mystery

English Online Dictionary. What means mystery‎? What does mystery mean?

English

Etymology

From Middle English mysterie, from Anglo-Norman misterie (Old French mistere), from Latin mysterium, from Ancient Greek μυστήριον (mustḗrion, “a mystery, a secret, a secret rite”), from μύστης (mústēs, “initiated one”), from μυέω (muéō, “I initiate”), from μύω (múō, “I shut”). Displaced native Old English ġerȳne.

Pronunciation

• enPR: mĭsʹt(ə)rē, IPA^(key): /ˈmɪst(ə)ɹi/
• Rhymes: -ɪstəɹi
• Hyphenation: mys‧te‧ry, myst‧ery

Noun

mystery (countable and uncountable, plural mysteries)

1. Something secret or unexplainable; an unknown.
2. Someone or something with an obscure or puzzling nature.
3. An account, story, book, film, or play, often with the theme of crime or murder, with a surprise ending that explains all the strange events that have occurred.
4. A mystery play.
5. (obsolete) A secret or mystical meaning.
   • 1567, Matteo Bandello, Certain Tragical Discourses of Bandello, tr. Geffraie Fenton:

     […] and, not knowing the meaning or misterie of her pollicie, forgat no termes of reproche or rigorous rebuke against his chast doughter.

6. A religious truth not understandable by the application of human reason alone (without divine aid).
   • 1744 (first printed), Jonathan Swift, A Sermon on the Trinity

     If God should please to reveal unto us this great mystery of the Trinity, or some other mysteries in our holy religion, we should not be able to understand them, unless he would bestow on us some new faculties of the mind.

7. (archaic outside Eastern Orthodoxy) A sacrament.
8. (chiefly in the plural) A secret religious celebration, admission to which was usually through initiation.
9. (Catholicism) A particular event or series of events in the life of Christ.

10. (archaic) A craft, art or trade; specifically a guild of craftsmen.

Synonyms

• roun (obsolete)

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

References

Middle English

Etymology 1

From Anglo-Norman misterie.

Noun

mystery

1. Alternative form of mysterie (“mystery”)

Etymology 2

From Old French mistere.

Noun

mystery

1. Alternative form of mysterie (“duty”)