From afar, travelers to Emese, Syria, guided themselves on the high silhouette of the temple of Elagabal, perched on its promontory. It was there, in this temple designed for lightning initiations, that the young man received “the coronation of the Sun“. And this initiation would bring a silly Buddha to the throne of the Roman Empire.
Here is the precise and detailed vision of the initiation of the young man, as I found it in the Akashic annals. When the ceremony began, the weather was stormy. This sign was considered favorable and attributed to the bethyle Elagabal, who was a lightning stone. None of them worried about it. However, thanks to the storm, the ceremony was going to be much less symbolic than usual.
While the young man was standing in front of the sacred stone, his palms against the bethyle, lightning fell on the lightning rod of the temple, connected to the bethyle. The teenager did not hear the thunder, just a soft rustle, like birds moving away in the tall grass. The bethyl has become super-luminous. Balls of lightning sprang up, bouncing on the walls and furniture in graceful curves, and triggering terror among the frightened priests. Heliogabalus was not afraid.
Around him danced a luminous magic of lightning balls. One of them crowned the head of the young man, remaining for a long time on his shoulders without him feeling any inconvenience.
On the contrary, fascinated, he fell in love with the bethyle, which he took for the sun god Elagabal.
From that moment on, his destiny is set: he will be Héliogabale, solar pope and first worshipper of the sacred stone, the bethyle Elagabal.
The image opposite shows us a cyclops mask, on which we can see a third eye above the other two. This third eye could launch flashes, or rather rays capable of igniting or destroying inanimate objects, but also of killing or awakening their target alive. Hence the nickname “lightning masters” that is given to cyclops. I hold this pseudo-mask for a copy of a bethyle or lightning trap, if it is not an original.
It is displayed at the Gallo-Roman Museum in Fourvière. I encourage any reader passing by to check the exact nature of this object. Is it, yes or no, an original bethyle and not a mask? Is it made of stone or plaster? Is it solid or flat?
The first task of the young emperor will be to bring back from Syria his bétyle, with great pomp, according to a crazy ritual: he brings back to Rome the black stone perched on a golden chariot drawn by white horses, for a journey of two months. Let’s step back, because it would have been indecent and disrespectful for these animals to show their ass to the stone god. We see how far he can push the delirium, and no one dares to contradict him.
The holy stone reminds me of something else. Jesus says to his disciple Simon: You are Peter and on this stone I will build my church. The word game doesn’t work in English, nor does it work in Coptic, the original language of the Gospels. How strange is that?
On the other hand, in French it works perfectly. Well then? Should we conclude that this word from Jesus was said in French first? One wonders. Peter is the only pope who bears that name; the other popes will bear only the first three letters: they will be called Pius. Curious story.
Rome once bestowed a strange title on our country: France, eldest daughter of the Church… Distinguished honor or recognition of an act?
After two months of walking backwards, the Syrian procession finally arrives in Rome. On the Palatine Hill, the hill of power, Elagabalus had a temple built in Elagabal. He placed the holy stone there.
The Romans could have been offended, but they love the new gods too much, and this one is rather funny. The laughter stops when the young emperor, to inaugurate his temple, “has all the sacred objects of the Romans carried there: the statue of Juno, the fire of Vesta, the Palladium and the sacred shields”. We have broad ideas among Berlusconi’s ancestors, but an emperor who begins his reign with a sacrilege is not a good thing. Worthy of a barbarian from a Bedouin dynasty, one murmurs already.
Heliogabalus goes further still: “He also said that the religions of the Jews and the Samaritans, as well as the worship of Christ, would be transported to this place, so that the mysteries of all beliefs would be gathered in the priesthood of Heliogabalus.”
The religions of Isis, Serapis, or Cybele, Mithras, or the Christians had their worshippers in Rome, without threatening the old Roman pantheon. But Elagabalus wanted to impose his god above all others. It was a political mistake. To succeed, he would have needed the physique and aura of a Constantin.
Héliogabale raised the scandal to a new level by abducting the great vestal Aquila Seveta – the first crime – with the intention of marrying her who had taken the sacred vow of virginity – the second crime. Wait, he will say in the Senate, it is just “so that divine children may be born”.
The measure was complete, and without further ado the Senate had him assassinated, which was the most normal end for a Roman emperor.” In Rome, do as the Romans do. Héliogabale didn’t know the proverb, too bad for him.
I see in him a follower of Constantine I, emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire. He ruled in Byzantium, which he renamed his own name, Constantinople, the city of Constantine. And he made for himself a custom religion, of which he was the Christ, because in his time Jesus had not yet been invented. Is that so? But Constantine lived three centuries after him? It’s quite a story, more true than the catechism…
Illuminated by lightning at age 13, Emperor of Rome at age 14, murdered at 18
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