Kebra Negest

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The Kebra Nagast (also Kebra Negast , old Ethiopian : ክብረ ነገሥት, phon. Kəbrä nägäst ) or Glory of the Kings of Ethiopia is an account of the origin of the Solomonic emperors of Ethiopia , written in the ancient Ethiopian language Geʽez . The existing text was written at the end of the 13th century AD and is regarded by many Ethiopian Christians and Rastafarians as a reliable representation. The book tells not only about how the Queen of Sheba met King Solomon , begot Menelik with him and how the ark with Menelik reached Ethiopia, but also how the Ethiopians of the worship of the sun, moon and stars to worship the “Lord, God of Israel ”.

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The Kebra Negest is divided into 117 chapters and appears as a composite work even after reading it once. It is written down in the form of a debate among the 318 “Orthodox Fathers” of the First Council of Nicaea . These Church Fathers ask the question: "What is the glory of kings?" One, Gregor, responds with a speech (chapters 3-17), which ends with the statement that a copy of the glory of God through Moses was made and in the ark is preserved.

Domitius is introduced at the beginning of this section as "Archbishop of Rome" (ie Constantinople ) and is referred to at the end as that of Antioch. This person can possibly be identified with the Patriarch Domnus II of Antioch , who was deposed at the Second Council of Ephesus . Then the Archbishop Domitius reads from a book that he found in the church "Sophia" (possibly the Hagia Sophia is meant). This part (chapters 19-94), the story of Makeda, Queen of Sheba , King Solomon, Menelik, and the narrative of how the Ark of the Covenant came to Ethiopia is described by David Allen Hubbard, Professor of the Old Testament at the evangelical Fuller Theological Seminary in California, as the centerpiece of the plant.

Even if the author of the final edition equates this Gregory with Gregory Thaumaturgus , who lived in the third century before the council, the time and allusions to Gregory's 15-year imprisonment by the King of Armenia rather point to Gregory the Illuminator .

Queen Makeda learns about the wisdom of King Solomon from Tamrin, a trader from her kingdom, and travels to Jerusalem to visit him. She is captivated by his level of education and knowledge and explains: "From now on I will no longer worship the sun, but the creator of the sun, the God of Israel" (Chapter 28). The night before she went home, Solomon managed to use a trick to sleep with her. He gives her a ring so that her child can identify himself to him. After their departure, Solomon dreams of the sun leaving Israel (chapter 30).

On the way back, Makeda gives birth to Menelik (Chapter 32).

At the age of 22, Menelik traveled to Jerusalem via Gaza to receive Solomon's blessing. He reveals himself to be his son by means of the ring. Overjoyed by this reunion, Solomon tries to convince Menelik to stay there and follow him to the throne. However, Menelik insists on returning to his mother in Ethiopia. King Solomon decides to give him a company of firstborn sons from the elders of his kingdom. Angry at leaving Jerusalem, the young men who are supposed to accompany him smuggle the Ark of the Covenant out of the temple and Solomon's kingdom (chapters 45–48) without Menelik knowing. He had only asked Solomon for a single tassel to cover the ark, and Solomon had given him the entire cloth.

During the journey home, Menelik learns that the ark is with him, and Solomon notices that it has disappeared. The king tries to go after Menelik, but his son is magically flown home before he can leave his kingdom. King Solomon then seeks comfort in his wife, the daughter of Pharaoh of Egypt. She leads him to worship the idols of her country (Chapter 64).

After a question from the council's 318 bishops, Domitius continues with a paraphrase of biblical history (chapters 66–83) and tells of Menelik's arrival in Aksum , where he is feasted and Makeda cedes her throne to him. Menelik then used the Ark of the Covenant in some campaigns and “no one could defeat him; on the contrary, anyone who attacked him was defeated ”(Chapter 94).

The book found by Domitius thus not only documented the acquisition of ownership of the Ark of the Covenant, but also explained the descent of the Solomon dynasty from the firstborn son of Solomon. Domitius therefore praises the book (chapter 95), and Gregory then gives a longer speech with prophetic content (chapters 95–112). Hubbard refers to this as "the patristic collection of prophecies". “There is no doubt that chapters 102-115 were written as a polemic, if not a gospel, against the Jews. In these chapters with the help of attempting Old Testament parables and proof texts the Messianic destiny of Jesus, the validity of the Ethiopian mode of worship and the spiritual superiority of Ethiopia to prove Israel. "(P 39) speculates Hubbard that this excerpt from the Old Testament was as old as Frumentius , who had converted the kingdom of Aksum to Christianity.

The Kebra Negest closes with the prophecy that the strength of Rome will fade behind the power of Ethiopia and describes how King Ella Asbeha will bring the Jews in Nagran under control and designate his son Gabra Maskal to be his heir (Chapter 117).

Origins

The colophon attached to most editions notes that the kebra Nagast was initially written in Coptic , then in the year of grace 409 (corresponds to the year 1225 in the Christian calendar) by Ethiopian clergy during the term of Abuna Giyorgi in Arabic and ultimately at the behest of Governor Ya 'ibika Igzi' was translated into Old Ethiopian . Based on this colophon, Conti Rossini, Littmann, Cerulli et al. a. the period of origin limited to the years 1314 to 1321-1322.

During a precise scientific examination of the text, traces of Arabic were found, which presumably point to an Arabic original. There is no clear evidence of an earlier Coptic version, and the existence of such a version is doubted by many scholars. On the other hand, the numerous biblical quotations in the text do not come from an assumed Arabic model, but from Ethiopian versions of the Bible, which were either copied or taken over from memory. The use and interpretation of these biblical passages indicate influences from patristic sources such as Gregory of Nyssa .

Hubbard describes in detail the numerous sources believed to have been used by the author of the Kebra Nagast . This includes not only the two Testaments of the Bible (even if the Old Testament was used to a greater extent than the New Testament ), but also rabbinical sources, apocryphal works (in particular the Ethiopian Book of Enoch and the Book of Jubilees ) and the Syrian Book of Treasure cave and the works he influenced, Book of Adam and Eve and Book of the Bees .

Early European translations

One of the first collections of documents about Ethiopia arose from the letters cisco Álvares , the official envoy of King Manuel I at the court of David II , under the ambassador Don Rodrigo De Lima . The papers of this embassy also contain a representation of the Emperor of Ethiopia and a description - in Portuguese - of the habits of the Ethiopians with the title Truthful Report from the Kingdom of the Priest John of India , which was printed in 1540.

Further information on Arabic appendices to the original stories of the Kebra Nagast was taken up by the Jesuit priest Manoel de Almeida (1580-1646) in his Historia de Etiopía . However, this never seems to have been published in full. Almeida had come to Ethiopia as an envoy and, thanks to his excellent knowledge of the language, had ample opportunities to gather information about the Kebra Nagast at first hand. His manuscript is therefore of great value. His brother Apollinare also came to the country as an envoy and was stoned to death with his two companions in Tigray .

In the first quarter of the 16th century PN Godinho published some traditions about King Solomon and his son Menelik, which came from the Kebra Nagast . Further information on the content of the Kebra Nagast was given by Baltazar Téllez (1595–1675), the author of the Historia General de Etiopía Alta (Coimbra, 1660). The sources for his work were the stories of Manoel Almeida, Alfonso Méndez and Jerónimo Lobo .

Beginnings of modern research

It was only when James Bruce , the famous Scottish explorer, published his travelogue in search of the sources of the Nile at the end of the 18th century that some information about the content of the Kebra Nagast reached the ears of many European scholars and theologians. When Bruce left Gonder , the powerful Indian race (regent) of Emperor Tekle Haymanot II , Ras Mikael Sehul , gave him some of the most valuable Ethiopian manuscripts, including a copy of the Kebra Nagast . In the third edition of his Travels in Search of the Sources of the Nile , a description of the contents of the original manuscript appeared. In his day these documents came into the possession of the Bodleian Library at Oxford University .

Even though August Dillmann prepared a summary of the contents of the Kebra Nagast and published the colophon , for a long time no essential part existed in the original language before Franz Praetorius published chapters 19 to 32 in Latin translation. However, it was another 35 years before Carl Bezold published the entire text in 1905 (with explanation). The first English translation was done by EA Wallis Budge and appeared in two editions in 1922 and 1932.

Dr. Bernard Leeman , whose reasoning is generally not accepted, claims that the Kebra Nagast consists of two main documents. These come from the time of King Solomon (around 950 BC) or the eve of King Caleb's invasion of Axum into Yemen in Himyar (around 520 AD). His arguments for the earlier point in time are: (i) the Kebra Nagast quotes from the oldest passages of the Torah according to today's knowledge (including the law of holiness , ( Lev 17.26  EU )); while the laws written in Deuteronomy (which according to many scholars arose much later) are not mentioned; (ii) it contains the only detailed account of both the fate of the ark and the disappearance of the high priests of Judah under Solomon's rule; (iii) the ancient spelling for the Ark of the Covenant in this document; (iv) lack of references to later Old Testament history; (v) the ancient Ethiopian text shows an extraordinarily imprecise geography, which Leeman believes only makes sense if one proceeds from locations on the Arabian Peninsula and not in Palestine. Leeman also relies on evidence published by Chaim Rabin that suggests that an ancient Hebrew-speaking population lived between Medina and Yemen. Leeman Roger Schneider serves as additional evidence, according to which queens of Saba ruled a Hebrew-Sabaean population near Mek'ele around 700 BC .

References

  1. ↑ EA Wallis Budge sees him as the patriarch Timotheos IV of Alexandria, without giving an explanation for it.
  2. ↑ Hubard notes that there is a tendency in Middle Eastern scriptures to group people with the same name. David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, p. 253.
  3. ↑ The Kebra Nagast states that Menelik was born in BÂLÂ ZADÎSÂRE YÂ.
  4. ^ David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, p. 44.
  5. ^ David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, p. 358.
  6. ^ David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, p. 352.
  7. ↑ Hubbard claims, for example, that he only found one word that could indicate Coptic roots (David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, p. 370.)
  8. ↑ An example of this: In chapters 106-107, all but three of the passages quoted can also be found in Gregor von Nyssa's Testimonia adversus Judeos . (David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, p. 39).
  9. ^ David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956.
  10. ↑ Fabula de regina Sabaea apud Aethiopes. Halle 1870, (Halle, university, dissertation, 1870, digitized: urn : nbn: de: bvb: 824-dtl-0000014902 ).
  11. ↑ This overview is based on the doctoral thesis David Allen Hubbard: The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast. St. Andrews 1956, pp. 6-8.
  12. ^ Bernard Leeman: Queen of Sheba and Biblical Scholarship . Queensland Academic Press, Westbrook 2005.
  13. ↑ Chaim Rabin : Ancient West Arabian. Taylor's foreign Press, London 1951.
  14. ^ Roger Schneider: Deux inscriptions subarabiques du Tigre. In: Bibliotheca Orientalis. Vol. 30, 1973, ISSN  0006-1913 , pp. 385-387.

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