Source: Margaret Barker, Temple Mysticism: An Introduction (London: SPCK, 2011), ix–39.
Reconstructing_the_Suppressed_Temple_Mysticism_Core.m4a
This excerpt from Margaret Barker's Temple Mysticism proposes that an ancient, unacknowledged system of temple mysticism is foundational to the Bible and early Christianity, arguing that this secret tradition was largely lost or suppressed in later canonical writings. The author seeks to recover this ancient system from scattered fragments and underlying assumptions in familiar texts, which often preserved teachings through oral tradition and mystery religion elements—such as the things shown (deiknumena), done (drōmena), and spoken (legomena). Barker uses the prophet Isaiah's vision of the enthroned Lord as a key example, asserting that his experience in the Holy of Holies, or dabeir (oracle), establishes the antiquity of these mystical concepts, which were later applied to Jesus by his closest disciples, identifying him as the divine figure at the center of the vision. Furthermore, the text explores how the editing and stabilization of the Hebrew canon after the second temple’s destruction filtered out key mystical elements—including those pertaining to Wisdom and the Anointed One—which the early Christians, who viewed Jesus as their great high priest, preserved and centered in their worship.
Most people think of the Bible as a finished product—a complete book handed down through the ages. It's often viewed as a singular, final text, a library of sacred history and doctrine bound between two covers. But this perception overlooks a foundational layer of belief that predates and underpins much of the text itself, a system that has been largely lost or suppressed: Temple Mysticism.
Imagine being given a thousand jigsaw pieces with no picture on the box to guide you. You can connect some pieces, but you have no idea what the final image is supposed to look like. This is the challenge of recovering this lost tradition. We have scattered fragments in the biblical text, but the original picture—the vibrant, visionary faith centered on the Jerusalem temple—has been obscured. This post uncovers five revelations from this lost tradition that challenge our modern assumptions and offer a new key to understanding Christian origins.
Here are five takeaways from the work of recovering this lost mystical core of the scriptures.