red, and during initiation the members were made to take a vow of secrecy.Pythagoreans practiced many rituals derived directly from preceding mystery cults such as sea bathing at initiation and fasts. They adopted most of the rituals and traditions from the Eleusinian mysteries, but they also used Orphic religious books as a reference to traditional ceremonies. Pythagoreans performed many rituals as part of their daily routine. “The practice of silence each morning, between rising from bed and the ascetically sparse community breakfast, was a means on the one hand of reawakening one’s inner affinity with the divine, and on the other hand of exercising and strengthening one’s power of memory by daily practice in recalling the ordered events of the preceding day, then of the day before that, and so on” (Wheelwright 201). These ritualistic actions were traditional to the Pythagoreans as well as daily readings, community meals and the practice of sharing. Pythagoreans are famous for their strict secrecy policies. “Isocrates in a bantering vein (Bus. 29) remarks that those who claim to be disciples of Pythagoras are more admired for their silence than their most famous orators for their speech” (Guthrie 151). To become a member of the school, an initiate took a pledge of silence for five years. Religious historians will never know exactly what Pythagoras said to his followers because of the remarkable silence the Pythagoreans kept.While the Pythagoreans adopted most of their central beliefs from ancient mystery cults, they developed some differences as well. Mystery cults were totally dedicated to religious beliefs such as the immortality of the soul and transmigration, and so were the Pythagoreans, but the Pythagoreans dedicated themselves to higher learning as well (as is seen by the establishment of a school which mystery cults never had). “To a degree and in a manner which it is difficu...
