| Greetings PHAmily, I found this story awhile back , I don't remember exactly where I found it so I cannot give credit to the author. It is truly a beautiful and en"light"ening piece. Remaining Prayerful, Sis. Joyce Solomon and Sheba The first written records pertaining to the Horn of Africa date back approximately our thousand five hundred years. We owe these early historical commentaries to two of the very first centres of human civilization, Persia and Egypt - for both of which the Horn seems to have served as an emporium of much-prized tropical products. Egyptian hieroglyphic records indicate that the Pharaohs obtained frankincense and myrrh from Ethiopia, and from the Somali coast, as far back as 2700. Trade with India was likewise of great antiquity - the Horn has supplied the subcontinent with vast quantities of ivory since time immemorial. It was ancient contacts such as these that nurtured and strengthened the emerging culture of the peoples of northern Ethiopia. The result - not long after David's reign in Israel - was the establishment of a kingdom that was to dominate the vital crossroads of Africa and Asia for more than a thousand years. Conducting its foreign trade through the Red Sea port of Adulis, this kingdom's capital was Axum - described by Nonnosus, Ambassador of the Roman Emperor Justinian, as "the greatest city of all Ethiopia". Today silent witness is borne to this noble past by extensive ruins of temples, fortresses and palaces as well as by a series of vast stelae - carved granite monoliths, some of which exceed 65 feet in height and weigh more than 500 tons. Adding substance to chimeras and testifying to the lost truths embedded in myths and fables, the bones of long gone eras protrude everywhere through the soil and hordes of gold, silver and bronze coins continue to be washed out from time to time by heavy downpours of rain. Axum's greatest significance, however, is not as an archaeological site but rather as the supposed capital of the Queen of Sheba - the capital from whence she set out on her legendary visit to the court of Solomon in Jerusalem. Upon this story, with some unusual embellishments, rests the notion of the sacral kingship of the Semitic peoples of Ethiopia - a notion that links the recent past to ancient times in a most unambiguous fashion. Emperor Haile Selassie was, after all, the 225th monarch of a dynasty that traced its descent back to the union of Solomon and Sheba. The revolution of 1974, and the Emperor's death in obscure circumstances a year later, thus marked the end of an immense era - and the beginning of the end for an entire way of life and an entire system of values associated with it. The legend of Solomon and Sheba is one of great mythopoeic power that has infiltrated numerous cultures outside Ethiopia. The earliest known version is preserved in two books of the Old Testament. Here we are told that the Queen of Sheba, lured by Solomon's fame, journeyed to Jerusalem with a great caravan of costly presents and there "communed with him of all that was in her heart". King Solomon, for his part, "gave to the Queen of Sheba all her desire.. So she turned and went to her own land, she and her servants." The Talmud also contains oblique references to the story, as does the New Testament (where Sheba is referred to as "the Queen of the South"). There is, in addition, a fairly detailed account in the Koran, echoed in several Arabic and Persian folk tales of later date (in which she is known as Bilqis). Furthere afield, in southern Africa, the enigmatic stone ruins of Great Zimbabwe are said by the local Mashona people to have been the palace of the Queen of Sheba, and tribal elders still repeat their own fully evolved version of the legend. Of all these different narratives, however, it is the Ethiopian variant (where Sheba's name becomes Makeda) that is the richest and the most convincing - despite the fact that it does not seem to have been set down in writing until medieval times when it appeared in the Kebra Nagast (Glory of Kings), the Ethiopian national saga. One thing is certain: the veneration of the Queen of Sheba - and her appropriation as the spiritual ancestress of the Ethiopian people - began much earlier than the fourteenth century (when the Kebra Nagast was written); indeed, the cult of Makeda probably substantially predates the Christian era. As a historical figure she is thought to have lived in the period between 1000 and 950 BC and, despite a rival claim from South Arabia, the evidence is extremely strong that her capital was indeed in Abyssinia - although not necessarily in the city of Axum. It is in Axum, however, that the Ethiopians locate her. From here, according to the Kebra Nagast, she was persuaded to travel to the court of Solomon by the head of her caravans - a man much impressed by the King's wisdom and might. In Jerusalem a banquet of specially seasoned meat was given in her honour and, at the end of the evening, Solomon invited her to spend the night in his chambers. Makeda agreed, but first extracted a commitment from the King that he would not take her by force. To this he assented, on the single condition that the Queen make a promise not to take anything in his house. Solomon then mounted his bed on one side of the chamber and had the Queen's bed prepared at the other side, placing near it a bowl of water. Made thirsty by the seasoned food, Makeda soon awoke, arose, and drank the water. At this Point Solomon seized her hand and accused her of having broken her oath; he then "worked his will with her". That night the King dreamt that a brilliant light, the divine presence, had left Israel. Shortly afterwards the Queen departed and returned to her country and there, nine months and five days later, she gave birth to a son - Menelik, the founder of Ethiopia's Solomonic dynasty. In due course, when the boy had grown, he went to visit his father who received him with great honour and splendour. After spending a year at court in Jerusalem, however, the prince determined to return once more to Ethiopia. When he was informed of this, Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and commanded them to send their first born sons with Menelik. Before the young men departed, however, they stole the Ark of the Covenant and took it with them to Ethiopia - which then, according to the Kebra Nagast, became "the second Zion". The notion that the Ark of the Covenant was removed from Jerusalem to Axum is central to the reverence accorded to the tabots, the Tablets of the Law, in Abyssinian Christian practices. The belief system of which the tabots are a part is, however, an unusual one. No other Christian Church gives such importance to what is, by definition, a pre-Christian - indeed a Judaic - tradition. Furthermore, the Christian faith did not itself reach Ethiopia until the fourth century AD - some one thousand three hundred years after Solomon's rule in Israel. The only satisfactory explanation for the unique position given to the Ark and to the tabots, therefore, is this: in Old Testament times, there must have been a period when there were very close cultural and religious links between Abyssinia and the Holy Land. Could it not be that the Queen of Sheba "legend" and the story of Menelik bear witness to this deeper truth? This is a matter on which there may never be any final or incontrovertible proof. What is beyond dispute, however, is that the Axumite realm converted to Christianity in the fourth century AD during the reign of King Ezana, who thus occupies a vitally important place in Ethiopian history. Remaining Prayerful, Sis. Joyce Reaves |
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