In order to understand this you must know what is the difference between a function call and a reference to a function. As well as how scopes work in javascript.
Assuming you do know these things, let's get explaining.
So you first have a variable hidden
that is being assigned a value of mystery(3)
. So immediately look at the function mystery
and see what it returns. it returns a reference to an inner function mystery2
. So now hidden
holds a reference, meaning that it has no actual numeric value. Following you have a second variable declaration
var jumble = mystery3(hidden);
. Now in order to know what jumble
holds you need to look at the function mystery3
and the value it returns. It, again, returns a reference to an inner function mystery4
. So now the two variables you have contain references to inner functions of the closures mystery
and mystery3
.
Now let's have a look at var result = jumble(2)
. Executing jumble(2)
is an actual function call to the function that jumble
holds a reference to, which is mystery4
. When mystery4
runs you see it requires a parameter bonus
, which will be 2
given from the line var result = jumble(2)
. It returns param(6) + bonus
. bonus
is 2
, ok, but what is param(6)
? That is the value given to jumble
: hidden
, which was a reference to mystery2
, remember? So running param(6)
will execute mystery2
with a parameter 6
And so, tracing back the functions may have turned out a little confusing, but let's follow that with actual values to make it a little clearer ( if that's even a word ).
Executing var result = jumble(2)
will give us a return value of param(6) + 2
to get param(6)
we go into mystery2
with multiplier = 6
, where we set multiplier = 6 * input
. Our input is equal to 3+2=5
, so multiplier
becomes 6*5=30
and as a return value we multiply that by 4
which is our var secret
. By the end of the execution of mystery2
we have a value of 120
, which is returned to our param(6)
in mystery4
. And if you remember that our bonus
was 2
, 120+2=122
Voila!
I get the feeling I didn't do a very good job at explaining this simply, but that's probably the best I could do. Hope that helped!