Born in Bitinia, present-day Turkey, who became the favorite of Emperor Hadrian and eventually his lover.  Hadrian's love for Antinous is manifested in all the sculptures of the young man that traveled throughout the empire, and served to eternalize his beauty until today. The Emperor also brought him to the imperial court, showing him to the world, removing him from anonymity, and possible slavery, to live by his side. Few were the years they lived together, but they were intense enough to culminate in the birth of a new religion. 

 

The last trip to the east ended with the death of Antinous in the River Nile, at the time of a festival in honor of Osiris, and also when the region was going through a great drought that compromised the entire harvest. After his death, the Nile finally overflowed, making the local priests believe that the sacrifice of Antinous had ended the drought, and started to worship Him as a river deity. In addition, a new star was identified in the sky, which made Hadrian believe to be the spirit of his beloved. Hadrian's love and the beginning of the cult on the part of the Egyptian priests, led him to officialize the cult of Antinous as a new God, with new temples and priesthood that spread throughout the Roman territory, but the center was the city of Antinópolis, the capital of their religion in Lower Egypt.

 

Hadrian raised Antinopolis based on Greek and Roman architecture and with an obsession on the Greek concept of Beauty, which would serve as one of the bases for the new religion of Antinous. The city was open to anyone who wished to become a citizen and pay tribute to the new God, being populated not only by Romans but also by Greeks and Egyptians, which ended up creating an extremely syncretic religion that united elements of the kemetic faith, Roman and Hellenic under a new vision. 

 

Antinous in His pure face, represents eternal youth and beauty, but He was also related to several other Gods, creating new archetypes for His cult. The first of them, for example, was Antinous-Osiris as a fertility deity, for having ended the drought of the Nile and also a god of the underworld, as the conqueror over death, since they believed that Antinous had ascended to Divinity. Other very important ones are Antinous-Dionisio, Antinous-Apollo, Antinous-Eros and so on. There are also indications of a possible relationship with sports and the arts, since in Antinópolis there were annual games with the participation of athletes and artists, where the winner received the title of divine ephebe, being considered the new Antinous in life. Although the cult is centered on the figure of Antinous, the existence of other deities is not denied. As already said, it is an extremely syncretic religion and in the sacred texts of the Obelisk of Antinous there are passages where the Gods Osiris, Ra and Toth are asked to raise His soul to the divine realm.

 

Antinous can also be linked to magical practices, as it said on his obelisk. He sends visions of healing and help through dreams and meditation to everyone who seeks and calls his name. Ancient texts describe the presence of mystical rituals and ceremonies in Antinópolis and the invocation of His name as an entity from the underworld to give strength to spells. So Antinous is seeked in his various faces in times of difficulty, as he is the Beauty who overcomes disorder and chaos. He the serene Beauty that comforts us when we call by His sacred name, and contemplates His image. Eternalized by the art of the ancient.

 

On 2002, the cult of Antinous was restablished with the creation of the Holywood Temple, worshiping him as Antinous, the Gay God. As one of the factors for the creation of the new faith was Hadrian's love for him, and as syncretism was made with many Gods linked to sexual freedom like Dionysus and Eros, many people who would be considered gay by the eyes of our contemporary society, were attracted to Antinópolis where they enjoyed extreme liberty. It was this homosexual connotation that led the church to endeavor to suppress the cult of Antinous as soon as possible. So the new religion of Antinous serves as a light for LGBT spirituality, but as Antinopolis and his cult were open to all in the past, besides this Queer focus, the new cult of Antinous is open to all. 

 

Antinous is also a representation of Apotheosis (human becoming God). It’s a materialistic faith in the sense of honoring humanity as divine, and the quest for the sacred through the physical world.

Antinous is a celebration of the flesh and human beauty.   

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Antinous lived, died and was worshiped as one of the most peculiar cults of the pagan world. Today, in his modern religion, Antinous is honored as the Gay God, and protector of queer people. In fact, since the Renaissance, He became a gay icon and a symbol for homossexuality among aristocracy. Although is a valid way to approach Antinous, and even necessary as we live in a world where queer people are often excluded from their spiritual experiences, the ancient cult of Antinous had a deeper and broader meaning. 

 

The base to understand the divinity of Antinous it in the Mysteries of life, death and rebirth. Antinous is primarily a God of eternal life and conqueror of  Death. That’s the reason why the first God of the “Antinous pantheon” is Antinous-Osiris. When he died in the Nile, the local priests considered that his death made the water rise again, bringing life and saving the harvest. And for that reason he became one with Osiris. Antinous is a God that by his sacrifice, he conquered death and achieved eternal youth and pleasure, and offers the same salvation to his followers. 

 

The celebration of this Mystery was the central aspect of the ancient cult of Antinous in His sacred city, and involved the celebration of ecstasy and joy as part of the after-life with Antinous. Christian writers from that time wrote about this aspect of Antinoan religion, describing the Dionisiac connotation of the rituals and celebrations of the Mysteries. This was represented by the God Antinous-Dionysus, as Dionysus was also a dying God like Osirir, but He had an ecstatic element to His cult and was also related to sexual liberation, joy and the divine madness. A minor archetype of the Antinoan pantheon is Antinous-Ganymedes, the bearer of the cup of youth and eternal life, who offer His gifts  to His followers that crossed the Heavens on the Sacred Barque of Million of years, and rest now on His Sacred Star. 

 

His “life giver” attributes weren’t limited to human health, protection and salvation of the soul, but also to the preservation of nature and the harvest, as His cycle of birth-life-death-rebirth was a reflection of the cycles of nature. His relationship with the environment can also be explained by the fact that he used to live in the countryside, and to his previous life and work as a human. Antinous continued to be as God, what he was in life: a steward and protector of nature, harvest and vegetation, as one of his epithets is “The fruitful God”. This can be seen with the already mentioned Antinous-Dionysus as a vegetation God, together with the other attributes of ecstasy and resurrection; Antinous-Vertumnus, as the God of the seasons, plant growth, gardens, fruits and trees; Antinous-Aristaus, as the God of farm and pastoral life and activities; and as Antinous-Pan, a minor representation of Antinous, present only on ancient coins, as a God of nature, the wild, sexual liberation and the divine madness as well. 

 

Antinous was also related to healing, the arts, and civilization. Through this connection, He was disguised as Apollo. Antinous-Apollo is the God of healing and intellectual arts, and also of oracular powers. He also has a Gaulish connection, as Antinous-Belenus. The God Belenus is the Italian Gaulish God of light, healing, vitality and life everlasting, who was later identified as Apollo. In one inscription found at Rome, Antinous was also identified as Belenus, for His beauty and light.

 

The cult of Antinous, historically, was syncretic in nature. Although keeping with the historical and ancient syncretisms is always a safe choice, denying that the  Antinoan cult was an amalgamation of Gods of healing, life, vegetation, death and resurrection, and limiting the space to new syncretism, would also be a non-historical tendency. When approaching a contemporary syncretism for Antinous, one should have in mind His main characteristics, and His relationship with the Gods in His historical fusions. In that way, creating new forms of the Antinoan cult based on the syncretic tendency of the ancient one, while also respecting the main archetypes, cultures and deities that may be related to Antinous or not.

 

As a Gallo-Roman polytheist, I’m most comfortable with Antinous-Belenus. But in my practice and research I can see the possibility of the archetype of Antinous-Maponus, even though I never approached Him/Them that way. But in my personal gnosis, I had an experience with  another possible Gallo-Roman version of Antinous, that appeared to me in my dreams (which is a good sign, as the sacred obelisk states that He comes to his followers through the oniric realm). He appeared to me as Antinous-Vindonnus, while I was casting white lepontic runes. As Vindonnus is a Gaulish title to Apollo, and they are both related to oracular arts, it became an interesting part of my Theology and way to interact with Antinous, while I recognize that it’s a non-historical syncretism and I can’t expect that everyone will accept it as valid. 

 

Antinous is the earthly vessel from which we can drink the Divine Mysteries