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Published: September 15th 2011
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(I found this while cleaning the computer. Apparently I was not impressed with it 8 months ago. This may still be the case, but if I ever reread any of these things in my dotage, it should be with the rest. good or bad.)
Disentangling mythology from history is a tricky business. Perhaps one that is not even possible. Napolean said that history was only “the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon”. So, what is history, and consequently, what is true, depends on who you ask. What outsiders might consider myth or apocrypha is for Ethiopians, indisputably, historical fact. They have resoundingly agreed, and for a couple millennium have been fleshing out the story, working out the kinks, and tying up loose ends. For Ethiopians, the legitimacy and foundation of the country and the imperial dynasty is unshakably rooted in the bedrock of the Bible.
In the Kebra Negast, Ethiopia’s national epic, it is written that in the time of King Solomon of Israel, the Ethiopian Queen Makeda journeyed to Jerusalem. Makeda, better known as The Queen of Sheeba, was devastatingly beautiful. (A rather surprising detail since she allegedly had hooves, the unfortunate consequence
of having stepped in dragon’s blood as a child.) Smitten, King Solomon used his legendary wisdom to get to know Makeda biblically. She returned to Ethiopia and bore a son called Menelik. He later stole the Arc of the Covenant (with the Ten Commandments not the US Constitution inside) and founded the Solomonic Dynasty that ruled Ethiopia until the overthrow of the 237th Emperor, Halie Selassie in 1974 CE.
The only historically accepted interruption in the 2000 year old Solomonic Dynasty is the rule of the Zagwe Dynasty from 1137 - 1270. For continuity and consistency of historical narrative, this aberration would have undoubtedly been expunged, but the greatest of the Zagwe kings, Lalibela, left a rather lasting. After a rise to power that included omens, failed assassination, and divine visions, Lalibela began construction of a ‘New‘ Jerusalem. Though renaming the local river Jordan wasn’t so impressive, his other efforts were more audacious: eleven churches (probably not all churches at the time, but they are now) hewn directly into the reddish volcanic rock. Some, similar to churches in the north, were excavated from cliff walls, exploiting and expanding pre-existing caves or fissures. The others, however, were carved into the
bedrock. This entailed digging trenches up to 45 feet down into the rock, leaving a central monolith, which was then hollowed out. Legend (i.e. local history) claims that workmen were helped by a host of angels working the night shift. Dark twisting tunnels connect the churches, forming a subterranean village complex hidden beneath the folds of the Ethiopian Highlands.
In the days preceding Christmas (Jan 7th), pilgrims swathed in white gabis (like the white cowl worn in those bizarre portraits of blue-eyed, white-skinned Jesus that hang in the churches of memory) descend on Lalibela. The poor, wrapped in their poverty, and resplendent robed priests await. A seemingly endless procession of white shrouded pilgrims stream through the cavernous gloom of the churches prostrating in front of, knocking their foreheads against, and reverentially kissing the icons, walls, stairs, crosses and anything else that might be infused with holy.
On Christmas Eve, priests gather on carpets laid in the courtyard of the church Bet Maryam. Leaning on tall prayer staffs, their antiphonal chanting in the 2500 year-old liturgical language of Ge’ez rises and falls, swelling to fill the gathering night. Swaying and shaking, the tintinnabulation of the sistras (like a tuning
fork with a wire strung with bottle caps stretched between the two tines) twinkle between the deep rumblings of bass drums throbbing like a collective heart beat. As night falls, shadow creeps over the thousands huddled atop the rocks, stopping abruptly at the trench surrounding the church. Light streaming upward from Bet Maryam illuminates the ecstatic faces tightly clustered along the rim. The darkness seems to dissolve the boundary between the priests and the people and merge them into complementary components of the ritual. Thousands of ululating voices rise to answer the priests’ chants: a piercing ‘ellelellelellelellelellel’ that bursts from the courtyard and is joined by the voices in the darkness before rushing out into the night.
Out near the edge, nested amongst the still warm rocks above New Jerusalem, we listen across history to primeval Christianity. The warp and weft of drum, sistra, chant, and ululation weave together with the star spangled thickness of night. This is a Christianity deeply entwined with first temple Judaism. A Christianity where there is no Augustine, no Aquinas, no Rome, no papacy, no Calvin, and no Luther. A Christianity with its own distinct history, i.e. its own legends and mythology. A Christianity
that has changed little in the last sixteen hundred years and is still very much alive in the country that proudly and jealously guards its own history. It is no less crazy than other versions, but a unique living vibrant testament to the variety of religious experience.
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Brad Watson
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Lalibela's 11 Rock-hewn Churches: 7 are like caves and 4 are connected only at their base
I'm currently watching History Channel 2 (H2) 'Cities of the Underworld' - 'Secret Holy Land' where they are exploring Ethiopia's great ancient churches. King Lalibela built 11 rock-hewn churches: 7 are like caves and 4 are connected only at their base. This is an example of the GOD=7_4 algorithm/code (google that) that the ancients knew from the heavens.