Disciplina Arcani

Disciplina Arcani (Lat., 'Discipline of the Secret'), a term first employed by the German controversialists Tentzel and Schelstrate (1683-85) to denote a discipline of the early church, founded upon the words of Christ in Matt. vii. 6, and on 1 Cor. iii. 1-2, and Heb. v. 12-14, in virtue of which the knowledge of certain doctrines and the liberty of presence at certain rites connected with the most solemn mysteries of the Christian religion were withheld by the initiated from pagans and catechumens. Both unbelievers and catechumens were removed from the church at the commencement of what was afterwards called the Missa Fidelium (see MASS); such doctrines as regarded the sacraments of baptism and the eucharist were either not mentioned in the presence of these classes, or were referred to in enigmatical language, unintelligible to the uninitiated. This principle of reserve accounts for the absolute silence as to the eucharist preserved in many early Apologies; the earliest indications of the discipline are met towards the close of the 2d century. After the 6th century, all need for it having disappeared, the practice was discontinued. See Newman's Arians; Rothe, De Disc. Arcani; and Bonivetsch, in the Zeitschrift für historische Theologie (1873).