![]() Regardless, the important point is that it offered a plausible way for Ethiopian Christians to fit into the Bible's narrative. Perhaps their empire extended to the historical Sheba in southern Arabia. Later Aksumite inscriptions list a title that could be the kingship of Sheba. It is not known when Aksum was first associated with Sheba, but they very likely did it themselves. There has been a close connection between the Egyptian and Ethiopian churches ever since. Missionaries from Roman Egypt successfully converted the rulers to Christianity sometime in the 4th century, and the population followed. The 3rd-century Persian prophet Mani named Aksum one of the four great world civilisations, along with Persia, China and Rome. It may have even extended, at least in influence, over the Red Sea into southern Arabia. ![]() At its height, this ancient kingdom ruled over much of what is now Ethiopia and Eritrea. 87).Īksum was very significant to medieval Ethiopia's sense of itself. "No one except the male seed of David, the son of Solomon the King", asserts the Queen in the Kebra Nagast, "shall ever reign over Ethiopia" (ch. Menelik went on to rule and have sons of his own, the Kebra Nagast claims, and that is the origin of family ruling Ethiopia at the end of the 13th century. The Ark has remained a focus for Ethiopian Christian life ever since purportedly it lies in the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion in the modern city of Axum and is so important that even the symbolic representations of the tablets within (tabots) must be treated with great reverence and concealed from the eyes of any but the priests. When he grew up, Menelik travelled back to his father, learned the wisdom of Solomon, then returned to his home country, bringing with him the Ark of the Covenant. The queen gave birth after she returned home to a son called Menelik. ![]() II Chronicles 9:12 says that "King Solomon gave the queen of Sheba all she desired" and the Kebra Nagast takes that to mean they had a son together. The Kebra Nagast identifies Sheba with the ancient Kingdom of Aksum, situated in Ethiopia. ![]() It all begins with the Queen of Sheba's embassy to King Solomon of Israel, as told in I Kings and II Chronicles of the Old Testament. Menelik went on to rule and have sons of his own, the Kebra Nagast claims, & that is the origin of the family ruling Ethiopia at the end of the 13th century. ![]()
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