Sarolta A. Takacs, Isis and Sarapis in the Roman World (E.J. Brill: New York, 1995), p. 118.

Antoninus Caracalla's murderer Macrinus could not hold his own against Varius Avitus Bassianus, known as Elagabalus, because the Syrian legions sided with the Emesenians. The high-priest of the sun god Elah-Gabal turned Roman emperor, and named after his alleged father M. Aurelius Antoninus, Elagabalus stands out as a sad figure preoccupied with his cult rather than politics. His mother, Julia Soaemias, and grandmother, Julia Maesa, Julia Domna's sister, apparently took care of that aspect, at least according to the available sources. Elagabalus' attempt to subordinate all deities to the cults, was doomed. Again the moral issue was not decisive, but the fat that the political, economic, and ideological conditions were not allowing a change of the religious system at this point of Rome's history was all-important. Elagabalus and his mother were murdered while the powerful Julia Maesa was able to distance herself from the two and thus escape their fate. Together with her younger daughter, Julia Mamaea, mother of Severus Alexander, she successfully promoted Alexander as legitimate successor. The armies then proclaimed him emperor.