I am very new to this terrain but I wonder if the secrecy that various factions manipulated to somehow verify their superiority over other, also secretive factions, had an entirely different motive in its original origins in the occult world: the desire not to run afoul of church authorities, Catholic or Protestant. During the Inquisition apparently there were lists of herbs that one could be killed for employing in healing work. Tens of thousands of people, largely women, were put to death for witchcraft in the golden age of witch hunting, prior to 1800. Again, I’m a newbie but it makes all the GD posturing seem pretty sad. If secrecy around occult things began in any part as self-protection, did these oh-so-gifted magicians ever acknowledge this?