Translations:Ḏušarē/23/en

Names and Attributes

Dushara is the head of the Nabatean pantheon. His name means “the One of the Sharāt (Seir) mountain range.” He is a storm, mountain and fertility God and Lord of Heaven. Dushara was called Zeus Dusares Soter (Zeus Dushara Savior) and Zeus Hypsistos (Zeus Most High). He was worshipped at temples, mountaintops and open-air shrines all over the Nabatean realm and even in some trading colonies in Egypt, Greece and Italy. Dushara was usually depicted as a baetyl, a cult stone. This can be freestanding, carved onto a rockface or handheld and portable. There are also some figurative depictions of Dushara as a young cuirassed God, a child God, or an older robed and bearded God. One fresco in Shabwa might depict Aion as an interpretatio romana of Dushara. His depiction as Aion and as a child God might reference His mysteries that were celebrated in Petra and Elusa on the winter solstice. Devotees would stay up all night chanting hymns and playing music before Dushara's baetyl was revealed announcing the birth of Dushara. This links him to other dying and rising God mysteries such as those of Isis and Osiris, Adonis, and Dionysus. Dushara's consort is Al'Uzza and His mother is Allat. The fact that Dushara continued to be worshipped after the annexation of the Nabatean kingdom into the Roman empire demonstrates the Nabateans' commitment to their religion. They achieved this by the continuation of their main cult, the worship of Dushara, Lord of Heaven.