| Chapter 1: | Historical Background |
The ancient history of Ethiopia is also connected with the legendary story of King Solomon of Jerusalem and Makedda, the Queen of Sheba, from whose line 225 Ethiopian emperors, starting from Menelik I to Haile Selassie I, have claimed descent.
As recounted in the New Testament, Christianity came to the region early during the time of the Apostles when Nubia (Northern Sudan) and Northern Habasha were referred to as Ethiopia. But it was in 330 A.D. when Emperor Ezana of Axum was converted by a Syrian monk called Frumentius that Christianity spread far and wide. During the early Middle Ages, Christian Axum’s power was challenged by the Beta Israel or the Ethiopian Jews who were led by Queen Judith of the Beni Hamuya clan. Because of widespread rebellions by the Christian princes of highland Ethiopia, however, the Beta Israel, who succeeded in bringing about the total destruction of Axum around the 10th century A.D., ultimately relinquished their power to the Christian Agaw Hamites of Lasta to whom they were related by marriage. The Agaws established the Zagwe dynasty and traced their royal line not to Menelik I, the legendary son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, but to Moses who, according to local and Biblical traditions, was married to an Ethiopian wife while he was in Egypt. The Zagwes are known for building huge subterranean churches carved out of single blocks of rock; the elaborate design and craftsmanship amazed the Portuguese envoys who visited Lalibela in Lasta in the 16th century. The nation’s stand in the Christian world was so important during the Zagwe dynasty that Saladin, the sultan of Egypt and Syria, gave Ethiopia a station in the Chapel of the Invention of the Cross, a service quarter in the Church of Holy Sepulcher, Jerusalem, as well as a section of the grotto of the Nativity in Bethlehem.
The survival of Christianity in Ethiopia was partly due to a historical incident. According to Mohammed’s biographer Ibn Hisham, when the Moslem prophet’s followers were persecuted in the seventh century A.D. in Mecca, he ordered them to take refuge with the negus (king) of Axum. As expected, the Ethiopian monarch gave Mohammed’s followers (some of whom were his near relatives) full protection.