Replies

Sure it is, in a number of places. For example, your buddy +Paul uses it in Ephesians referring to the Mysterion of Marriage. You'll find several in Corinthians. One of the best descriptions of Apostles/bishops/priests is at 1 Cor. 4:1 "...οἰκονόμους μυστηρίων θεοῦ", "stewards of the mysteries of God". The Greek is beautiful, bb! And there are more examples. You may want to learn Greek for your bible studying. English will lead you wrong as often as not.

I'm sure Greek IS a beautiful language and Hebrew as well. I appreciate the wonderful study guides, concordances and lexicons we have today so that every single word in the Bible can be looked up and the word in the original language is given along with the meaning and other uses of it.

It is curious that the word "sacrament" is not used anywhere in the English language translations but, as you said the word means mystery. I wonder why then that it did not get translated that way? There are many places where the word IS translated as mystery from the Greek "mysterion" and according to the Strong's concordance, it means a hidden thing or secret. It even has that meaning in the Hebrew OT.

So I'm not getting the sense that it is really like you say in that it implies the same thing as the Church's term "sacrament". For example, there is the "mystery of the Kingdom"; the mystery of Israel's salvation; the mystery of the Gospel being preached to all the world; the mystery of the hidden wisdom of God; the mystery that we will not all die but we will all be changed; the mystery of Christ in us; mystery of faith; mystery of Godliness; even a mystery of the seven stars and the mystery of iniquity and, finally, the mystery of the whore of Babylon. But I did not find anywhere a mystery of marriage, of baptism, of communion/Eucharist, of Holy Orders, of healing or of last rites that would justify your assertion of the sacraments being described in Scripture.

I'm fully aware that the Church developed these doctrines of the seven sacraments, but they were really not spelled out as such in Scripture.

"It is curious that the word "sacrament" is not used anywhere in the English language translations but, as you said the word means mystery. I wonder why then that it did not get translated that way?"

I have no idea why the word wasn't translated into "sacrament". We don't use translations so there's no problem for us. Maybe the people who did the English translations didn't like the idea of Latin Church sacraments? "...according to the Strong's concordance, it means a hidden thing or secret."

For us, the essence of a "sacrament" is hidden or secret thing. "So I'm not getting the sense that it is really like you say in that it implies the same thing as the Church's term "sacrament".

The "sacraments" do not comprise all of the mysteries of and around and about God, bb. In the East we don't constrain God, putting Him in little boxes, having Him compelled by Necessity and limiting Him to what we can fully understand.

"I did not find anywhere a mystery of marriage, of baptism, of communion/Eucharist, of Holy Orders, of healing or of last rites that would justify your assertion of the sacraments being described in Scripture."

I assume you are familiar with the biblical (not Traditional) basis for the Mysteria so I won't go into that. So far as I recall, the only one actually called a Mysterion in the NT is marriage but calling it a Mysterion is not the point. Mysterion and Mysteria are not "magic words". The point is that we do not fully (or even marginally) understand the what and how of the Mysteria because these are matters of God, not us. When we claim we do, we inevitably fall into error. Can you explain how baptism works on us (not what it does visibly), or Holy Orders, or the Annointing of the sick, or confession or Holy Communion or how matrimony is a type of Christ's relationship to The Church and how it advances us in theosis?

The West is fixated on "proving" and explaining matters of Faith and rejecting matters of Faith when it cannot "prove" or explain what is essentially unprovable and inexplicable. It is absolutist and legalistic, whether in Latin Rite or Protestant vestments, which leads to otherwise perfectly rational human beings arguing over whether bats really are birds! What does this lead to? Simple, it leads to atheistic secularism. Western Christians need to learn humility. A step in that direction will be to accept that they don't need to know everything!

"The power to bear Mysteries, which the humble man has received, which makes him perfect in every virtue without toil, this is the very power which the blessed apostles received in the form of fire. For its sake the Savior commanded them not to leave Jerusalem until they should receive power from on high, that is to say, the Paraclete, which, being interpreted, is the Spirit of consolation. And this is the Spirit of divine visions. Concerning this it is said in divine Scripture: 'Mysteries are revealed to the humble'. The humble are accounted worthy of receiving in themselves this Spirit of revelations Who teaches mysteries" +Isaac the Syrian

It is curious that the word "sacrament" is not used anywhere in the English language translations but, as you said the word means mystery. I wonder why then that it did not get translated that way?

To make it sound more "mysterious." :) Well, why not translate the word "amen," or "why not translate the word mystery as secret because that's what it means, or Christ as the Anointed One, or Messiah as the Anointed One, or the Kingdom of God as Israel, or Satan as the Accuser, which is a title and not a name, etc.?

There are also other Greek words translated as mystery that doe not come form the word mysterion, thus adding to the confusion and erroneous conflation of concepts.