Epiphanius of Salamis, a Christian theologian from the 4th century, in a piece entitled “Panarion”, the place he lists what he considers heresies, says that once a year in Petra, the capital of the Nabatean kingdom, within the south of lately’s Jordan, an evening competition was once held to rejoice the delivery of the god Dous Dureshar in Greece.
The sector-famous archaeological website of Petra is visited through many vacationers once a year.
However the Nabateans, an Arab other folks of antiquity, are a lot much less identified to most people than the outstanding stays in their historical town. Between the tip of the 4th century BC and 106 AD, the date in their integration into the Roman Empire, they however ruled an overly huge territory from southern Syria to the oasis of Al-Ula, lately in Saudi Arabia, throughout the Negev and Sinai. Their sovereign, the commander of an impressive military, was once identified as “the king of the Arabs”, writes the traditional historian Flavius Josephus. He dominated now not handiest the Nabataeans, but in addition different peoples who have been his vassals.
The phrase “Arabic” first gave the impression within the type of Aribi, within the ninth century BC, in Assyrian texts.
This can be a common time period, like “Greek” or “Gaelic”. A number of the Greeks there have been Ionians, Dorians… A number of the Gauls, Arverni, Aedui… In a similar fashion, a few of the Arab peoples of antiquity there have been Nabataeans, but in addition Tamudeans, Minaeans, Lycians…
Doushara, god of mountains
The primary god of the Nabateans is known as Dushara. He’s the protector of rulers, as some Nabatean inscriptions proclaim. His identify way “He of Shara”, the identify of a mountain close to Petra. “A very high peak of Arabia,” writes Stephen of Byzantium, a Sixth-century creator.
Doushara is subsequently now not a reputation strictly talking, however a time period denoting superb standing. Which means that Doushara is the god who’s on most sensible of the mountain. A top position harking back to Mount Sinai the place Moses’ god manifests himself in Exodus. Likewise, God within the Bible has no actual identify: he’s the Lord, the Everlasting.
The Nabateans have in not unusual with the Jews the similar reluctance to call a deity. This can be a function of Semitic religions, whilst in historical Greece or Rome the gods had their very own names: Zeus, Jupiter, Apollo, and so forth.
Betiles of the Nabatean god Dushara. Flegrean Fields Archaeological Museum, close to Pozzoli, Italy. : Schwentzel, Supplied through the creator of Worshiping stones
Some of the not unusual rites of the Nabataean faith is the worship of status stones, which can be regarded as sacred, referred to as “betili”. The time period comes from the Aramaic beth-el, which accurately way “house of God”, as it was once believed {that a} deity or debris of a deity may well be discovered inside of it.
Probably the most noted biblical betel is the stone of Jacob, son of Isaac and grandson of Abraham, in Genesis (Genesis 28, 17-22).
Jacob makes this stone together with his bedding. Lay your head on it and go to sleep. Throughout the dream, he sees in his dream “a ladder whose top touched the sky”. When he wakes up, he realizes that the stone he slept on is sacred, straightens it like a stele and pours oil on most sensible of it. Then he named where Bethel.
Leb Jacob, Jacques Learn. Wikimedia
The Nabateans don’t use the time period “betyl” to indicate the stones they worship. They use the phrase Nesiba because of this “upright” and inspires a pillar or stele. However the observe is identical.
A number of of those idols, most commonly quadrangular, have been present in Petra. We additionally know their bureaucracy, due to representations sculpted on rocks, in Petra or in Hegra, crucial Nabatean town within the al-Ula oasis. The devoted stopped in entrance of those rock reliefs to wish and bow down.
3 betils erected in a distinct segment, Nabatean shrine of Jabal al-Ithlib, Hegra, oasis of al-Ula, Saudi Arabia. Christian-Georges Schwentzel, Supplied through the creator of The idol of Doushara
The primary Nabataean betil stood within the very center of Petra, within the nice temple, which lately is known as Qasr al-Bint (“Castle of the Maiden”) in Arabic. This sanctuary is a sq. development, about twenty meters top. Inside of, within the central room, stood the betil Dušare, on most sensible of the platform. The Byzantine encyclopedia referred to as Souda provides us a moderately correct description, despite the fact that it was once compiled a number of centuries after the destruction of the temple. The paintings is in line with previous writings, now misplaced.
The idol, we will be able to learn, was once a black sq. stone and not using a divine symbol. Its top was once 4 ft (about 1.20 meters), and its width was once two ft (60 centimeters). It stood on a golden base.
The textual content provides us an outline of the Aniconian idol that symbolically manifests the presence of the god. The black colour suggests it is going to had been carved from a meteorite. Souda specifies that the devoted sacrificed to her and spilled the blood of the sufferers, like a gulf.
Those sacrifices came about out of doors the temple. At the spacious esplanade that precedes the sanctuary, an altar was once discovered, 3 meters top, which was once coated with marble. That is the place the primary sacrifices that the Nabatean rulers made in Dushari came about for the happiness in their kingdom and their topics. Animals supposed for the god have been additionally introduced there to be slaughtered, surely oxen, sheep, possibly camels.
The camel was once, in truth, an animal carefully related to the good god. Then the blood of the sacrificed animals was once gathered to sprinkle betil throughout the temple.
3 betils in a distinct segment, carved into the cliff of Sikh, a slim gorge resulting in the middle of Petra, Jordan. Christian-Georges Schwentzel, equipped through the creator of Son of the Virgin and Simplest Kid of the Lord
Throughout the good annual competition celebrating the delivery of Dushara, discussed through Epiphanius of Salamis, the devoted sang in Arabic, the creator tells us, a hymn to Dushara’s mom referred to as Chaamou, this is, “Young Maiden” or “The Virgin”. Dushara, son of the Mom of God, was once nicknamed “the only child of the Lord” (Epiphanes of Salamis, Panarion II, 51, 22, 11).
This putting resemblance between Dushara and Jesus, additionally born of a virgin conception, explains why Epiphanius noticed are compatible to invoke this Nabataean “Christmas”. Take into account that the phrase “Christmas” comes from the Latin phrase natalis dies because of this “day of birth”. Epiphanius of Salamis thus supposed to sentence the faith of the Nabataeans which might seem to compete with Christianity.
The risk for the theologian was once additionally that detractors of the faith of Christ would accuse Christian authors of plagiarism, the cult of Doushara which preceded that of Jesus through a number of centuries. Christians didn’t have a monopoly in relation to the virgin conception. Epiphanius, responding to those accusations, works to delegitimize the Nabatean faith, which is thought of as a heresy and a pagan parody of the one true faith in his eyes.
This apologetic point of view has thankfully transmitted to us some fragments of Nabataean ideals that surely would by no means have reached us with out this putting similarity between the 2 religions.
A camel poses in entrance of the ruins of Qasr al-Binta, the good temple in central Petra, Jordan. Christian-Georges Schwentzel, Supplied through Creator Doushara’s Christmas Birthday celebration
That passage could also be very instructive insofar as Epiphanius of Salamis mentions 3 puts the place the Christmas competition of Dushar was once celebrated: the good temple of Peter, as we mentioned, but in addition the sanctuary of the Nabataean town of Elusa within the Negev, and in any case the temple of Cora, daughter of Demetrius, in Alexandria. Korah, whose identify way “Young Maiden,” was once regarded as the Greek an identical of Chaamou.
She was once worshiped in Alexandria, Epiphanius tells us, because the Mom of God, the mum of the younger god who embodies Eternity, whom the Greeks referred to as Aion. Indubitably, the Nabataeans, settled in Alexandria, established there, as in different towns the place they have been provide, a sanctuary in honor in their nice god. The non secular affiliation there worshiped Chaamou, related to the mysteries of the Greek Koray.
Doushara, father and son?
Thru touch with the Greek global, the Nabateans found out different deities related to their nice god. Doushara, who felt like an influence related to crops, may well be assimilated to Dionysus, the promoter of vine cultivation in Hellenic mythology.
However as the best Nabataean god, Dushara was once additionally regarded as the an identical of Zeus, father of Dionysus and ruler of Greek Olympus. Epiphanius of Salamis may just counsel this: the Nabateans will have observed Dushara as the one son of his father with whom he was once perplexed, modeled at the “two in one” that Christianity would later undertake.
Nabateans, 4 BC-2. century. From Petra to Al-Ula, Developers of the Barren region, Christian-Georges Schwentzel, Tallandier Editions, Humanities Assortment, September 2025.
