and stuff like that, people get into ecstatic states when

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Speaker 3: they're not expecting to meet the power of a god.

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Speaker 3: Imagine you go into a powerful musical experience and you

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Speaker 3: are expecting to meet a god and experience their power. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: and so like that doesn't even cross a lot of

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Speaker 3: people's minds. That like, music is a special effect designed

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Speaker 3: to sort of set you up to have a certain

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Speaker 3: kind of emotional vulnerability or openness to an experience, maybe

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Speaker 3: a religious of an experience or secular nature.

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Speaker 2: That's a great point. And what's so interesting about that

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Speaker 2: point is that I myself will be I'll be quicker

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Speaker 2: to criticize a film for emotionally manipulating me with its music,

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Speaker 2: then I will some sort of religious ceremony where they

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Speaker 2: are likely doing something of the same nature.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think this is funny because people get

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Speaker 3: people get really excited and interested about the idea of

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Speaker 3: hallucinogenic compounds possibly being used in these ancient cults, like

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Speaker 3: you know, and we can't rule it out.

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Speaker 4: They may or may not have been.

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Speaker 3: I think some of the arguments for us We've just

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Speaker 3: talked in the last episode about how say the arguments

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Speaker 3: for ergotism is being used at elusis or probably not

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Speaker 3: very strong.

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Speaker 4: You know.

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Speaker 3: You could maybe say it's a little more possible that

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Speaker 3: mushrooms were involved, but there's not strong evidence for that.

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Speaker 3: But people are really captivated by this idea. There's a

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Speaker 3: lot less attention seems to be paid to how often

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Speaker 3: music is mentioned, and a lot of these ceremonies as

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Speaker 3: being like a key element.

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Speaker 4: You know.

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Speaker 3: The rights of Dionysus involve ecstatic dancing on the mountain

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Speaker 3: side out in the wild with overwhelming loud music, shrieking

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Speaker 3: and flutes and drums and singing. I don't know, that

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Speaker 3: sounds to me like its own kind of hallucinogen.

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Speaker 4: In a way.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, they have the rhythm of the heat.

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Speaker 3: In fact, it comes back to a strain comparison that

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Speaker 3: Boden does make in his book. There's a part where

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Speaker 3: he talks about, I think quite convincingly notices parallels between

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Speaker 3: ecstatic religious experiences and rave culture.

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Speaker 2: That's a great connection. You know. We also mentioned in

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Speaker 2: Passing some of the ideas that Terrence McKenna had. Terrence

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Speaker 2: McKenna also was very much an advocate of, I guess

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Speaker 2: more like the sort of cy trance culture, but adjacent

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Speaker 2: to rave culture, and a part of that, very much

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Speaker 2: tying that in with the sort of the same sort

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Speaker 2: of experiences that that may have played a part in

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Speaker 2: ancient religions. Yes, now coming back to allegations of fraud

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Speaker 2: in the ancient world concerning mystery cults, especially gly couldn't hear,

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Speaker 2: we also have to reflect on some of the things

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Speaker 2: that Boden points out regarding critics of mystery cults who

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Speaker 2: would often dwell on alleged spoiler regarding sacred items that

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Speaker 2: are part of the initiation, such as you know, revealing

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Speaker 2: oh it's a grain of wheat or whatnot, you know,

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Speaker 2: letting you know what's in the secret box, and by

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Speaker 2: removing the spoiler from the context of the initiation, you know,

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Speaker 2: attempting to sort of gut punch it a little bit

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Speaker 2: and say, look, this religion is about nothing, because this

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Speaker 2: is what is in the box.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 3: So some of these claims we have of the secret

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Speaker 3: content of the mysteries come from Christian apologists who were

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Speaker 3: opposed to the mystery cults, and we're talking about how, oh,

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Speaker 3: these things are stupid, they're celebrations of error, or sometimes

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Speaker 3: they even make these weird kind of numerological or kind

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Speaker 3: of word play arguments that like, oh, actually, here's why

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Speaker 3: you know they're they're instead of celebrating the wisdom of

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Speaker 3: the gods, they're worshiping the error of Eve and eating

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Speaker 3: the apple or something. So so, yeah, they're not a

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Speaker 3: fan of these rival religions, and they're revealing the secrets

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Speaker 3: in order to lampoon them in a way.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so we have to keep all of that in

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Speaker 2: mind when we're considering these criticisms. So, on one hand,

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Speaker 2: it's possible that a cult like that of Glycans could

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Speaker 2: be considered in keeping with just theatrics of the time,

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Speaker 2: like maybe you're just dwelling a little bit too much

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Speaker 2: on the fact that, yes, they're using theatrical effects to

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Speaker 2: enhance the initiation rights of the mystery, you know, and

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Speaker 2: because in this particular case, the cult of Glican it

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Speaker 2: was likely a spin on already established snake cults in

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Speaker 2: the region, and it seems to have survived in some

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Speaker 2: form or re emerged after its creator's death. It's also

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Speaker 2: possible that Alexander, the creator, alleged creator of the religion

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Speaker 2: was not that different from other mystics of the time.

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Speaker 2: We just happened to have strong surviving criticism of him,

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Speaker 2: whereas we might not have that regarding other particular mystery cults.

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Speaker 2: On the other hand, if Alexander really was, as Lucian charged,

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Speaker 2: is involved in murder plots against his critics, well then

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Speaker 2: perhaps there was something kind of singular about him, and

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Speaker 2: he really was a heel. I was reading a bit

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Speaker 2: more about this in an article titled Narcissistic Fraud in

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Speaker 2: the Ancient World by Stephen A. Kent. This was published

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Speaker 2: in Ancient Narrative back in two thousand and seven, and he

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Speaker 2: contends that based on what we know about Alexander from

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Speaker 2: these writings, he may well have been the sort of

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Speaker 2: person that we'd now classify as a malignant narcissist.

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Speaker 3: Oh it sounds juicy. I wanted to tell me more.

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Speaker 2: Okay, Well, Lucian had a lot to say. He really

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Speaker 2: digs into this guy. I'll read a few quotes from him.

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Speaker 2: He points out that Alexander quote was tall and good looking,

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Speaker 2: really godlike, with a fair complexion, a beard that was

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Speaker 2: not very thick, hair partially natural and partially false, but

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Speaker 2: so well matched that most people couldn't tell the difference.

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Speaker 2: His eyes flashed like one possessed, while his voice was

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Speaker 2: very clear and pleasant. And he goes on to talk

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Speaker 2: about various other positive attributes that this guy had, and

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Speaker 2: talking about how when you met him, you believe that

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Speaker 2: this guy you know, believe you know this guy, believe

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Speaker 2: everything he's telling you is very sincere. And he had

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Speaker 2: all of these gifts, but quote, he used them for

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Speaker 2: the worst purposes, and equipped with noble instruments, he lost

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Speaker 2: no time in becoming the most accomplished of those who

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Speaker 2: have been notorious for wickedness. And he goes on to

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Speaker 2: accuse him of being quote a quack, the type who

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Speaker 2: offer magic spells and marvelous incantations charms for love, affairs,

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Speaker 2: afflictions for your enemies, discoveries of buried treasure, and inheritances

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Speaker 2: to his states. He also goes into detail about You're

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Speaker 2: going to be tired of winning, and then he also

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Speaker 2: goes in it goes on to discuss a little bit

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Speaker 2: about the Gliton puppet in question, about first of all,

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Speaker 2: Alexander would he alleges that he would do some sort

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Speaker 2: of an act where he would chew on soap work

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Speaker 2: that would cause him to foam at the mouth so

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Speaker 2: that he could fake some sort of a fit of madness.

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Speaker 2: And then also that the act of producing gly kind

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Speaker 2: involved quote a snake's head made of linen. It had

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Speaker 2: a slightly human look to it and was painted to

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Speaker 2: look completely lifelike. Its mouth opened and closed by means

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Speaker 2: of horse hairs, and the tongue black and forked like

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Speaker 2: a snake's would shoot out, also controlled by hairs.

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Speaker 3: So I guess I don't fully understand the spirit of

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Speaker 3: the allegation. Is it a problem that it's a puppet,

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Speaker 3: or is it that like, oh, he's trying to say,

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Speaker 3: it's not a puppet, it's a puppet he's trying to

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Speaker 3: pass off as a living organism.

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Speaker 2: Well, his criticism here, and I should add that historians

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Speaker 2: seem to agree that this is this is an actual

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Speaker 2: historic individual it is being criticized here. Yeah, I'm to

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Speaker 2: understand the stronger criticism here is that he's a scoundrel,

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Speaker 2: but I mean, he's also accused of being a quack,

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Speaker 2: so the fakeness of what he is doing, the theatrical

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Speaker 2: effects are also being criticized here, and it seems like

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Speaker 2: one interpretation could be that those particular criticisms are perhaps

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Speaker 2: maybe a little unfair compared to what is probably going

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Speaker 2: on with other mystery religions of the time. However, again,

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Speaker 2: if Alexander It really is as deceptive and awful as

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Speaker 2: he is accused of being here, then we definitely have

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Speaker 2: to take that into account too, and maybe that's what

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Speaker 2: pushes it over the edge here.

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Speaker 3: Now, this could be totally off base because as I said,

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Speaker 3: I don't know much about what Lucian is doing here.

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Speaker 3: But I wonder also could it be that a criticism

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Speaker 3: like this could be aimed at such a puppet being

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Speaker 3: in bad taste Like to the people of the time,

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Speaker 3: you'd have a certain kind of sensibility about what is

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Speaker 3: accept what are the acceptable special effects within a religious context,

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Speaker 3: and what are the not acceptable special effects the same

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Speaker 3: way that people would now, Like, there are certain types

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Speaker 3: of things that people think, oh, yeah, that fits right

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Speaker 3: in at a church. Music, it fits in in most

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Speaker 3: churches in some form. That's a powerful special effect. But

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Speaker 3: there are other things that if you did them in

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Speaker 3: a church, people in our culture would probably say, like,

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Speaker 3: that's really gaudy, that's that's not the appropriate tone.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 4: I wonder if something like.

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Speaker 3: That could be operative in other times and places in

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Speaker 3: history as well.

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Speaker 2: Like he is, he is crossing a line that his

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Speaker 2: critics are not ready for. But perhaps some of the

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Speaker 2: initiates are cool with or have come to accept or

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Speaker 2: just have a you know, a different threshold.

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Speaker 3: For Yeah, Like probably a lot of churches today would

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Speaker 3: be fine with music, but not with a pyrotechnics display

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Speaker 3: for the sermon. But I bet some some use them, probably.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, But I mean even you know, generationally in churches,

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Speaker 2: for example, you'll have some that are like electric guitars

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Speaker 2: in a service. That's just that's not done. You shouldn't

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Speaker 2: say that, And others are like, no, that's what we're

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Speaker 2: doing and that's what's bringing people in. So you know,

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Speaker 2: I think you could probably get into what might in

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Speaker 2: the long term be silly disputes about what is proper

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Speaker 2: and isn't proper given any particular religious right or service.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, I'm unsure exactly where to parse all of

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Speaker 2: the glycin situation here. But again, the cult of Glicon

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Speaker 2: did deal in theatrics and secrets, and what Lucian here

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Speaker 2: is doing is definitely spilling some tea about the secrets.

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Speaker 3: That brings us back to an interesting subject that I

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Speaker 3: did want to return to today. So there was a

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Speaker 3: scholar I talked about in Part three named Kevin Clinton

388
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Speaker 3: who wrote a chapter that dealt with the Elusinian mysteries,

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Speaker 3: And there's a part where Clinton was exploring a passage

390
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Speaker 3: and Aristotle making the case that the initiate who goes

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Speaker 3: through the secret rights at ilusis is not supposed to

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Speaker 3: learn anything. They're not there to get information, but rather

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Speaker 3: to have an experience. And then Aristotle says, and thus

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Speaker 3: by having the experience to become fit or deserving. I

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Speaker 3: interpret that as deserving of a certain kind of relationship

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Speaker 3: or intimacy with the gods.

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Speaker 4: But this really goes.

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Speaker 3: Against our normal idea of a secret doesn't it Like

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Speaker 3: when we talk about secrets, a secret is almost always

400
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Speaker 3: understood to mean information kept hidden from someone. So by

401
00:22:45,480 --> 00:22:48,880
Speaker 3: becoming an initiate and going through the mystic rights, you

402
00:22:48,960 --> 00:22:52,560
Speaker 3: gain access to the secrets. What is hidden from others

403
00:22:52,680 --> 00:22:56,080
Speaker 3: is revealed to you. But it's emphasized over and over

404
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Speaker 3: by all these sources we've been talking about that the

405
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Speaker 3: point is not to gain information. The initiat is not

406
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Speaker 3: expected to learn any informational content. So why the secrecy?

407
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Speaker 3: What is it doing? What's the point of it? And

408
00:23:09,800 --> 00:23:12,720
Speaker 3: I guess when you ask why about something like secrecy,

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Speaker 3: you could mean that question in different ways. So in

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Speaker 3: one sense, you might be asking why did the people

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Speaker 3: who first decided these rights should be kept secret decide that? Like,

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Speaker 3: what motivation did they have in their minds to establish

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Speaker 3: a tradition of secrecy? It seems there's probably no way

414
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Speaker 3: to answer that question with any confidence we could do.

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Speaker 3: All you could do is speculate. And then, in a

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Speaker 3: very different sense, you could ask why the secrecy to

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Speaker 3: mean why were cults with secret initiation rights successful and appealing?

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Speaker 3: In other words, why do secrets work in a religious context?

419
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Speaker 3: Why does a cult with secrets.

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Speaker 4: Make people want to come join it.

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Speaker 2: Uh.

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Speaker 3: And so this got me thinking about the psychology of secrets,

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Speaker 3: which we we have covered to some extent on the

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Speaker 3: show before.

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Speaker 4: I think years ago, we did at.

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Speaker 3: Least one episode, maybe a couple of parts about the

427
00:24:07,680 --> 00:24:12,639
Speaker 3: psychological effects of having secrets. There's definitely research about how,

428
00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:16,919
Speaker 3: like having a shameful secret, or one you perceive as shameful,

429
00:24:17,280 --> 00:24:21,199
Speaker 3: causes psychological distress. This shouldn't come as any surprise. It

430
00:24:21,240 --> 00:24:24,679
Speaker 3: tends to lead to feelings of isolation, to anxiety and

431
00:24:24,720 --> 00:24:29,440
Speaker 3: so forth, especially if depending on the nature and nature

432
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Speaker 3: of the secret, and like how it applies to say,

433
00:24:32,119 --> 00:24:35,000
Speaker 3: relationships you're in if you are forced to think about

434
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:38,040
Speaker 3: the secret a lot, and stuff like that, and a

435
00:24:38,119 --> 00:24:40,680
Speaker 3: lot of the psychological studies on secrets have this kind

436
00:24:40,760 --> 00:24:46,399
Speaker 3: of focus. Essentially there about the effects of thinking about

437
00:24:46,600 --> 00:24:50,720
Speaker 3: concealed personal information which people believe would be harmful to

438
00:24:50,800 --> 00:24:54,840
Speaker 3: them if discovered by others. The classic example is the

439
00:24:54,960 --> 00:24:59,120
Speaker 3: fact that you did something morally bad or something embarrassing

440
00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:01,720
Speaker 3: you hope no one ever finds out, so now it's

441
00:25:01,760 --> 00:25:04,400
Speaker 3: your secret. But when you think about it that way,

442
00:25:04,480 --> 00:25:08,080
Speaker 3: that's actually a very different kind of secret than we're

443
00:25:08,080 --> 00:25:11,680
Speaker 3: talking about with the mystery cults. If I am an

444
00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:15,280
Speaker 3: initiate of a mystery cults, I am an apoptase of

445
00:25:15,400 --> 00:25:18,879
Speaker 3: the Elusinian mystery. So I've gone through initiation the second

446
00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:21,920
Speaker 3: time with open eyes. I've seen all the mystic rites

447
00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:26,720
Speaker 3: of Demeter. I've witnessed something that is kept secret to outsiders,

448
00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:28,960
Speaker 3: and I'm not allowed to talk about it or share

449
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:31,920
Speaker 3: it under pain of great penalty, possibly under pain of death.

450
00:25:33,840 --> 00:25:35,720
Speaker 3: I will be in a state where I have to

451
00:25:35,760 --> 00:25:38,240
Speaker 3: carry this secret with me and I can't tell people.

452
00:25:38,640 --> 00:25:42,560
Speaker 3: But there's no evidence that there is any feeling of

453
00:25:42,600 --> 00:25:47,240
Speaker 3: shame associated with this secret. It's not bad or damaging information,

454
00:25:47,600 --> 00:25:51,080
Speaker 3: certainly not about me, probably not about anyone. And in fact,

455
00:25:51,200 --> 00:25:55,080
Speaker 3: there's not really much evidence that these secrets were perceived

456
00:25:55,080 --> 00:25:58,159
Speaker 3: as a burden in any way. Also, the thing that

457
00:25:58,280 --> 00:26:01,160
Speaker 3: is being kept secret is, as best I can tell,

458
00:26:01,840 --> 00:26:06,760
Speaker 3: probably not a piece of discrete information that can easily

459
00:26:06,800 --> 00:26:10,280
Speaker 3: be put into words, like you know, one thing like

460
00:26:10,320 --> 00:26:13,159
Speaker 3: that would be the kinds of secrets that we trade

461
00:26:13,160 --> 00:26:17,120
Speaker 3: in in regular, regular gossip. So those kind of secrets

462
00:26:17,160 --> 00:26:20,560
Speaker 3: might be like a fact about something that somebody did

463
00:26:20,600 --> 00:26:22,639
Speaker 3: you know, so and so cheated on their spouse or

464
00:26:22,640 --> 00:26:27,120
Speaker 3: so and so lied about something. Things like that, they're

465
00:26:27,119 --> 00:26:31,199
Speaker 3: not really discrete things that you can put into words. Instead,

466
00:26:31,240 --> 00:26:35,880
Speaker 3: it seems like these secrets were probably a kind of baffling,

467
00:26:36,080 --> 00:26:43,280
Speaker 3: overwhelming emotional experience of sites, sounds, strange words, strange objects,

468
00:26:43,800 --> 00:26:47,000
Speaker 3: and rituals that you took part in yourself. So it

469
00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:49,600
Speaker 3: would almost be as if like the secret were not

470
00:26:49,840 --> 00:26:53,880
Speaker 3: information encoded in words, but like the experience of going

471
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:56,239
Speaker 3: to a concert or a great play like we've been

472
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:56,919
Speaker 3: talking about.

473
00:26:57,640 --> 00:27:01,800
Speaker 2: So, for instance, an example of the former would be

474
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:05,879
Speaker 2: Bruce Wayne's secret being that he is Batman, but the

475
00:27:06,000 --> 00:27:10,080
Speaker 2: latter would be the secret that we all might realize

476
00:27:10,280 --> 00:27:13,280
Speaker 2: that we are all Batman, something that maybe is a

477
00:27:13,280 --> 00:27:18,199
Speaker 2: little harder to really explain, but if you know it,

478
00:27:18,240 --> 00:27:19,439
Speaker 2: you know it well.

479
00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:22,840
Speaker 3: It's also that that might be a good example, because

480
00:27:22,840 --> 00:27:25,120
Speaker 3: it's the kind of thing that if you just say it,

481
00:27:25,119 --> 00:27:28,280
Speaker 3: it sounds kind of banal, it's not a very interesting

482
00:27:28,359 --> 00:27:30,920
Speaker 3: thing to hear. But if you saw a great story,

483
00:27:30,960 --> 00:27:33,199
Speaker 3: like if you watched a movie that convinced you and

484
00:27:33,280 --> 00:27:36,000
Speaker 3: your gut that yes, we are all Batman, then it

485
00:27:36,040 --> 00:27:37,920
Speaker 3: would feel really powerful.

486
00:27:37,760 --> 00:27:41,320
Speaker 2: Right, and it might might very well depend on a

487
00:27:41,400 --> 00:27:45,240
Speaker 2: sensory overload experience like seeing a really good Batman movie.

488
00:27:46,040 --> 00:27:49,679
Speaker 3: Also, ancient writers describe the effect of being in on

489
00:27:49,720 --> 00:27:54,240
Speaker 3: the secret of a mystery cult as an extremely positive one.

490
00:27:54,240 --> 00:27:56,800
Speaker 3: It's a good thing. It doesn't feel bad, it doesn't

491
00:27:56,800 --> 00:27:59,800
Speaker 3: feel like a burden, it feels good. Instead, being in

492
00:27:59,840 --> 00:28:03,760
Speaker 3: on the secret actually unburdens you of your worries. It

493
00:28:03,760 --> 00:28:06,680
Speaker 3: allows you to go with lightness when it is time

494
00:28:06,680 --> 00:28:09,040
Speaker 3: to enter the land of the dead. So I was

495
00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:13,040
Speaker 3: looking to see if there's any research on positive secrets,

496
00:28:13,080 --> 00:28:15,920
Speaker 3: and indeed there have been some experiments on this. One

497
00:28:15,960 --> 00:28:21,040
Speaker 3: study I wanted to mention was by Michael Sleepian, Catherine Greenaway,

498
00:28:21,160 --> 00:28:25,719
Speaker 3: Nicholas camp and Adam Galinsky called The bright Side of Secrecy,

499
00:28:25,800 --> 00:28:29,879
Speaker 3: The Energizing Effect of Positive Secrets in the Journal of

500
00:28:29,920 --> 00:28:34,000
Speaker 3: Personality and Social Psychology twenty twenty three. Now, the author's

501
00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:36,640
Speaker 3: here is start off by saying, like, yes, we do

502
00:28:36,720 --> 00:28:41,080
Speaker 3: often associate secrets with burdens and distress, but this is

503
00:28:41,960 --> 00:28:44,840
Speaker 3: in the scientific context. This is mainly because secrets have

504
00:28:44,880 --> 00:28:48,440
Speaker 3: been studied in cases of adverse secrets. It's stuff we

505
00:28:48,520 --> 00:28:51,000
Speaker 3: don't want people to find out about. What about when

506
00:28:51,040 --> 00:28:54,720
Speaker 3: people have information that they are not sharing with other people,

507
00:28:54,800 --> 00:28:57,120
Speaker 3: but it's information they feel good about.

508
00:28:57,920 --> 00:29:00,720
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, this is this is going to be another

509
00:29:00,760 --> 00:29:03,920
Speaker 2: silly example. But I'm reminded of a stand up bit

510
00:29:04,000 --> 00:29:08,520
Speaker 2: from Uparna Mantula, who is hilarious, but she has a

511
00:29:08,520 --> 00:29:11,360
Speaker 2: bit about reading in a women's magazine, the advice that

512
00:29:11,400 --> 00:29:15,240
Speaker 2: she should walk around like she's carrying a sexy secret

513
00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:18,840
Speaker 2: and which is on the face silly, and I believe

514
00:29:18,880 --> 00:29:21,440
Speaker 2: her bit is like it sounds like women's magazines are

515
00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:25,800
Speaker 2: just written by spambots. That's what she that's her interpretation.

516
00:29:26,320 --> 00:29:28,800
Speaker 2: But on the other hand, I also kind of understand

517
00:29:28,800 --> 00:29:31,040
Speaker 2: what they're getting at, like the idea of having some

518
00:29:31,080 --> 00:29:33,840
Speaker 2: sort of a secret that is not a negative secret

519
00:29:34,160 --> 00:29:37,000
Speaker 2: but positive that you know you're keeping it secret so

520
00:29:37,160 --> 00:29:39,920
Speaker 2: you're not just expressing it everywhere, but perhaps the light

521
00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:41,720
Speaker 2: of that secret is shining through you.

522
00:29:42,280 --> 00:29:44,720
Speaker 3: Instead of walking around feeling like you are in hawk

523
00:29:44,840 --> 00:29:47,600
Speaker 3: to the world by you know, the way you do

524
00:29:47,640 --> 00:29:50,720
Speaker 3: when you have a shameful secret, Having a positive secret

525
00:29:50,800 --> 00:29:53,560
Speaker 3: that you haven't shared with anyone feels like a you have,

526
00:29:53,640 --> 00:29:56,520
Speaker 3: like a plus you have a credit. You know you

527
00:29:56,560 --> 00:30:01,000
Speaker 3: have a plus thing on the balance that hasn't cleared yet. Yeah, yeah,

528
00:30:01,320 --> 00:30:04,880
Speaker 3: so in their abstract to the author's right. In contrast

529
00:30:04,920 --> 00:30:08,400
Speaker 3: to the prior research, five experiments total sample size of

530
00:30:08,400 --> 00:30:12,160
Speaker 3: twenty eight hundred find that positive secrets increase feelings of

531
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:17,120
Speaker 3: energy relative to first of all content matched positive non secrets.

532
00:30:17,480 --> 00:30:21,520
Speaker 3: So it's not just that positive news increases your energy,

533
00:30:21,560 --> 00:30:25,160
Speaker 3: it's specifically when it is secret news, the other thing

534
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:30,680
Speaker 3: being other pieces of unknown positive information, and finally other

535
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:34,040
Speaker 3: kinds of secrets. So that last part might not be surprising,

536
00:30:34,040 --> 00:30:37,320
Speaker 3: but yes, positive secrets are more energizing than negative secrets

537
00:30:38,080 --> 00:30:41,440
Speaker 3: the author's right. Importantly, these energizing effects of positive secrets

538
00:30:41,440 --> 00:30:45,720
Speaker 3: were independent of positive affect We further found that positive

539
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:49,400
Speaker 3: secrets are energizing because, compared to other kinds of secrets,

540
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:54,200
Speaker 3: people keep them for more intrinsically than extrinsically motivated reasons.

541
00:30:55,200 --> 00:30:59,240
Speaker 3: That is, these secrets are more freely chosen, more consistent

542
00:30:59,320 --> 00:31:03,640
Speaker 3: with personal values, and more motivated by internal desires than

543
00:31:03,680 --> 00:31:08,320
Speaker 3: by external pressures. Using both measures and manipulations of these motivations,

544
00:31:08,320 --> 00:31:12,160
Speaker 3: we found that a motivational mechanism helps explain the energizing

545
00:31:12,160 --> 00:31:15,760
Speaker 3: effect of positive secrets. The present results offer new insights

546
00:31:15,760 --> 00:31:18,960
Speaker 3: into secrecy how people respond to positive life events and

547
00:31:19,080 --> 00:31:23,840
Speaker 3: the subjective experiences of vitality and energy. And for a

548
00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:27,280
Speaker 3: little more explication of this study, I found a summary

549
00:31:27,560 --> 00:31:31,160
Speaker 3: written for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology by

550
00:31:31,200 --> 00:31:35,400
Speaker 3: first author Michael Sleepian here and Sleepian explains their finding

551
00:31:35,480 --> 00:31:38,360
Speaker 3: by first of all, by saying, a lot of times

552
00:31:38,400 --> 00:31:42,680
Speaker 3: we don't keep positive news secret. They started with a

553
00:31:42,680 --> 00:31:46,440
Speaker 3: survey of five hundred people that found when people learn

554
00:31:46,560 --> 00:31:49,680
Speaker 3: good news, seventy six percent of respondents said that the

555
00:31:49,720 --> 00:31:52,959
Speaker 3: first thing they would do is go tell someone. And

556
00:31:53,000 --> 00:31:55,000
Speaker 3: you can almost kind of feel that in those writings

557
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:57,120
Speaker 3: from the ancient world about the mystery cults where people

558
00:31:57,160 --> 00:31:59,560
Speaker 3: are like, you know, I can't tell you what the

559
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:02,480
Speaker 3: mystery are, but I want It's like it's really good,

560
00:32:02,600 --> 00:32:05,320
Speaker 3: it's really good stuff, Like you should go, you know,

561
00:32:05,440 --> 00:32:08,920
Speaker 3: you talk to those multiple passages where they're just exhorting readers,

562
00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:09,840
Speaker 3: go for yourself.

563
00:32:09,960 --> 00:32:10,600
Speaker 4: Check it out.

564
00:32:11,360 --> 00:32:13,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, no spoilers, but it's wonderful.

565
00:32:13,760 --> 00:32:17,840
Speaker 3: But in contrast to this desire to immediately share good news,

566
00:32:17,880 --> 00:32:21,840
Speaker 3: the authors found there are distinct psychological benefits to keeping

567
00:32:21,920 --> 00:32:25,840
Speaker 3: good news a secret. So the authors one way they

568
00:32:26,080 --> 00:32:28,960
Speaker 3: investigated this was they took a list of thirty eight

569
00:32:29,040 --> 00:32:33,520
Speaker 3: common types of good news, and they found that on average,

570
00:32:33,600 --> 00:32:37,320
Speaker 3: people had between five and six pieces of good news

571
00:32:37,360 --> 00:32:41,280
Speaker 3: that they were currently keeping to themselves for the time being. Now,

572
00:32:41,320 --> 00:32:43,240
Speaker 3: you might think, well, like, what kinds of good news?

573
00:32:43,240 --> 00:32:46,479
Speaker 3: What would examples be? A very common one was a

574
00:32:46,720 --> 00:32:49,600
Speaker 3: self gift. That's what the authors call it. It's when

575
00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:55,040
Speaker 3: you have bought or otherwise treated yourself to something special.

576
00:32:56,080 --> 00:32:58,360
Speaker 3: Apparently this is a common type of secret people have

577
00:32:58,440 --> 00:32:59,680
Speaker 3: and they feel good about it.

578
00:33:00,000 --> 00:33:02,120
Speaker 2: Supposed to feel good about those I feel bad about this.

579
00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:02,840
Speaker 2: I do too.

580
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:05,080
Speaker 4: Every time I'm trying to get over it.

581
00:33:05,160 --> 00:33:08,080
Speaker 3: Whenever I like get myself something nice, I feel real guilty.

582
00:33:08,320 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, same, Yeah, I'm struggle. I don't think I

583
00:33:11,080 --> 00:33:13,960
Speaker 2: have any positive secrets I'm keeping to myself at the moment.

584
00:33:14,000 --> 00:33:15,600
Speaker 2: I think I've let them all out.

585
00:33:15,800 --> 00:33:17,360
Speaker 3: Well, we'll see. We'll go down the list for a

586
00:33:17,400 --> 00:33:20,240
Speaker 3: few more common examples. What about a gift to another

587
00:33:20,360 --> 00:33:22,080
Speaker 3: person that they don't know about yet?

588
00:33:22,960 --> 00:33:24,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, none of those right now either. I'm like in

589
00:33:24,680 --> 00:33:28,080
Speaker 2: one of those periods between birthdays and okay, in mother's

590
00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:29,040
Speaker 2: days and so forth.

591
00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:33,400
Speaker 3: How about having found something that the person was looking for.

592
00:33:33,520 --> 00:33:37,080
Speaker 3: This apparently often people are walking around feeling good about

593
00:33:37,120 --> 00:33:39,280
Speaker 3: having found the thing, but they didn't tell anybody they

594
00:33:39,320 --> 00:33:39,680
Speaker 3: found it.

595
00:33:40,080 --> 00:33:41,840
Speaker 2: I had one of those a couple of days ago,

596
00:33:42,040 --> 00:33:44,560
Speaker 2: but then then I gave it to them. So now

597
00:33:44,680 --> 00:33:45,120
Speaker 2: that's time.

598
00:33:45,280 --> 00:33:49,760
Speaker 3: So finally completing a task. Oh this is a common thing, right,

599
00:33:49,800 --> 00:33:51,840
Speaker 3: Oh you know, I finished writing this thing I was

600
00:33:51,880 --> 00:33:53,720
Speaker 3: working on, but I haven't talked to anybody about it.

601
00:33:54,440 --> 00:33:56,680
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, all right, that makes sense.

602
00:33:57,040 --> 00:34:00,000
Speaker 3: So anyways, sleeping goes on to say quote. Across several studies,

603
00:34:00,160 --> 00:34:03,040
Speaker 3: we asked participants to think of a positive secret they

604
00:34:03,040 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 3: were keeping, and then measured their current mood and how

605
00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:09,040
Speaker 3: energized they felt in that moment. Another group of participants

606
00:34:09,080 --> 00:34:11,920
Speaker 3: were asked was asked to think of good news that

607
00:34:12,080 --> 00:34:15,320
Speaker 3: was not secret. For the same types of good news,

608
00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:19,120
Speaker 3: thinking about the secret good news was more energizing than

609
00:34:19,160 --> 00:34:23,560
Speaker 3: thinking about non secret good news. Thinking about positive secrets

610
00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:27,200
Speaker 3: was also more energizing than thinking about positive information that

611
00:34:27,239 --> 00:34:30,600
Speaker 3: has not been shared for other reasons, such as when

612
00:34:30,640 --> 00:34:33,560
Speaker 3: you intend to share good news with someone but cannot

613
00:34:33,600 --> 00:34:36,319
Speaker 3: talk to them until later in the day. So I

614
00:34:36,320 --> 00:34:39,359
Speaker 3: thought that was a very interesting distinction to make there,

615
00:34:39,760 --> 00:34:43,600
Speaker 3: at least within this sample given these controls, there's something

616
00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:50,000
Speaker 3: specially invigorating about having positive information that you specifically intend

617
00:34:50,239 --> 00:34:52,640
Speaker 3: to keep secret, that you have made the choice not

618
00:34:52,760 --> 00:34:55,040
Speaker 3: to share with people, as opposed to just you haven't

619
00:34:55,040 --> 00:34:56,840
Speaker 3: had a chance to tell them yet.

620
00:34:58,200 --> 00:35:00,520
Speaker 2: And you know it could be a sexy, say, just

621
00:35:00,560 --> 00:35:02,880
Speaker 2: to come back to what we mentioned.

622
00:35:02,600 --> 00:35:07,440
Speaker 3: Earlier, certainly good. So I thought this was very interesting. Obviously,

623
00:35:07,640 --> 00:35:11,480
Speaker 3: these secrets being discussed here are are also not a

624
00:35:11,520 --> 00:35:15,200
Speaker 3: perfect analogy to the hidden truths of the mystery cults

625
00:35:15,239 --> 00:35:17,919
Speaker 3: for multiple reasons, some of which we've already talked about,

626
00:35:18,560 --> 00:35:21,799
Speaker 3: which I'll get to in just a minute. So it's

627
00:35:21,800 --> 00:35:24,040
Speaker 3: not exactly the same kind of thing as being in

628
00:35:24,120 --> 00:35:27,320
Speaker 3: on the secret of Illusis or any of these other cults.

629
00:35:27,520 --> 00:35:29,600
Speaker 3: But I feel like it's closer than most of the

630
00:35:29,640 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 3: research we look at on secrecy, which is about like

631
00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:35,480
Speaker 3: something shameful or you believe to be shameful, that you're hiding.

632
00:35:36,480 --> 00:35:40,160
Speaker 3: And I can see how this kind of I know,

633
00:35:40,200 --> 00:35:43,640
Speaker 3: this bubbling up sense of energy that comes from thinking

634
00:35:43,719 --> 00:35:46,799
Speaker 3: about the secret that is good news to you, but

635
00:35:47,000 --> 00:35:50,320
Speaker 3: you are choosing not to share with others. It seems

636
00:35:50,360 --> 00:35:53,279
Speaker 3: to be, as the author say, a kind of expression

637
00:35:53,320 --> 00:35:56,520
Speaker 3: of one's own intrinsic personality, like the fact that you

638
00:35:56,680 --> 00:35:59,520
Speaker 3: know this thing and others don't becomes a part of

639
00:35:59,560 --> 00:36:03,120
Speaker 3: your idea entity. It becomes a way of thinking about

640
00:36:03,160 --> 00:36:05,480
Speaker 3: who you are. Part of who I am is that

641
00:36:05,600 --> 00:36:08,360
Speaker 3: I know this thing and I don't express it to

642
00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:12,040
Speaker 3: other people, at least unless they're initiated as well. And

643
00:36:12,040 --> 00:36:14,640
Speaker 3: then maybe that creates a whole second order thing of

644
00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:17,640
Speaker 3: effects of the kind of bonding you might experience with

645
00:36:17,719 --> 00:36:21,560
Speaker 3: other initiates, people you could talk to about the secret,

646
00:36:21,640 --> 00:36:24,080
Speaker 3: and that that creates a whole other sense of bonding

647
00:36:24,160 --> 00:36:27,120
Speaker 3: and you know their social benefits there as well.

648
00:36:28,000 --> 00:36:32,560
Speaker 2: We mentioned in passing the idea of weird fiction ideas

649
00:36:32,600 --> 00:36:34,960
Speaker 2: of cultists, and it does occur to me that what

650
00:36:34,960 --> 00:36:39,600
Speaker 2: we're talking about here does match up in interesting ways

651
00:36:39,760 --> 00:36:43,920
Speaker 2: with some of the revelations that occur in weird fiction,

652
00:36:45,360 --> 00:36:48,160
Speaker 2: with those revelations being kind of an inversion of what

653
00:36:48,200 --> 00:36:51,080
Speaker 2: we're talking about here where I have I just went

654
00:36:51,120 --> 00:36:53,879
Speaker 2: through some serious stuff and I got a real dark

655
00:36:53,920 --> 00:36:57,280
Speaker 2: revelation about the secret nature of the universe, and it's

656
00:36:57,480 --> 00:37:01,839
Speaker 2: sanity shredding, and I probably can't tell anyone about it

657
00:37:01,960 --> 00:37:05,640
Speaker 2: or properly convey it to other people. So that's that's

658
00:37:05,640 --> 00:37:08,080
Speaker 2: the sort of the negative version of what we're talking

659
00:37:08,120 --> 00:37:08,880
Speaker 2: about here.

660
00:37:08,880 --> 00:37:10,680
Speaker 3: And might not even be able to put it into

661
00:37:10,680 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 3: words right right.

662
00:37:11,760 --> 00:37:14,279
Speaker 2: It could be the opposite is like I just went

663
00:37:14,320 --> 00:37:19,600
Speaker 2: through this amazing ritual initiation to a strength, dark god

664
00:37:19,920 --> 00:37:23,040
Speaker 2: and it was amazing. I have this real clear cut

665
00:37:23,120 --> 00:37:25,359
Speaker 2: vision of what the universe is all about. Now I

666
00:37:25,360 --> 00:37:27,719
Speaker 2: can't convey it to you in words, but you've got

667
00:37:27,719 --> 00:37:28,960
Speaker 2: to You've got to go to the colt as well.

668
00:37:29,000 --> 00:37:30,640
Speaker 2: That's the only way you get to be able to

669
00:37:30,719 --> 00:37:32,440
Speaker 2: understand what I'm even getting at here.

670
00:37:32,680 --> 00:37:33,479
Speaker 4: Well in that vein.

671
00:37:33,920 --> 00:37:37,200
Speaker 3: This got me thinking about another way of framing the secrecy.

672
00:37:37,280 --> 00:37:40,279
Speaker 3: What these secret rights are? You know, it came up

673
00:37:40,320 --> 00:37:43,600
Speaker 3: in the Boden book that it is something. Of course,

674
00:37:43,640 --> 00:37:45,959
Speaker 3: there are there are mystic rights of Dionysus as well.

675
00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:48,520
Speaker 3: You know, this is one of the famous mystery religions.

676
00:37:50,200 --> 00:37:53,960
Speaker 3: It is sometimes said that the god Dionysus appears only

677
00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:58,760
Speaker 3: in disguise. In fact, he is often represented by a mask,

678
00:37:59,719 --> 00:38:04,200
Speaker 3: and that perhaps what's going on is that when women

679
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:07,560
Speaker 3: went out into the wild mountain side to participate in

680
00:38:07,640 --> 00:38:11,239
Speaker 3: ecstatic music and dance and fulfill the mystic rights of Dionysus.

681
00:38:11,800 --> 00:38:16,480
Speaker 3: Something about that profound experience meant that you would get

682
00:38:16,520 --> 00:38:20,960
Speaker 3: to see the god unmasked. You would see the true

683
00:38:21,080 --> 00:38:25,120
Speaker 3: face of Dionysus, which is always kept in disguise with

684
00:38:25,200 --> 00:38:25,880
Speaker 3: everyone else.

685
00:38:26,680 --> 00:38:28,640
Speaker 4: And it struck me.

686
00:38:28,600 --> 00:38:31,480
Speaker 3: That this is another way of thinking about the type

687
00:38:31,520 --> 00:38:37,000
Speaker 3: of secret that is revealed here, not as information divulged,

688
00:38:37,440 --> 00:38:43,400
Speaker 3: but as either intimacy attained or true form revealed, and

689
00:38:43,480 --> 00:38:46,959
Speaker 3: both connect to the idea of seeing someone uncovered, either

690
00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:50,239
Speaker 3: like unmasked in the sense of true form revealed, or

691
00:38:50,320 --> 00:38:54,440
Speaker 3: disrobed in the sense of intimacy. And I think this

692
00:38:54,600 --> 00:38:59,759
Speaker 3: is often one of the most emotionally powerful types of hiddenists.

693
00:38:59,800 --> 00:39:02,880
Speaker 3: Rev of these moments of revelation that we get in

694
00:39:02,960 --> 00:39:07,320
Speaker 3: storytelling or in religious ritual or whatever you know. In storytelling,

695
00:39:07,320 --> 00:39:09,680
Speaker 3: if you're watching a play or a movie, when a

696
00:39:09,800 --> 00:39:14,000
Speaker 3: masked character is suddenly unmasked, and let's say, this is

697
00:39:14,080 --> 00:39:17,719
Speaker 3: not like revealing them to be some other character that

698
00:39:17,719 --> 00:39:20,319
Speaker 3: we already know about. Instead, we're just seeing somebody's face

699
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:23,799
Speaker 3: for the first time. This might not really reveal much

700
00:39:23,880 --> 00:39:26,960
Speaker 3: that can be encoded into words, except maybe in a

701
00:39:27,000 --> 00:39:30,200
Speaker 3: loose way by describing the face. But it still feels

702
00:39:30,239 --> 00:39:33,799
Speaker 3: like a profound type of revelation. It's one of the

703
00:39:33,800 --> 00:39:36,719
Speaker 3: most potent revelations there is. But it's not really a

704
00:39:36,840 --> 00:39:41,280
Speaker 3: clue or piece of information. It's an experience of knowing someone.

705
00:39:41,920 --> 00:39:44,240
Speaker 3: And I wonder if the secrets of mystery cults actually

706
00:39:44,280 --> 00:39:47,000
Speaker 3: felt a bit more like that. It's not so much

707
00:39:47,239 --> 00:39:50,279
Speaker 3: the secret password that you have learned, though there are

708
00:39:50,360 --> 00:39:54,520
Speaker 3: a few things like that, but a masked face unmasked

709
00:39:54,600 --> 00:39:56,719
Speaker 3: and is it is the face of a god with

710
00:39:56,880 --> 00:40:07,880
Speaker 3: unspeakable power over your life.

711
00:40:09,760 --> 00:40:12,839
Speaker 2: Now, as we close out this four part look at

712
00:40:12,880 --> 00:40:17,800
Speaker 2: the Mystery Cults, it makes sense to finally discuss properly

713
00:40:18,080 --> 00:40:21,080
Speaker 2: the end of the mysteries, and in doing so on

714
00:40:21,160 --> 00:40:24,240
Speaker 2: to briefly come back to the writings of Terence McKenna,

715
00:40:24,239 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 2: who we referenced Food of the Gods a little bit

716
00:40:27,080 --> 00:40:31,040
Speaker 2: in a previous episode on the Mystery Cults here and again.

717
00:40:31,080 --> 00:40:34,480
Speaker 2: The broader themes in the Food of the Gods concerned

718
00:40:34,520 --> 00:40:38,160
Speaker 2: the possible roles that in theogens may have played in

719
00:40:38,239 --> 00:40:42,279
Speaker 2: human evolution and the development of archaic human cultures, with

720
00:40:42,400 --> 00:40:46,520
Speaker 2: a falling off and gradual descent with the advent of

721
00:40:46,600 --> 00:40:51,200
Speaker 2: Western civilization and mckinna's does specifically point to the end

722
00:40:51,239 --> 00:40:54,319
Speaker 2: of the mystery cults as one possible watershed moment in

723
00:40:54,360 --> 00:40:57,920
Speaker 2: all of this, one that helped reinforce quote the emergence

724
00:40:58,000 --> 00:41:03,200
Speaker 2: of the anti visionary dominators dial of culture and this

725
00:41:03,560 --> 00:41:07,879
Speaker 2: beginning to usher in a quote, progressively more vacant, more

726
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:13,520
Speaker 2: ego dominated world whose energies were coalescing into monotheism, patriarchy,

727
00:41:13,840 --> 00:41:18,000
Speaker 2: and male domination. Tell us what you really think, Terrence, Yeah,

728
00:41:18,040 --> 00:41:19,640
Speaker 2: And like I say, this is all very much part

729
00:41:19,680 --> 00:41:25,120
Speaker 2: of his you know, archaic revival bohemian thread messaging. And

730
00:41:25,200 --> 00:41:27,000
Speaker 2: I will again say that I do think food of

731
00:41:27,040 --> 00:41:30,200
Speaker 2: the Gods. Whether you agree with with this some of

732
00:41:30,239 --> 00:41:34,120
Speaker 2: the the the theories that he's throwing out there, I

733
00:41:34,120 --> 00:41:36,440
Speaker 2: do think it's it's a better work of scholarship than

734
00:41:36,520 --> 00:41:41,920
Speaker 2: than some might assume. But I found this this commentary interesting.

735
00:41:42,000 --> 00:41:43,839
Speaker 2: You know, in fact, many of the mystery cults were

736
00:41:43,880 --> 00:41:48,440
Speaker 2: centered on mother goddesses and or their consorts Sybil in

737
00:41:48,520 --> 00:41:52,719
Speaker 2: the Roman Magna Mater cult isis Demeter and Corey, who

738
00:41:52,760 --> 00:41:55,400
Speaker 2: have talked about as well as the mother goddess that

739
00:41:55,480 --> 00:42:00,200
Speaker 2: we alluded to just several minutes ago. So I think

740
00:42:00,200 --> 00:42:03,360
Speaker 2: a lot of what he's getting at does coalesce nicely

741
00:42:03,560 --> 00:42:07,920
Speaker 2: with what we're discussing here. To bring up another theorist,

742
00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:11,000
Speaker 2: sort of outside thinker that we've talked about on the

743
00:42:11,000 --> 00:42:13,200
Speaker 2: show before. I'm not going to go down the complete

744
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:17,759
Speaker 2: bicameral mind rabbit hole, but Julian James refers to this

745
00:42:17,880 --> 00:42:20,800
Speaker 2: time period as one in which religions that adhere to

746
00:42:21,000 --> 00:42:25,720
Speaker 2: more estatic or in his writings, possessive rights are falling

747
00:42:25,719 --> 00:42:29,640
Speaker 2: to quote, a siege of rationalism as Christianity picks up

748
00:42:29,680 --> 00:42:34,160
Speaker 2: steam and to be clear, changes during this time period

749
00:42:34,520 --> 00:42:38,320
Speaker 2: to become an increasingly dominant religion, certainly within the Roman Empire.

750
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:39,680
Speaker 4: Yeah.

751
00:42:40,880 --> 00:42:43,920
Speaker 2: Now, to be sure, James was discussing all of this

752
00:42:43,960 --> 00:42:46,680
Speaker 2: in his nineteen seventy six book to support his theory

753
00:42:46,719 --> 00:42:50,920
Speaker 2: regarding a gradual change in human consciousness from one of

754
00:42:51,120 --> 00:42:55,200
Speaker 2: inherently and spirit experienced other voices in the mind toward

755
00:42:55,239 --> 00:42:58,360
Speaker 2: their increasing silence. You can go back and listen to

756
00:42:58,360 --> 00:43:02,400
Speaker 2: our episodes where we discuss the bicameral mind hypothesis in

757
00:43:02,400 --> 00:43:04,960
Speaker 2: greater detail whether there is any truth to it in

758
00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:08,240
Speaker 2: the end, I do think James was in part exploring

759
00:43:08,280 --> 00:43:11,040
Speaker 2: some of the same changes we're discussing here in the

760
00:43:11,080 --> 00:43:13,280
Speaker 2: Manifestation of Religious Experiences.

761
00:43:13,760 --> 00:43:15,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's been a while in that, but you know,

762
00:43:16,000 --> 00:43:20,120
Speaker 3: I do remember thinking that despite obviously I'm not convinced

763
00:43:20,120 --> 00:43:23,719
Speaker 3: of the bicameral mind hypothesis, but I remember thinking a

764
00:43:23,719 --> 00:43:28,160
Speaker 3: lot of James's peripheral insights about the smaller matters were

765
00:43:28,239 --> 00:43:29,280
Speaker 3: often quite interesting.

766
00:43:30,160 --> 00:43:32,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I think so. And you know, he is,

767
00:43:32,800 --> 00:43:35,279
Speaker 2: you know, getting at some major shifts and changes that

768
00:43:35,320 --> 00:43:38,120
Speaker 2: were occurring, but there are a lot of different ways

769
00:43:38,120 --> 00:43:41,440
Speaker 2: to tease apart what was happening and why. Now in

770
00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:44,000
Speaker 2: Boden's book, he of course gets into this and discusses

771
00:43:44,040 --> 00:43:46,440
Speaker 2: the end of the mystery cults. As you know, we

772
00:43:46,480 --> 00:43:51,960
Speaker 2: previously discussed the Roman Empire's relative tolerance toward various religions

773
00:43:51,960 --> 00:43:55,040
Speaker 2: and cults was notable. As long as they didn't conflict

774
00:43:55,040 --> 00:43:58,200
Speaker 2: with Roman authority and didn't stir up trouble with other faiths,

775
00:43:58,520 --> 00:44:01,239
Speaker 2: then you know, things were generally tolerated.

776
00:44:01,640 --> 00:44:04,040
Speaker 3: I mean, there are other cases in the book he

777
00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:07,160
Speaker 3: talks about where other mystery religions were subject to some

778
00:44:07,320 --> 00:44:11,520
Speaker 3: regulation or suppression, say if Roman authorities thought they were

779
00:44:11,520 --> 00:44:15,160
Speaker 3: contributing to disorder or thought that they might become a

780
00:44:16,200 --> 00:44:20,040
Speaker 3: might become sort of a launching point for political conspiracy.

781
00:44:20,719 --> 00:44:22,960
Speaker 3: In fact, I don't remember the specific example, but there

782
00:44:23,000 --> 00:44:25,680
Speaker 3: was one case where they limited certain cults. It might

783
00:44:25,719 --> 00:44:30,160
Speaker 3: have been ones related to Dionysus that you know, where

784
00:44:30,200 --> 00:44:32,120
Speaker 3: it was like, you can't have too many people gathering

785
00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:32,680
Speaker 3: in secret.

786
00:44:32,719 --> 00:44:36,399
Speaker 2: At the same time, you could very well to sort

787
00:44:36,400 --> 00:44:39,040
Speaker 2: of lean into Alan Moore's interpretation of glyc on. You

788
00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:42,240
Speaker 2: can imagine them being like, yeah, this, this snake puppet

789
00:44:42,280 --> 00:44:44,760
Speaker 2: is obviously fake. They can totally have this. Let's actually

790
00:44:44,760 --> 00:44:45,640
Speaker 2: put it on some coins.

791
00:44:47,640 --> 00:44:50,920
Speaker 3: But driving the point that, you know, the Romans, what

792
00:44:50,960 --> 00:44:53,400
Speaker 3: they were mainly concerned about was like actual here and

793
00:44:53,440 --> 00:44:56,600
Speaker 3: now power. When they were concerned with stamping out other

794
00:44:56,640 --> 00:44:59,600
Speaker 3: religious stuff, it was because they perceived it as some

795
00:44:59,760 --> 00:45:02,160
Speaker 3: kind of here and now power threat exactly.

796
00:45:02,280 --> 00:45:06,839
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you might well ask about Christian persecution during

797
00:45:06,880 --> 00:45:09,480
Speaker 2: this time period as well, you know, feeding christianstillions and

798
00:45:09,560 --> 00:45:13,040
Speaker 2: so forth. As we've discussed on the show before in

799
00:45:13,160 --> 00:45:17,399
Speaker 2: other episodes in the past, the persecution of Christians wasn't

800
00:45:17,440 --> 00:45:20,800
Speaker 2: total and constant throughout this period. It's sort of varied

801
00:45:20,800 --> 00:45:25,560
Speaker 2: depending on who was in charge, with different fluctuations, but

802
00:45:26,320 --> 00:45:29,759
Speaker 2: after three point thirteen CEE, Christian persecution comes to an

803
00:45:29,920 --> 00:45:33,040
Speaker 2: end and in the Roman Empire and Christianity begins to

804
00:45:33,080 --> 00:45:38,000
Speaker 2: receive active support from the Emperor Constantine the Great, and

805
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:41,879
Speaker 2: Boden writes that this resulted in more and more converts

806
00:45:42,000 --> 00:45:46,759
Speaker 2: to Christianity, and baptism began to be seen as a

807
00:45:46,800 --> 00:45:51,880
Speaker 2: preliminary ritual into this new popular faith, and notably Christian

808
00:45:51,880 --> 00:45:57,440
Speaker 2: baptism began to also lose its imagistic features in Christian faith.

809
00:45:57,560 --> 00:46:00,320
Speaker 2: So he gets to this, this is an inner interesting

810
00:46:00,400 --> 00:46:03,160
Speaker 2: thing to think about. So we're at this time where

811
00:46:03,280 --> 00:46:08,800
Speaker 2: Christianity is gaining in popularity, mystery cults are falling away,

812
00:46:09,560 --> 00:46:16,320
Speaker 2: but Christianity arguably is losing its mystery cult like attributes

813
00:46:16,800 --> 00:46:21,040
Speaker 2: as it rises in popularity. So there's a lot of

814
00:46:21,080 --> 00:46:23,040
Speaker 2: interesting transitions going on here.

815
00:46:23,800 --> 00:46:26,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, Now, one topic that often comes up is it

816
00:46:26,719 --> 00:46:30,000
Speaker 3: does seem that the decline of mystery cults, like the

817
00:46:30,080 --> 00:46:35,600
Speaker 3: general decline of Greek and Roman polytheism, is related to

818
00:46:35,640 --> 00:46:39,719
Speaker 3: the rise of Christianity. But like, what is the explanation there?

819
00:46:39,760 --> 00:46:42,400
Speaker 3: People have offered a lot of different theories over the years,

820
00:46:42,400 --> 00:46:45,680
Speaker 3: like what led to the success of Christianity within the

821
00:46:45,719 --> 00:46:48,760
Speaker 3: Roman Empire. People have tried to explain it in terms

822
00:46:48,800 --> 00:46:54,200
Speaker 3: of like particular doctrines or attributes of Christian communities. Those

823
00:46:54,880 --> 00:46:57,960
Speaker 3: those arguments may have some weight to them, may may not.

824
00:46:58,280 --> 00:47:00,680
Speaker 3: But one argument about the success of Christchristianity in the

825
00:47:00,719 --> 00:47:03,120
Speaker 3: Roman Empire that I find very persuasive is just sort

826
00:47:03,160 --> 00:47:08,680
Speaker 3: of a mathematical argument that was made, at least in

827
00:47:08,719 --> 00:47:12,399
Speaker 3: one case by a previous show guest, the historian bart Erman,

828
00:47:12,440 --> 00:47:13,600
Speaker 3: who's been on our show before.

829
00:47:13,640 --> 00:47:15,080
Speaker 4: I interviewed him a few years ago.

830
00:47:15,640 --> 00:47:19,320
Speaker 3: He's a secular scholar of Christianity and of the Bible

831
00:47:19,400 --> 00:47:23,799
Speaker 3: and historian of this time period of early Christianity, and

832
00:47:24,239 --> 00:47:27,440
Speaker 3: he makes the point that really the main thing Christianity

833
00:47:27,480 --> 00:47:29,400
Speaker 3: had going for it in terms of its success in

834
00:47:29,400 --> 00:47:32,880
Speaker 3: the Roman Empire is that it was an exclusive cult,

835
00:47:33,120 --> 00:47:36,360
Speaker 3: Whereas when you loo say, look at the other mystery cults,

836
00:47:36,360 --> 00:47:39,600
Speaker 3: you will have powerful Roman people who are bragging about

837
00:47:39,640 --> 00:47:43,360
Speaker 3: how many different mystery cults they've been initiated to Oh, yeah,

838
00:47:43,400 --> 00:47:46,399
Speaker 3: I did the Lusini and I'm demeter, I did this one,

839
00:47:46,440 --> 00:47:47,200
Speaker 3: I did that one.

840
00:47:47,239 --> 00:47:47,600
Speaker 4: Look at it.

841
00:47:47,640 --> 00:47:51,759
Speaker 3: I'm racking them up. I'm becoming so accomplished and Greek

842
00:47:51,760 --> 00:47:54,360
Speaker 3: and Roman Polytheism was generally of that sort. There was

843
00:47:54,400 --> 00:47:57,040
Speaker 3: no need to be exclusive with one god or another.

844
00:47:57,120 --> 00:47:59,120
Speaker 3: You could do some stuff for Apollo, you could do

845
00:47:59,200 --> 00:48:02,840
Speaker 3: some stuff with with Demeter, and that was all fine.

846
00:48:03,400 --> 00:48:06,640
Speaker 3: That Christianity was kind of unique, and that when you

847
00:48:06,760 --> 00:48:10,319
Speaker 3: converted to Christianity, you didn't just add that on to

848
00:48:10,400 --> 00:48:12,960
Speaker 3: the list of gods you had some relationship with. You

849
00:48:13,440 --> 00:48:16,879
Speaker 3: cut off relations with all the other gods. So every

850
00:48:16,960 --> 00:48:21,600
Speaker 3: time somebody converted to Christianity and stayed a christian that

851
00:48:22,040 --> 00:48:25,480
Speaker 3: all of the other cults lost permanently lost and adherent

852
00:48:25,520 --> 00:48:28,800
Speaker 3: and everybody you know, that flowed downstream from their household

853
00:48:28,840 --> 00:48:32,680
Speaker 3: and so forth. So it was the exclusivity of Christianity

854
00:48:32,680 --> 00:48:35,560
Speaker 3: when compared to these other religions, according to Ermine's argument,

855
00:48:35,600 --> 00:48:36,840
Speaker 3: which I find pretty convincing.

856
00:48:37,600 --> 00:48:40,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean you can imagine the ripples that

857
00:48:41,160 --> 00:48:45,200
Speaker 2: that creates in the religious ecosystem. Yeah, you suddenly can't

858
00:48:45,239 --> 00:48:46,799
Speaker 2: just sort of, oh, yeah, I'm a member of five

859
00:48:46,800 --> 00:48:48,919
Speaker 2: different ones. No, you've got to commit. This religion wants

860
00:48:48,960 --> 00:48:52,120
Speaker 2: you to commit and settle down. And as that becomes

861
00:48:52,160 --> 00:48:56,399
Speaker 2: popular and that becomes an increasing in group, Yeah, its

862
00:48:56,440 --> 00:48:58,400
Speaker 2: power just grows socially.

863
00:48:58,360 --> 00:49:00,920
Speaker 3: Right, it's like a one way vowel. People are mostly

864
00:49:01,040 --> 00:49:02,919
Speaker 3: just flowing in and not back out.

865
00:49:03,360 --> 00:49:05,839
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, you can't sort of have one foot

866
00:49:05,880 --> 00:49:07,600
Speaker 2: in and one foot out so much, orly is not

867
00:49:07,640 --> 00:49:12,000
Speaker 2: as easily, not with as much social fluidity as had

868
00:49:12,040 --> 00:49:16,280
Speaker 2: been possible before. Right. A lot has been written about

869
00:49:16,600 --> 00:49:20,120
Speaker 2: the decline of mystery cults the rise of Christianity, about

870
00:49:20,160 --> 00:49:23,960
Speaker 2: the possible links between the two, especially the extent to

871
00:49:24,040 --> 00:49:28,800
Speaker 2: which early Christianity was in many ways a mystery cult,

872
00:49:29,280 --> 00:49:33,960
Speaker 2: and how you know, arguably Christianity becomes this sort of

873
00:49:34,000 --> 00:49:39,680
Speaker 2: anti visionary religion as it rises. And one thing that

874
00:49:39,840 --> 00:49:42,759
Speaker 2: Boden points out is that, you know that a lot

875
00:49:42,800 --> 00:49:47,319
Speaker 2: of this comes down the scholarly debate often comes down to,

876
00:49:48,000 --> 00:49:50,440
Speaker 2: you know, the agendas of whoever's making the argument. So

877
00:49:50,520 --> 00:49:54,399
Speaker 2: Protestant voices might argue, might have argued that early Christianity

878
00:49:54,480 --> 00:49:58,200
Speaker 2: was corrupted by mystery cult influences and therefore needed correcting.

879
00:49:58,840 --> 00:50:02,240
Speaker 3: Oh, because because they're doing an anti Catholic narrative. Yeah,

880
00:50:02,280 --> 00:50:05,279
Speaker 3: so they're saying that stuff that the parts of Christianity

881
00:50:05,440 --> 00:50:08,239
Speaker 3: as practice today that we don't approve of that came

882
00:50:08,280 --> 00:50:10,000
Speaker 3: from other religions.

883
00:50:09,760 --> 00:50:14,839
Speaker 2: Right, Right, And Likewise, critics of Christianity in general, he says,

884
00:50:14,920 --> 00:50:18,239
Speaker 2: might argue that Christianity itself borrows heavily from the likes

885
00:50:18,239 --> 00:50:21,520
Speaker 2: of Mythraism, and that alone you can really get into

886
00:50:21,960 --> 00:50:24,120
Speaker 2: like a nuanced discussion off like how much of it

887
00:50:24,160 --> 00:50:28,239
Speaker 2: is Christianity potentially borrowing from Mithraism or them just sort

888
00:50:28,239 --> 00:50:30,719
Speaker 2: of like being like on the same vibe, you know,

889
00:50:31,880 --> 00:50:35,040
Speaker 2: and how much in religious right is truly exclusive to

890
00:50:35,080 --> 00:50:36,040
Speaker 2: anyone given faith.

891
00:50:36,520 --> 00:50:39,640
Speaker 3: You could also argue that Christianity need not have borrowed

892
00:50:39,760 --> 00:50:42,600
Speaker 3: from Mythraism to have similarities. They could in fact, I mean,

893
00:50:42,680 --> 00:50:45,200
Speaker 3: of course, some similarities could just be coincidences in the

894
00:50:45,200 --> 00:50:47,440
Speaker 3: way that a lot of religions have similar things. But

895
00:50:47,520 --> 00:50:50,920
Speaker 3: you could also have a common ancestor, right, a lot

896
00:50:50,960 --> 00:50:55,200
Speaker 3: of religions have common ancestors. Things that shared, shared rituals

897
00:50:55,200 --> 00:50:57,680
Speaker 3: and stuff are derived from traditions that are found all

898
00:50:57,680 --> 00:50:58,320
Speaker 3: over the place.

899
00:50:58,800 --> 00:51:12,839
Speaker 2: Absolutely, so, whatever the reason mystery cults end up falling away,

900
00:51:12,880 --> 00:51:17,520
Speaker 2: their temples when destroyed, are sacked, are just often not rebuilt.

901
00:51:18,040 --> 00:51:21,280
Speaker 2: Things fall into ruin or disrepair and are not re repaired.

902
00:51:22,760 --> 00:51:26,880
Speaker 2: And Boden gets into this a bit as well, pointing

903
00:51:26,920 --> 00:51:30,799
Speaker 2: out that the rise of Christianity, it doesn't completely eradicate

904
00:51:31,320 --> 00:51:34,719
Speaker 2: is static religious experience under its watch, the history of

905
00:51:34,800 --> 00:51:40,040
Speaker 2: Christianity is sprinkled with Christian mystics and no doubt many

906
00:51:40,080 --> 00:51:44,320
Speaker 2: a squashed heresy that leans more into a static religious

907
00:51:44,360 --> 00:51:47,920
Speaker 2: experience than is comfortable for the powers that be. And

908
00:51:47,960 --> 00:51:51,480
Speaker 2: we can also point to various static religious practices from say,

909
00:51:52,440 --> 00:51:56,360
Speaker 2: later Protestant movements. Snake handling is discussed in the book,

910
00:51:56,840 --> 00:51:59,319
Speaker 2: but you can also apply this lens too much in

911
00:51:59,360 --> 00:52:02,040
Speaker 2: the revived and fate healing tradition as well.

912
00:52:02,600 --> 00:52:06,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, Boden has a long section on snake handling, where

913
00:52:07,440 --> 00:52:09,920
Speaker 3: you know, when you read about snake handling, you really

914
00:52:10,280 --> 00:52:12,400
Speaker 3: there's a lot of emphasis put on the snakes or

915
00:52:12,400 --> 00:52:15,160
Speaker 3: maybe on the other deadly things like the drinking of poison,

916
00:52:15,440 --> 00:52:18,560
Speaker 3: and of course that is a big part of the practice,

917
00:52:18,880 --> 00:52:23,960
Speaker 3: but it's also associated with just general ecstatic frenzy. You know,

918
00:52:24,000 --> 00:52:28,120
Speaker 3: like a lot of these churches will have loud, powerful

919
00:52:28,200 --> 00:52:30,920
Speaker 3: music to coming back to music once again, you know,

920
00:52:30,960 --> 00:52:32,880
Speaker 3: that gets you into a kind of trance. And people

921
00:52:32,960 --> 00:52:35,279
Speaker 3: describe the way like they feel like they're leaving their

922
00:52:35,280 --> 00:52:38,239
Speaker 3: body or they feel like the Holy Spirit has entered them.

923
00:52:38,400 --> 00:52:42,239
Speaker 3: They have become another person in these loud, raucous ceremonies

924
00:52:42,280 --> 00:52:46,160
Speaker 3: where yes, dangerous, deadly things are happening, people are handling

925
00:52:46,239 --> 00:52:50,960
Speaker 3: venomous snakes, but it's also just it's a wild array

926
00:52:50,960 --> 00:52:52,040
Speaker 3: of sights and sounds.

927
00:52:52,360 --> 00:52:56,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, and there are numerous examples of contemporary estatic dance

928
00:52:56,080 --> 00:53:00,080
Speaker 2: you can point to that have the same effect. I

929
00:53:00,160 --> 00:53:04,479
Speaker 2: believe speaking in tongues in some Protestant traditions. That's also

930
00:53:04,520 --> 00:53:08,160
Speaker 2: brought up. So, yeah, there are various examples of religious

931
00:53:08,160 --> 00:53:13,879
Speaker 2: frenzy experienced by large groups. Boden does say that these

932
00:53:13,920 --> 00:53:20,440
Speaker 2: are generally discouraged in the grand arc of Christian history,

933
00:53:20,040 --> 00:53:23,120
Speaker 2: but they do exist, and you can also point to

934
00:53:23,160 --> 00:53:26,040
Speaker 2: examples of it in other, you know, surviving examples in

935
00:53:26,120 --> 00:53:28,040
Speaker 2: other religions and contemporary faiths.

936
00:53:28,760 --> 00:53:31,959
Speaker 3: This is not necessarily something that is backed up by say,

937
00:53:32,040 --> 00:53:35,840
Speaker 3: religious anthropology research. It's just a kind of gut feeling

938
00:53:35,880 --> 00:53:40,160
Speaker 3: I have. But I would tend to think that people

939
00:53:40,200 --> 00:53:44,319
Speaker 3: who practice mystical or ecstatic religious worship stuff where they

940
00:53:44,400 --> 00:53:47,879
Speaker 3: get into an altered state of consciousness and believe they're

941
00:53:47,880 --> 00:53:50,879
Speaker 3: having direct experience of the power of the gods, are

942
00:53:50,920 --> 00:53:56,600
Speaker 3: sometimes perceived as dangerous by religious authorities, because that kind

943
00:53:56,600 --> 00:53:59,799
Speaker 3: of experience lends itself to the production of new doctrine.

944
00:54:00,960 --> 00:54:04,319
Speaker 3: Like people, there's an idea that heresy emerges from that

945
00:54:04,440 --> 00:54:07,960
Speaker 3: kind of behavior, and not to label it as heresy

946
00:54:08,040 --> 00:54:09,560
Speaker 3: or say what doctrine is right or wrong, but I

947
00:54:09,600 --> 00:54:13,439
Speaker 3: think often new beliefs and new doctrines do come out

948
00:54:13,480 --> 00:54:15,360
Speaker 3: of that kind of religious behavior.

949
00:54:15,960 --> 00:54:18,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, and again going back to what we were talking about,

950
00:54:18,400 --> 00:54:23,040
Speaker 2: doctrinal religion is very top down. The people who interpret

951
00:54:23,320 --> 00:54:26,720
Speaker 2: the words of God, the will of God or God's

952
00:54:27,200 --> 00:54:30,560
Speaker 2: they're at the top and they're filtering that down to

953
00:54:30,640 --> 00:54:35,400
Speaker 2: the followers. They're going to be very much opposed in

954
00:54:35,440 --> 00:54:38,000
Speaker 2: general to the idea that anything would be bottom up,

955
00:54:38,280 --> 00:54:41,520
Speaker 2: that anyone at the bottom would have new revelations, and

956
00:54:41,560 --> 00:54:44,560
Speaker 2: that God or the gods would still be speaking on

957
00:54:44,640 --> 00:54:48,960
Speaker 2: any level to anyone except the top of the hierarchy.

958
00:54:49,320 --> 00:54:50,640
Speaker 4: Well, that's right. By definition.

959
00:54:50,719 --> 00:54:52,840
Speaker 3: If you're on the top of a hierarchy, it is

960
00:54:52,880 --> 00:54:54,280
Speaker 3: your job to maintain control.

961
00:54:54,560 --> 00:54:54,799
Speaker 2: Yeah.

962
00:54:54,880 --> 00:54:57,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, But it's also interesting that we see, you know,

963
00:54:57,960 --> 00:55:00,600
Speaker 3: a kind of top down control of some these ancient

964
00:55:00,600 --> 00:55:04,400
Speaker 3: mystery cults, Like so the culted Eleusis was administered, but

965
00:55:04,440 --> 00:55:06,800
Speaker 3: you know, there was a religious hierarchy in place there,

966
00:55:07,320 --> 00:55:09,360
Speaker 3: and we don't know all of the secrets, but it

967
00:55:09,560 --> 00:55:13,200
Speaker 3: seems quite likely that they were inviting people in to

968
00:55:13,280 --> 00:55:16,160
Speaker 3: become initiated, to go through these rights, to have these weird,

969
00:55:16,360 --> 00:55:20,640
Speaker 3: powerful experiences, and then probably we're not told what it meant,

970
00:55:21,160 --> 00:55:23,560
Speaker 3: and we're just like sending people off to make their

971
00:55:23,560 --> 00:55:25,879
Speaker 3: own sense of it, which, on one hand, you would

972
00:55:25,920 --> 00:55:29,120
Speaker 3: imagine from the point of view of somebody trying to

973
00:55:29,160 --> 00:55:32,520
Speaker 3: control a religious tradition, that seems dangerous for exactly the

974
00:55:32,520 --> 00:55:34,680
Speaker 3: reasons we've just been talking about. But that seems like

975
00:55:34,719 --> 00:55:37,839
Speaker 3: probably what was going on there, So I don't know.

976
00:55:37,880 --> 00:55:41,960
Speaker 3: Maybe there are other ways in which it's it's empowering

977
00:55:42,000 --> 00:55:44,759
Speaker 3: in the right ways, Like it creates the right kind

978
00:55:44,760 --> 00:55:47,080
Speaker 3: of effect that sends more and more people your way

979
00:55:47,120 --> 00:55:49,799
Speaker 3: every year, and that's a fair trade maybe from some

980
00:55:51,280 --> 00:55:52,480
Speaker 3: hierarchy's point of view.

981
00:55:52,800 --> 00:55:56,120
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. This topic has just been so fascinating to

982
00:55:56,120 --> 00:56:01,440
Speaker 2: think about, not only in exploring how ancient people's thought

983
00:56:01,600 --> 00:56:05,320
Speaker 2: about their faith, about their world and their place in

984
00:56:05,360 --> 00:56:09,760
Speaker 2: the universe, but also the various ways we can apply

985
00:56:10,719 --> 00:56:13,280
Speaker 2: what they seem to believe to what people believe today,

986
00:56:14,040 --> 00:56:16,360
Speaker 2: and also the reverse, how we can take what we

987
00:56:16,480 --> 00:56:21,480
Speaker 2: can and can't take from modern religiosity and apply to

988
00:56:21,600 --> 00:56:24,799
Speaker 2: their world. Yeah, so it's been it's been really fun

989
00:56:24,840 --> 00:56:26,359
Speaker 2: to research and record these.

990
00:56:26,840 --> 00:56:29,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, whenever you study something like this, there

991
00:56:29,560 --> 00:56:33,560
Speaker 3: is always you always just keep catching yourself interpreting what

992
00:56:33,600 --> 00:56:37,240
Speaker 3: you're reading about or seeing through a lens that's probably

993
00:56:37,280 --> 00:56:40,720
Speaker 3: just too familiar, that's just too based on what something

994
00:56:40,760 --> 00:56:44,120
Speaker 3: would mean in your own cultural context. And you're not

995
00:56:44,600 --> 00:56:48,640
Speaker 3: you're not remembering to let it be alien and ambiguous

996
00:56:48,719 --> 00:56:50,840
Speaker 3: enough to you because you just don't know the context

997
00:56:50,840 --> 00:56:51,920
Speaker 3: well enough to make sense of.

998
00:56:51,920 --> 00:56:52,680
Speaker 2: It, right.

999
00:56:53,360 --> 00:56:55,160
Speaker 4: And and we're I know, whenever.

1000
00:56:54,920 --> 00:56:57,920
Speaker 3: We do these historical topics or topics about you know,

1001
00:56:58,000 --> 00:57:00,720
Speaker 3: cultures other than our own, there's always as a tendency

1002
00:57:00,760 --> 00:57:03,920
Speaker 3: to it's just too easy to feel confident that you

1003
00:57:04,000 --> 00:57:06,160
Speaker 3: understand what something means because you know what it would

1004
00:57:06,200 --> 00:57:09,279
Speaker 3: mean to you. It might not mean that to the

1005
00:57:09,280 --> 00:57:10,160
Speaker 3: person involved.

1006
00:57:10,360 --> 00:57:13,239
Speaker 2: Yeah, like the snake puppet. You know, we know what

1007
00:57:13,480 --> 00:57:17,520
Speaker 2: Lucian thought about it. We may have in our idea

1008
00:57:17,840 --> 00:57:19,920
Speaker 2: in our head, some idea what we would think about

1009
00:57:19,920 --> 00:57:21,760
Speaker 2: it if we went to a religious service and there

1010
00:57:21,760 --> 00:57:24,120
Speaker 2: was an obvious puppet, But as for the people that

1011
00:57:24,160 --> 00:57:27,760
Speaker 2: were there in attendance and perhaps came back and didn't feel,

1012
00:57:28,160 --> 00:57:30,840
Speaker 2: you know, ripped off by by what they experienced. You know,

1013
00:57:31,440 --> 00:57:32,360
Speaker 2: who's to say.

1014
00:57:32,800 --> 00:57:35,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, I guess all that just to say, like,

1015
00:57:36,200 --> 00:57:39,960
Speaker 3: you know, survey, survey the world past and present with

1016
00:57:40,320 --> 00:57:43,640
Speaker 3: open eyes, but be cautious about interpreting what you see.

1017
00:57:43,680 --> 00:57:47,240
Speaker 4: You might be jumping to conclusions. I know we do sometimes.

1018
00:57:48,360 --> 00:57:50,080
Speaker 2: All right, we're gonna go ahead and close the book

1019
00:57:50,120 --> 00:57:52,320
Speaker 2: here on the mystery cults, but we'd love to hear

1020
00:57:52,320 --> 00:57:55,360
Speaker 2: from everyone out there if you have thoughts on the

1021
00:57:55,360 --> 00:57:58,360
Speaker 2: broader subject here, particular of mystery cults that we talked about,

1022
00:57:58,720 --> 00:58:02,120
Speaker 2: mystery cults that we didn't talk about write in. We

1023
00:58:02,160 --> 00:58:04,960
Speaker 2: would love to hear from you. Just a reminder once

1024
00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:06,880
Speaker 2: more that Stuff to Blow Your Mind is primarily a

1025
00:58:06,880 --> 00:58:09,920
Speaker 2: science and culture podcast with core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

1026
00:58:09,920 --> 00:58:12,560
Speaker 2: On Wednesdays we air a short form episode, and on

1027
00:58:12,600 --> 00:58:15,360
Speaker 2: Fridays we set aside most serious concerns to just talk

1028
00:58:15,360 --> 00:58:19,000
Speaker 2: about a weird film on Weird House Cinema. You can

1029
00:58:19,040 --> 00:58:23,840
Speaker 2: follow us on various social media accounts, including Instagram, where

1030
00:58:23,880 --> 00:58:26,360
Speaker 2: we are stb ym Podcast. So if you use that

1031
00:58:26,360 --> 00:58:30,280
Speaker 2: platform follow us there. There's activity on numerous ones right now,

1032
00:58:30,320 --> 00:58:32,440
Speaker 2: but that one is perhaps one of the more active ones.

1033
00:58:32,680 --> 00:58:36,360
Speaker 2: Though We're still working on getting our follower base up

1034
00:58:36,400 --> 00:58:41,200
Speaker 2: on that platform again, having lost a previous version of

1035
00:58:41,280 --> 00:58:44,160
Speaker 2: our Instagram account. And let's see.

1036
00:58:44,000 --> 00:58:45,680
Speaker 3: What those stories now denied to us.

1037
00:58:45,760 --> 00:58:47,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, the mysteries are denied to us. I think it

1038
00:58:47,520 --> 00:58:49,360
Speaker 2: was finally eradicated. Were just locked out of it for

1039
00:58:49,400 --> 00:58:51,920
Speaker 2: a long time and then it was fine. It's finally gone.

1040
00:58:52,040 --> 00:58:53,720
Speaker 2: But now we just have to build up the new one.

1041
00:58:54,320 --> 00:58:55,919
Speaker 2: On's thee And then where else are we? Oh, we're

1042
00:58:55,920 --> 00:58:59,080
Speaker 2: on the letterbox. If you are into our Weird House

1043
00:58:59,120 --> 00:59:02,000
Speaker 2: Cinema episodes, you can follow us on Letterbox where we

1044
00:59:02,040 --> 00:59:03,680
Speaker 2: are a weird house and that's a great way to

1045
00:59:03,720 --> 00:59:05,840
Speaker 2: keep up with the movies that we're discussing on Weird

1046
00:59:05,840 --> 00:59:06,400
Speaker 2: House Cinema.

1047
00:59:06,960 --> 00:59:10,760
Speaker 3: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway.

1048
00:59:11,120 --> 00:59:12,560
Speaker 3: If you would like to get in touch with us

1049
00:59:12,600 --> 00:59:15,000
Speaker 3: with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest

1050
00:59:15,000 --> 00:59:17,040
Speaker 3: a topic for the future, or just to say hello,

1051
00:59:17,200 --> 00:59:19,800
Speaker 3: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow

1052
00:59:19,800 --> 00:59:27,920
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1053
00:59:28,480 --> 00:59:31,400
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1054
00:59:31,480 --> 00:59:34,280
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