Sheikh Shems

Sheikh Shems, also called Melek Shams ad-Din or Sex Sems, is a holy figure venerated in Yazidism as one of its Seven Divine Beings, embodying the divinity of the sun and understood as the source of light and life and the divine light of God; he is also associated with fire and oaths. Yazidis regard him as genuinely divine, one of God's representatives to whom the affairs of the world were assigned, considered an earthly incarnation of a divine being and the patriarch of the Semsani sheikh lineage, one of four principal lineages descended from the divine sons of Ezdina Mir. His veneration includes the annual three-day Rojiyen Sesims fast held each December and ceremonial bull sacrifices at his shrine during the Feast of the Assembly.