Apotheosis

Apotheosis (from Ancient Greek ἀποθέωσις (apothéōsis), from ἀποθεόω/ἀποθεῶ (apotheóō/apotheô) 'to deify'), also called divinization or deification (from Latin deificatio 'making divine'), is the glorification of a subject to divine levels and, commonly, the treatment of a human being, any other living thing, or an abstract idea in the likeness of a deity.

Apotheosis relates to religion and is the subject of many works of art. Figuratively "apotheosis" may be used in almost any context for "the deification, glorification, or exaltation of a principle, practice, etc.", so normally attached to an abstraction of some sort.

In religion, apotheosis was a feature of many religions in the ancient world, and some that are active today. It requires a belief that there is a possibility of newly created gods, so a polytheistic belief system. The Abrahamic religions of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism do not allow for this, though many recognise minor sacred categories such as saints (created by a process called canonization). In Christian theology there is a concept of the faithful becoming god-like, called divinization or in Eastern Christianity theosis. In Hinduism there is some scope for new deities. A human may be deified by becoming regarded as an avatar of an established deity, usually a major one, or by being regarded as a new, independent, deity (usually a minor one), or some mixture of the two.

In art, an apotheosis scene typically shows the subject in the heavens or rising towards them, often accompanied by a number of angels, putti, personifications of virtues, or similar figures. Especially from Baroque art onwards, apotheosis scenes may depict rulers, generals or artists purely as an honorific metaphor; in many cases the "religious" context is classical Greco-Roman pagan religion, as in The Apotheosis of Voltaire, featuring Apollo. The Apotheosis of Washington (1865), high up in the dome of the United States Capitol Building, is another example. Personifications of places or abstractions are also showed receiving an apotheosis. The typical composition was suitable for placement on ceilings or inside domes.

Before the Hellenistic period, imperial cults were known in ancient Egypt (pharaohs) and Mesopotamia (from Naram-Sin through Hammurabi). In the New Kingdom of Egypt, all deceased pharaohs were deified as the god Osiris, having been identified as Horus while on the throne, and sometimes referred to as the "son" of various other deities.

The architect Imhotep was deified after his death, though the process seems to have been gradual, taking well over a thousand years, by which time he had become associated primarily with medicine. About a dozen non-royal ancient Egyptians became regarded as deities.

Ancient Greek religion and its Roman equivalent have many figures who were born as humans but became gods, for example Hercules. They are typically made divine by one of the main deities, the Twelve Olympians. In the Roman story Cupid and Psyche, Zeus gives the ambrosia of the gods to the mortal Psyche, transforming her into a goddess herself. In the case of the Hellenistic queen Berenice II of Egypt, herself deified like other rulers of the Ptolemaic dynasty, the court propagated a myth that her hair, cut off to fulfill a vow, had its own apotheosis before becoming the Coma Berenices, a group of stars that still bear her name.

From at least the Geometric period of the ninth century BC, the long-deceased heroes linked with founding myths of Greek sites were accorded chthonic rites in their heroon, or "hero-temple".