A mystery is something that can not be explained. Many things in this world are a mystery, like how the universe was created. According to John F. Haught, a mystery is an other-than-ordinary dimension of reality that distinguishes religion from ordinary life and consciousness. When I put some more thought into what Haught’s defintion of mystery was, it became a mystery to me. Haught seemed to also agree with the scientists’ definition of mystery stating that mystery “often means nothing more than a set of problems that will eventually be solved by scientific exploration.” (Haught, 163) These set of problems that are in the realm of mystery, “seem to expand as we solve more of our scientific and other problems. It is like a ‘horizon’ that keeps receding into the distance the more our knowledge advances.” (Haught, 166) Hau
Haught seems to agree with Lao Tsu. Haught states, “In the end, therefore, the only adequate God-talk is no talk at all. The only way to imagine the divine is to abandon all images of God. The only adequate way to think about mystery is not to think at all.” It is as if God is the most Supreme Being. No one can think of his image, no one can even really speak about him. This is very similar to Lao Tsu’s saying of “The Tao that can be spoken is not the real Tao…The name that can be given is not the name itself. The unnamable is the source of the universe.” (Haught 113).
ght had a general and scientific definition of mystery. His definition of mystery became unclear to me when I realized he also had a religious definition.
Haught states, “In this text the term “religion” is used to designate only those modes of li
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