In the days since the bees encouraged me to create this, I have discussed it with many close friends.

Over and over, they asked the same question: "Just what was taught in mystery schools?"

This has challenged me to try and frame this as well as I could for you, so you can understand what we do here, and what we don't.

Mystery schools have been a source of esoteric fascination for thousands of years.

Offering pathways to spiritual awakening and a deeper understanding of the universe they operate outside the boundaries of conventional education. Symbolic teachings are passed from mouth to ear so the exact nature of what was taught in the mystery schools is  lost in time. However it is believed to have been about how the energies of the universe interact.

A Brief History of Mystery Schools

Before going too deeply into what is taught in mystery schools, it perhaps helps to understand their origins and purpose. 

The heyday of Mystery Schools was really around 3000 years ago, but they date back to ancient civilizations such as Egypt, Greece, India, and Mesopotamia.  Designed as a means to help people to come to terms with the bigger questions in life like “Why are we here?” and “What is life for?” They also sought to uncover the  nature of the soul and what happens after death. They did this by using rituals and myth as a way to see the world in different ways

Mystery school teachings were often protected by vows of silence, preserved on fear of death. For the most part, those secrets do remain intact,  so we don’t really know the exact nature of what was taught in mystery schools. What we do know is made up of fragments collected from many, many texts. They were designed to show people that there was more happening around them than what they could see in their material world, and to reveal wisdom hidden from other people’s eyes. 

The term "mystery" comes from  a Greek word  "myein," which means "to close the eyes" or "keep silent." One of the most famous of the Mysteries, the Eleusinian Mystery called their Initiates Mystai (veiled) until they had completed their initiation. Completion meant they experienced epopteia. That is, they “had witnessed”. These Mysteries of Eleusis were presided over by priestesses called Melissae, bees, who are believed to have made the experience possible through herbs, in a drink known as the kykeon. Again, whilst there are many theories about the ingredients of the kykeon, the recipe of the secret remains hidden to this day.

Rituals of The Mystery Schools

Central to the teachings of a mystery school were myths, enacted in ritual by the priests and priestesses, observed in communion with plants. That’s not that dissimilar to how, today, the Nativity or the Walk of The Cross is enacted by the people of a church, and then they partake of bread (wheat) and wine. Interestingly, scholars believe that the rituals probably came first, then the poets and singers created the myths as a way to explain what was happening. 

Those tales then opened up the tales that many of us grew up with. Tales of gods and goddesses, the heroes and monsters that have shaped society’s consciousness.  Myths which explore what it is to be human, to exist in a universe where things can happen that are out of control and perhaps, if there might indeed be a possibility that death is not the end, then what opportunities and threats might that offer.  The function of the Mystery Schools was to transmit this sacred knowledge to those select few deemed ready for such teachings. 

While there may be a sense of elitism to the sacred knowledge, actually many of the ancient mystery schools were open to anyone who wished to take part. However the process to complete the initiation was long, usually lasting between one to two years. Secrecy was not only about keeping the riffraff out though. It also meant that there was a designated route through, always passing through the initiations with the support of the priesthood who were able to deliver teachings intact which prevented them from being diluted for future generations. 

What Was Taught in Mystery Schools?

Students in mystery schools were encouraged to explore the nature of spirit, divinity, in whatever form that might look like to discover the interconnectedness of all things in life. 

Spiritual practices aimed to transcend the limitations of the 3D individual to connect them with universal consciousness. While the goal was for personal transformation, ultimately the vision of this kind of work remains the same today that hopefully society will also be improved, and that humanity as a whole might benefit.

At the Aromatic Mystery School we work with plant spirits and the wise trees  to do this. Most often, we approach this wordless conversation with the divine through our senses of smell.

Is What is Taught in Every Mystery School The Same?

No.  history reveals each mystery school as being unique, each with its own speciality areas. You can often find evidence of people who have worked with many mystery schools through their lifetimes. It is thought their access points were slightly different though, and that is best explained by the different myths used to tell their stories. That said, the tools they used to help people decipher these mysteries seem to be common throughout. These include mystical philosophies, sacred geometry, astrology, and the use of spiritual music and scent.

At the Aromatic Mystery School our focus is on the idea that all life is animate. That other beings outside of humans have consciousness and that given the right environment we can learn to interact with and learn from them. Specifically, the spirits whom we interact with here are plant spirits and bees.

Perhaps the easiest way to explain that, then, is that unlike other aromatherapy schools, the focus of our learning is not solely interested in the chemical constituents of a plant, but on the spirit or essence of the plant itself. Initiates learn how to engage with plant consciousnesses, to form relationships with them through meditation, ritual, and communication.

Unlike conventional aromatherapy which speaks of “using an essential oil to…” we believe that each plant has its own individual spirit with their own specialized talents to reveal truths to heal more than just the physical body. Here we come from the viewpoint that, given the right environment, non-human beings can guide us through emotional and mental turbulence, and even help with spiritual dis-eases, in ways that transcends space and time. 

Working With Spirit

Partnership with the plant spirit world illuminates human consciousness.

Fundamental to the Aromatic Mystery School is that we work with scent and particularly with essential oils. Healing comes through communication and partnership with plant spirits. This cosmic union is achieved not only through detailed exploration of religious and spiritual texts which recommend these plants, but also through exploration of oneself. 

Which parts of our psyche does the oil touch? 

What does that reveal about us? 

Again, whilst the plants are always our greatest teachers, sometimes a more worldly aspect is required, and at the Aromatic Mystery School, bees are our guides.

Meditation, Breathwork, and Energy Mastery

Energy work is central to mystery school teachings. 

How can we train energy? Control it? Enhance it or direct it? 

Practicing meditation and breathwork, and with plant medicines cultivates inner stillness. When you are calm, thoughts slow and it becomes easier to become “the observer”. Watching your own thought patterns and reactions shines light on the places where your own spirit may not be in control. In other words, where our minds make shortcuts to places we might not want to be. Often these come from societal conditioning, from things we have been taught as a child, or perhaps have been trained in by fear. Fear can take many forms, from things said by well meaning people, especially parents, to witnessing the horrors of war. 

It is thought that the average persona has around 70,000 thoughts a day, and about 80% of those are negative. 

Read that again! 

Fragrance is processed by the same part of our brains that processes these thoughts. Therefore scent has the power to “stop the traffic” and examine…how did I get from that thought to that one? What was hidden in that gap? 

The gap…well that’s the mysteries! 

What was taught in a mystery school (and still is, for that matter) was tools and techniques to peel back those layers like an onion, and see what lies beneath. 

Fear, anger, confusion are seen as things that stop us shining so brightly in the world, and this happens because they lower our vibration. Raising one's vibration by this spiritual clearing means we can start to evolve out of only seeing the mundane and access higher states of consciousness and interact with the spiritual realms. 

Mystical Thinking

Incidentally, part of what is taught in a mystery school is the ability to be critical in your thinking.

Often it seeks to challenge what you see as being real.

In our newly AI generated world, I find this most empowering. The need to ask new questions about whether what we are being shown is indeed real. 

Part of that thinking is to understand that many narratives we hear are polarized to further the endeavors of middle aged white men. This is not new, indeed much of our historical knowledge comes from the sectionalised narrative that the civilized world was Greek, and since the statuary of the ancient world was thought to be white, Greek must be white, and therefore white is civilized. When this was demonstrated to me, it made me feel sick to my stomach. Therefore, while the framework in the Aromatic Mystery School always come at things from a Eurocentric perspective, but it then asks “and what more is there…?”

Likewise, whilst there are no rules that exclude men,many of the teachings, especially those of the bee mysteries, are written by women, for women. 

By priestesses, for the priestesses of tomorrow.

Esoteric Knowledge Of Plant And Bee Spirituality

The poet John Muir once said “In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.” Such is the nature of plants, I think. If we can, just for a moment switch off the business of our minds, a connection, so fast and effective plugs us into a primordial matrix of information about humanity, about the earth and about ourselves

We are yet to understand why our minds react to scent in the way that we do, but somehow, deep in our limbic system, our brain remembers…stuff! 

Reactions, triggers, great loves, wounds, desires, ambitions, broken dreams…all open up to scent.

In modern day parlance, we might say the “spiritual benefits of essential oils and incenses”. These are revealed not only through ancient Christian and Jewish texts, but Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam and Shinto practices as well as many other religions, and from shamanistic traditions across the world. 

Fundamentally though, what was taught in mystery schools is somewhat different to your normal class, because it relies on the foundational belief that true understanding cannot only come from reading or intellectual study alone, but requires a direct experience of these deeper truths. From epopteia, from bearing witness to the transmission and transformation brought about through living the teaching.

Alchemical Transformation With Plants

Sadly, we have not yet perfected turning metal into gold, (you’ll know when we have because I’ll be dripping in it!) but the true alchemical journey is learning how to transform yourself by extracting  spiritual gold. In this case, Aromatic Mystery School teaching is gathering plant wisdom as if it were pollen and nectar so as to  alchemise it into honey. Consider how the bee alights on many flowers, supping each plant’s wisdom as she alights. Each plant has her own medicine and beauty, and speaks in wordless medicine with the human spirit.

Breathing exercises, and rituals shift both the initiate’s awareness and their energy. 

Astrology and Cosmic Influence

Many of the ancient teachings about the world talk about the microcosm and the macrocosm. The person as a personified microcosm of what is happening on the much larger starger stage of the universe. 

This is perhaps best perceived as how celestial bodies exert their influence on the earth. Think of how the moon affects the tides, but also our emotions. How venus brings and takes away feelings of love. 

For some, astrology is a powerful tool for divination, but at the Aromatic Mystery School we find astrology to be an invisible shorthand for healing us to understand plants and the places they can take us when we seek to heal. Each plant corresponds to certain movements and aspects of different celestial beings, but can morph between these depending on how and when it was harvested, then also how we choose to use it as a magical tool in a blend.

Is Magic Taught in Mystery Schools?

That is a very difficult answer, because first we need to define what we believe as magic. 

To avoid a very long post about the pitfalls of different interpretations of the word might mean…

At the Aromatic Mystery School we define magic as any place where something supernatural takes place. Thus if someone prays to God and asks for someone to get better, and they do….then that is seen as magic. A divinity was seen as intervening and changing the course of reality. And whilst that might seem vague and perhaps too all encompassing, it is important to remember that at the time of the original mystery schools, medicine was seen as a way of appeasing the spirits who had made someone unwell. 

It was not really until the 18th century that treatment of the mind and body split. Before that, medicine was always seen as dis-ease, because of some disturbance in the spirit. Spirituality as a form of wellness is not a new phenomenon, it’s merely reversing back to where we took a wrong turning, with a view to get healing back on track.

So, is magic taught in mystery schools? I would say the answer would always be yes, although the definition of magic might be different in each. 

Can a plant be a magical ingredient? Perhaps not so easily familiar as “eye of newt” or “toe of frog”, but definitely, it’s an unequivocal yes. 

The key of course is knowing how and why you are using it, and that most certainly is what we teach.

Subtle Bodies 

At the core of what was taught in a mystery school is that we are more than just physical bodies moving through our worlds. Our specialist area at the Aromatic Mystery School is what is known as subtle energies. These might be more commonly known as the aura and the chakras to m0st people. 

How do the aura and chakra affect the mental, emotional and physical bodies, and how do they connect to the wider world at large. As a hint, it might interest you to know that part of what was taught in the mystery schools of ancient Egypt was how to purify and empower the ba and ka (spirit and soul as very rough, overly simplistic translations) through sekhem (power) of the Sefchem ba ra (what the Hidnus would later refine as the chakras). This power was what would eventually allow their spirit to continue eternally in the Afterlife. 

Sacred Geometry 

Mystery schools teachings also show how the universe is structured according to certain geometric patterns, mathematical principles and relationships between spaces. Patterns can be seen in everything from the structure of atoms to the movement of the planets of how plants and animals grow. Or even humans for that matter….A great example is the Da Vinci’s illustration of Vitruvian man that shows how an artist can predict aspects of drawing a figure because of predictable relationships in nature.

Sacred symbols such as the Flower of Life, the honeycomb, and the Fibonacci Sequence reveal the underlying order of creation. Nature makes patterns and those patters each have their own universal truths into the divine blueprint of the cosmos. 

At the Aromatic Mystery School, sacred geometry is taught both in the relation to the construction of sacred spaces such as temples, pyramids, and other monuments, as well as within plants and flowers. Teachings are designed to align with cosmic forces at play and to  enhance spiritual practice.

Jewish Mysticism, the Kabbalah and the Tree of Life

The Kabbalistic Tree of Life representats invisible forces within the cosmos and illuminates the pathway a person must travel to achieve divine union. It consists of ten divine emanations, known as sefirot. 

These are: 

*Hokhmah: Wisdom

*Binah: Understanding

*Hesed: Loving-kindness

*Gevurah: Power or judgment

*Tiferet: Beauty

*Netzah: Victory

*Hod: Splendor

*Yesod: Foundation

*Malkhut: Sovereignty

Twenty two paths connect them.

Each represents a differentt step in the journey of spiritual ascension.

While we do not (yet) have a Jewish Mystery School division, I find the the Tree of Life to be a uniquely useful map to understand the relationship between the self, the universe and the divine.

Mystery school students study the structure of the Tree, learning how to ascend from our material world of Malkuth to Keter, to the realm of the divine source.

The Kabbalah offers an unseen language of the wisdom of each plant. 

What Was Taught in Mystery Schools was Ideas of Different Worlds

What I mean by that is how things are similar and how things are not the same.

A good example of that might be how cinnamon reminds you of Christmas. It belongs to the Christmas world. But in my culture, Christmas is cold, and cinnamon is warm. It's a bit like a Venn diagram; things walk between worlds. Becoming powerful means being able to decipher which world they are in

Take cedarwood, for instance. There is often confusion between the different types. 

Exploration of how they are seen in their own religious and cultural environments reveals much about the different planes they exist upon. We would describe both as being spiritually protective. However, studying how First Nations people use Juniperus virginia shows that they see the spirits working very much on this plane. They use the cedar tree to make beds for babies, for the roofs of their houses, they use bark to make items of clothing. Those spirits belong to Malkuth. 

If we contrast that to the Cedars of Lebanon used in Biblical times to build Solomon’s Temple, this Cedar, Cedrus libani, is associated in ancient texts with the astral law makers and good judgment. This variety belongs to Hockmah and Gevurah. 

A very large distinction when you seek to recruit allies…what realm do we seek to know?

Kabbalistic teachings also emphasize the importance of the creative potential of language.

To stress though, while the Kabbalah is  heavily influenced by Jewish mysticism, the Aromatic Mystery School follows the pantheist ideology that all religions have truths to offer. We believe that to be true as a global sentiment but especially when it comes to sacred teachings about plants. We do not recommend any one spiritual discipline over another.

Initiation and Spiritual Transformation

Initiation, in the mystery school tradition,  marks the beginning of the initiate's journey toward spiritual growth and knowledge. Rites, rituals, and practices are aimed at purifying the mind, body, and soul from the overlays of the outside world. They are designed to strip away layers of societal conditioning and trauma, to gain the very best opportunity to “know oneself”.

Ancient mystery schools like those of Eleusis in Greece or the Egyptian mystery schools offered initiations that represented the death of the old self and the rebirth of the soul into a higher state of awareness. This concept of spiritual rebirth is a recurring theme in mystery traditions across cultures and time periods. In some of the larger mystery traditions, these were large one off initiations. Working with scent, initiations happen every day. I never cease to be amazed when I find I have learnt inordinate amounts about something I never knew existed in the space of a couple of days! For the most part, we leave it to the plants and the bees to do the initiating. We simply show you the axis point in! 

Initiation takes students deeper into the mysteries, revealing new layers of knowledge and insights. Some initiations are merely symbolic, but others are not. Many rituals are designed to provoke spiritual transformation and they can sometimes involve facing your fears, overcoming limitations, or connecting with higher realms of consciousness.

What Was Taught In Mystery Schools About Ritual

Incidentally, the words ritual and rite can often intimidate people, but in truth, we engage in rituals every day. They bring structure and meaning to our lives. Rituals usually follow a precise sequence of words, gestures, and actions which we are conditioned to recognise, so our brains recognise a new thought pattern in the future. 

Think about the ritual of exchanging rings in a wedding service for example. Forever more, the two are bound in a golden cycle together. 

The bride and groom stamping on the glasses together.

The ritual of church bells ringing or the Imam calling the faithful to prayer. 

Eating hot cross buns or birthday cake even…the ritual gives context to why those sweetmeats are special. 

Long words and jargon aside, the only way to get a feel for what was taught in a mystery school is to come and have a go for yourself.

I have made the Cedarwood Mysteries free access for you to explore.

Step inside...come and have some fun.