Concept
Esoteric Christianity
Overview
Esoteric Christianity is a mystical approach to Christianity which features "secret traditions" that require an initiation to learn or understand. The term esoteric was coined in the 17th century and derives from the Greek ἐσωτερικός (esōterikos, "inner"). It stands in contrast to exoteric (ἐξωτερικός, exōterikos, "outer" or "public"), a distinction already noted by Aristotle, who referred to ἐξωτερικοὶ λόγοι ("exoteric discourses") intended for a general audience. Esoteric teachings were often transmitted orally to a small inner circle of initiates rather than through written publications, a pattern consistent with other religious "secret traditions".
Scholars note that esoteric Christian movements often emphasize alternative interpretations of Christian theology that differ from established orthodoxy. These currents frequently draw upon the canonical gospels, apocalyptic writings, and certain New Testament apocrypha as sources of hidden or symbolic meaning. Some traditions also refer to the disciplina arcani, a concept describing secret teachings or liturgical practices transmitted in the early Church, although mainstream scholarship generally understands it as limited to liturgical secrecy rather than esoteric doctrine.
Scholars debate the relationship between esoteric Christianity and Gnosticism. While some see Gnostic movements as among the earliest expressions of esoteric Christian thought, others argue that esoteric Christianity developed distinctively through Alexandrian theology, medieval mysticism, and later currents such as Rosicrucianism and Theosophy.
There are also esoteric Christian Societies such as the Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Possible passages
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Hence arose the custom of common meals, but the separation of the citizens into different families from Egypt: for the reign of Sesostris is of much higher antiquity than that of Minos. As we ought to think that most other things were found out in a long, nay, even in a boundless time (reason teaching us that want would make us first invent that which was necessary, and, when that was obtained, then those things…
Aristotle, Politics
States what Esoteric Christianity is; the author is tied to Esoteric Christianity in the knowledge graph.
Some such words there appear to be: as {epsilon rho nu upsilon gamma epsilon sigma}, 'sprouters,' for {kappa epsilon rho alpha tau alpha}, 'horns,' and {alpha rho eta tau eta rho}, 'supplicator,' for {iota epsilon rho epsilon upsilon sigma}, 'priest.'
Aristotle, The Poetics of Aristotle
States what Esoteric Christianity is; the author is tied to Esoteric Christianity in the knowledge graph.
In more developed Christianity, we see that seed of asceticism unfold into the full flower in the writings of the Christian saints and mystics. These preach, besides the purest love, complete resignation, voluntary and absolute poverty, genuine calmness, perfect indifference to all worldly things, dying to our own will and being born again in God, entire…
Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea
States what Esoteric Christianity is.
Related ideas
- Hellenistic Judaism
- Gnosticism
- Valentinianism
- Platonism
- Origen
- Reincarnation
- Romanticism
- Renaissance humanism
- Aristotle
- Church Fathers
- Exoteric
- Western esotericism
- Rosicrucianism
- Theosophy
- Christianity
- Contra Celsum
- The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
- Clement of Alexandria
- Prisca theologia
- Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia
- Basilidians
Place in the tradition
Part of Neoplatonism and Christianity.