Admission to the second degree took place during the night between the sixth and seventh days of the celebration of the Mysteries, when they were led into the temple precincts and the second Archon opened the ceremony with prayers and sacrifices. The candidates were crowned with myrtle and on entering the building an edifice so vast and capacious as to exceed in area the largest theatre of the period they purified themselves by immersing their hands in the consecrated water.
The priests, vested in their sacerdotal garments, then came forward. During the first part of the ceremony the candidates were assembled in the outer hall of the temple, the temple proper being closed. Then a herald came forth and proclaimed: "Away from here all ye that are not purified, and whose souls have not been freed from sin." If any who were not votaries had by chance entered the precincts they now left for if discovered afterwards the punishment was death. In order to make certain that no intruders remained behind all who were present had to answer certain specified questions. Then all again immersed their hands in the consecrated water and renewed the pledge of secrecy.
Next they took off their ordinary garments, and girded themselves with the skins of young does, whereupon the priests wished them joy of all the happiness their initiation would bring them and then went away. Within a few minutes the building was plunged in total darkness. Suddenly terrific peals of thunder resounded, shaking the very foundations of the temple; vivid flashes of lightning lit up the darkness and displayed fearful forms, while dreadful sighs, groans, and cries of pain resounded on all sides, like the shrieks of the condemned in Tartarus. The novices were taken hold of by invisible hands, their hair was torn, and they were beaten and thrown to the ground.
At last a faint light became visible in the distance and a fearful scene appeared before their eyes. The gates of Tartarus were opened and the abode of the condemned lay before them. They could hear the cries of anguish and the vain regrets of those to whom Paradise was lost forever and could, moreover, witness their hopeless remorse. They saw, as well as heard, all the tortures of the condemned. The Furies, armed with relentless scourges and flaming torches, drove the unhappy victims incessantly to and fro, never letting them rest for a moment. Meanwhile the loud voices of the hierophant, who represented the judge of the world, was heard expounding the meaning of what was passing before them and warning and threatening the initiates. It may well be imagined that all these fearful scenes were so terrifying that very frequently beads of anguish appeared on the brows of the novices.
At length the gates of Tartarus closed and the innermost sanctuary of the temple lay open before the initiates in dazzling light. In the midst stood the statue of the goddess Demeter brilliantly decked and gleaming with precious stones; heavenly music entranced their souls; a cloudless sky overshadowed them; fragrant perfumes arose; and in the distance the privileged spectators beheld flowering meads, where the blessed danced and amused themselves with innocent games and pastimes.
Among others writers the scene is described by Aristophanes in The Frogs:
Heracles: The voyage is a long one. For you will come directly to a very big lake of abysmal depth.
Dionysos: Then how shall I get taken across it?
Heracles: In a little boat just so big; an old man who plies the boat will take you across for a fee of two oboles.
Dionysos: Oh dear! How very powerful those two oboles are all over the world. How did they manage to get here?
Heracles: Theseus brought them. After this you will see serpents and wild beasts in countless numbers and very terrible. Then a great slough and over-flowing dung; and in this you'll see lying anyone who ever yet at any place wronged his guest or beat his mother, or smote his father's jaw, or swore an oath and foreswore himself.... And next a breathing of flutes shall be wafted around you, and you shall see a very beautiful light, even as in this world, and myrtle groves, and happy choirs of men and women, and a loud clapping of hands.
Dionysos: And who are these people, pray?
Heracles: The initiated. It was regarded as permissible to describe the scenes of the initiation, and this has been done by many writers, but a complete silence was demanded as to the means employed to realize the end, the rites and ceremonies in which the initiate took part, the emblems which were displayed, and the actual words uttered and the slightest divergence rendered the offender liable to the strongest possible condemnation and chastisement.
In the course of the ceremony the hierophant asked a series of questions to which written answers had been prepared and committed to memory by the candidates. Holy Mysteries were revealed to the initiates from a book called Petroma, a word derived from petra, a stone, and so called because the writings were kept enclosed between two cemented stones.
The garments worn by the candidates during the initiation ceremony were accounted sacred, and equal with incantations and consecrated charms in their power to avert evils. Consequently, they were never cast off until torn and tattered. Nor was it usual, even then, to throw them away but it was customary to make them into twaddling clothes for children or to consecrate them to Demeter and Persephone.
(to be continued)
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