ARETAS (Hāriṭah). - King of the Nabataeans, who from their capital Petra (v.) dominated Arabia from the Gulf of Elanitis as far as Damascus.
A. I is remembered by Flavius Josephus as "tyrannos" of the Arabs; with him fled the impious Jewish high priest Jason (2 Macc. 5:8).
A. waged war on the Hasmonean Alexander Jannaeus, whom he defeated near Adida by Lydda (Flavius Josephus, Antiq. Iud., XIII, 15, 2).
Under A. III (ca. 85-60 B.C.) the Nabataean kingdom reached its greatest extent. Having defeated Antiochus VII of Syria (d. 83 B.C.), A. seized Coele-Syria and Damascus. He meddled in the Jewish civil war, siding with Hyrcanus against Aristobulus, whom he besieged in Jerusalem; but he was forced by Scaurus, lieutenant of Pompey, who had recently annexed Syria to Rome (63 B.C.), to give up the siege, and in the retreat he was beaten by Aristobulus near Papyron (Flavius Josephus, Antiq. Iud., XIV, 1, 4 - 2, 3).
The best-known representative of the dynasty is A. IV (9 B.C.-A.D. 40), who was formerly called Aeneas, son of Obodas III, recognized by Augustus as king of the Nabataeans. He had given his daughter in marriage to Antipas (v.). Since Antipas had repudiated her in order to marry Herodias (v.), A. sought to avenge the affront and in 58 defeated Antipas near Gamala. But Tiberius, to whom the latter had appealed, ordered Vitellius, governor of Syria, to seize A. alive or dead. The order, however, was not carried out because of the emperor's death, which occurred in the meantime (March 16, 37). When St. Paul (2 Cor. 11:32) was sought for death by the Jews in Damascus, the "ethnarch of A." had placed guards at the city to capture him. It would therefore appear that A. had, between 37 and 40, jurisdiction over Damascus, perhaps granted to him by Caligula. But this authority of A. over Damascus is not certain: for his ethnarch does not arrest Paul within the city, but only has its approaches watched (Acts 9:24).