Taylor - Eleusianian and Bacchic Mysteries.pdf - Platonic Philosophy

Bacchic Mysteries. 85should first be refined by certain purifications : but after purification, the reception ofthe sacred rites succeeds. The third part isdenominated epopteia, or reception.* Andthe fourth, which is the end and design of therevelation, is [the investiture] the binding ofthe head and fixing of the crowns. The initiated person is, by this means, authorizedto communicate to others the sacred ritesin which he has been instructed ;whetherafter this he becomes a torch-bearer, or anhierophant of the Mysteries, or sustains someother part of the sacerdotal office. But thefifth, which is produced from all these, isfriendship and interior communion withGod, and the enjoyment of that felicitywhich arises from intimate converse withdivine beings. Similar to this is the communication of political instruction; for, inthe first place, a certain purification precedes,*Theon appears to regard the final apocalypse or epopteia, likeE. Pococke to whose views allusion is made elsewhere. This"writer says The initiated were styled : ebaptoi,"and adds in afoot-note "Avaptoi, literally obtaining or getting." Accordingto this the epopteia would imply the final reception of the interiordoctrines. A. W.