In response to his life-changing vision, Alma exclaimed:
My soul hath been redeemed from the gall of bitterness and bonds of iniquity. I was in the darkest abyss; but now I behold the marvelous light of God. My soul was racked with eternal torment; but I am snatched, and my soul is pained no more. (Mosiah 27:29)
According to Hugh Nibley, this is the epopteia. This was the thing that was recited in the Jewish and Christian mysteries, when you go from the darkness to the day. It was imitated in the ancient temples in Egypt. You would go through darkness and trials and through three levels. Then in the final stage you went through a veil into a sunlit courtyard at noon day. Everything was white alabaster and absolutely dazzling in this celestial room. It was the same thing in the epopteia with the Greeks. You went into a room that was brilliantly lighted after you had been in the dark. It's called the epopteia, "the seeing of the light," the sudden vision that pops on you when you realize. [Hugh W. Nibley, Teachings of the Book of Mormon, Semester 2, p. 194]