Elagabalus is the reason for the Season

Christmas means a lot of things for a lot of people. A time of giving and sharing. A time to spend with your love ones and to remember love ones who have passed. A time to experience the pure joy of children, and maybe recapture that joy for ourselves. However, many Christians will remind you that we should take our minds of our selfish celebrations, and remember the reason for the season. I personally am all for that! So, let me tell you a little story, about the reason for the season.

The Second Century CE is widely regarded to be the Zenith of Imperial Rome, in terms of wealth, power, stability and cultural importance. It was a time of the Five Good Emperors. If you were a wealthy Roman citizen, there were few times and places in history better to be alive ( though not so much if you were a subjected people, like the Jewish people of Judea, but that's another topic) , All good things come to an end, and after the last of the “good “ Emperors died, Rome (at least the Western Roman Empire) started it's long, slow and steady decline. There was a time of chaos following the Death of Commodus ( the son of the last “good” emperor, Marcus Aurelius, and decidedly NOT a good emperor. Unlike what Gladiator would have you believe, his death lead to chaos and the “year of five Emperors”). Rising out of that Chaos was Septimius Severus, founder of the Severan dynasty. Severus was a strong and capable leader, unfortunately his line would not share those traits. His son, Caracalla, was assassinated in 217 CE by the Praetorian guard, and they lifted one of their own, Marcianus, to the Purple. His reign did not last long. The living Severan women plotted to put up a living 15 year old male nephew of Severus as his heir, Marcus Aurelius Antonius, known to history as Elagabalus. In May of 218 CE, the Third Legion hailed him as Emperor and fully backed his claim. They marched against Marcianus, defeated him, and Elagabalus was the undisputed Emperor of the Roman Empire.

Backing up a moment, let me explain why he was known as Elagabalus. El Gabal was an ancient Syrian sun god, who's worship was wide spread in the Eastern Empire (though not so much in Rome itself). Elagabalus was raised in the religion and had been a priest of that god at an early age. In this, and many other ways, he is set apart from all previous Emperors. Though Maternally part of the Dynasty, he had been raised in Syria, and had never been to Rome, That made him the first emperor not culturally “Roman.” The Roman Senate got first wind of that when, before his arrival to Rome, Elagabalus sent paintings ahead of him, to put in the Senate building. The idea was to let the Roman people know who their new emperor, but it did not have the effect he desired. Elagabalus was not dressed “Roman” at all. He was dressed in silks. He wore rings and what appeared in the painting to be makeup. This concerned the Romans, as Ancient Rome was an extremely patriarchal society. Their ethics were not based on religion, but based on a fetishization of “Masculine virtues”. They viewed the Eastern Empire as having a corrupting influence, of “softening” Romans, of being more decadent and “feminine” than than Rome. However, Roman elite's concerns were just beginning.

You see, Elagabalus's fashion in those paintings wasn't just “decadent” eastern style. Elagabalus had, by a modern way of looking at it, a transgendered sexual identity. Elagabalus dressed as a female, and would often refer to himself as a female.When he took on a lover who was a famous charioteer , Hierocles, who called himself the Charioteer's wife, he was the Queen and Hierocles was his king.. This was doubly scandalous to the Roman elite. First of all, charioteers, while popular with the masses, had a social status akin to prostitutes, gladiators and actors in ancient Rome. An Emperor openly consorting with one was a scandal. More than that though , the whole idea of Roman virtue was offended. Ancient Rome did not have a modern view of homosexuality. It wasn't a “sin” in any kind of way, and it wasn't taboo, exactly. If you were the “male” partner, IE the top, homosexual relationships were fine. However, if you were the bottom in a relationship, that did have sigma ( particularly if it occurred in adulthood). Even more stigma was attached to what the Roman's called the “third gender”, what we would call m2f trans females. People who were born male that identified as female had no place in Roman high culture, in politics, in the military, in commerce. They were outcasts of sorts, pushed off into prostitution and acting and having little status elsewhere (it's sad that we've made such little ground in that respect after 2 millennia). So a Roman Emperor who identified as female was almost too much for the Roman elite to bare.

The final straw, however, was not Elagabalus's scandalous sexual and gender behavior. It was his religion. Elagabalus insisted on changing all of Roman worship when he ascended to the throne. He came to Rome and took Jupiter off the top of the Pantheon and put Elgabul in his place. He forced Senators to join him in worship of the diety. He even married Elgabul off to many Goddesses in the Roman Pantheon. He himself married a Vestal Virgin, to have “godlike” children. This was utter blasphemy in Rome, as anyone who sleeps with a Vestal Virgin was to be put to death. Roman Religion is not like modern western Christianity. They did not have a 'close, personal” relationship with the gods typically. They viewed the Gods more akin to the Mafia, as celestial extortionists, whom they had to sacrifice to so the gods would leave them alone. They feared the God's wraith, and Elagabalus was absolutely courting the wrath with all his blasphemy. So, in 222, at only the age of 18, Elagabalus was slain by the Praetorian Guard and Rome went back to it's old Pantheon and it's pure, unsullied Patriarchy.

Though he died, Elagabalus's legacy lived on,. The worship of El Gabul caught on in Rome, where the god became known as Sol Invictus ( the Unconquerable Sun). Over the course of the 3^rd century, worship of the God spread rapidly, and was likely the dominant religion in Rome at the time of Constantine's conversion to Christianity in 312. Of particular popularity was the cult's major festivals for summer and winter solstace. The winter celebration spread to not just devotee's of Sol Invictus, but to Rome as a whole, where the people would have a great feast on Dec. 25, would give gifts, and would wander the streets singing about the Sun's birth/rebirth and it's victory over darkness. The popularity of this festival was of particular issue for early Christianity in their attempts to convert the masses of Rome. So, since the date of the birth of Jesus was not known, the early church declared it was December 25 , so they could co-opt the traditions and festivals of Sol Invictus as their own. And so began a great tradition in what would become the Catholic Church, of converting Pagans by co-opting their beliefs, gods and traditions into Christianity.

So this year, when your obnoxious religious uncle or humorously devout co-worker tells you to remember the reason for the season, say “Oh, of course I remember it! The reason for the season is a teenage sun-worshiping transgendered pagan Roman Emperor named Elagabalus!”