ON December 17th the Religion of Antinous celebrates the life of the Sufi mystic Jalaluddin Rumi who dedicated his life to the illumination he received through the love of another man.
The mystic lover and poet Jalaluddin Rumi, better known simply as Rumi, was united with his beloved on this day.
Born in Afghanistan in 1207 CE, his family moved to Turkey while he was still young.
In the city of Konya, not far from the Bithynian birthplace of Antinous, Jalaluddin Rumi established himself as a traditional Islamic teacher.
But then one day he met Shams-e-Tabriz, a wandering Sufi mystic.
Shams set Jalaluddin free from worldly concern and revealed the inward love of god as expressed through music, poetry and the whirling dance that simultaneously confuses and centers the soul of one who spins.
When Shams mysteriously disappeared, Jalaluddin went in search of him, only to discover that Shams was within his own heart.
From that day forward, Jalaluddin Rumi became a profound teacher of mystic eloquence whose poetry refers to god as the Lover within.
The homoerotic character of Jalaluddin Rumi's spirituality, referring both to his love for Shams and his love for god, has ingratiated him to gay men because of the depth and sensitivity and sacred intimacy that his words exude.
Jalaluddin Rumi and his Mevlevi Order are the last remnants of the Bithynian-Phrygian ecstasy cults of Dionysus and Attis, and they are distantly connected to the Religion of Antinous, through the mystical charge of homoerotic spirituality.
Jalaluddin Rumi expressed total love, proclaiming that all religions were one. And on the day of his funeral, his bier was followed by a procession made up of representatives from five different faiths.
We sanctify Jalaluddin Rumi as a Saint in the Religion of Antinous. He died on December 17th, 1234.
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