Warszawskie Studia Teologiczne

XII/2/1999, 203-216
Kirsten Stoffregen PEDERSEN
Jerusalem

IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA

A JUDAIC CHURCH ?

The question whether the Ethiopian täwahedo Orthodox Church is or is not particu-
larly Judaic of character is by no means a new one.
Already the Jesuits who were trying in the 16th and part of the 17th century to
bring Ethiopian christendom into full union with Rome were attentive to the matter.
And unfortunately they were not always as broadminded as the “first Christian mis-
sionaries” in the way James Bruce of Kinnaird describes these in the late 18th cen-
tury, namely as choosing to respect rather than to refute the Jewish customs they
found well confirmed in Ethiopia1. This is how the Portuguese Jesuit Jerome Lobo
expresses his feelings concerning the judaic customs of Ethiopian christians: “their
present religion is nothing but a kind of confused miscellany of Jewish and Maho-
metan superstitions, with which they have corrupted those remnants of Christianity
which they still retain”2.
Even in our days and quite recently the question has been treated by a number of
scholars, such as Edward Ullendorff3, Maxime Rodinson4, John T. Pawlikowski5 and
Getatchew Haile6. Why should we then take it up again? Has it not already been suf-
ficiently clarified by those rightly famous men of research?
Their work is without any doubt impressive, but the author of these lines enjoys a
double privilege, which none of the others has had, namely the situation of living
inside the Ethiopian Church and in a Jewish state, having furthermore been educated
in a Jewish university and standing in a constant and lively contact with a number of

1
J. BRUCE, Travels to discover the Sources of the Nile, 3rd edition, 1813, III, 13.
2
J. LOBO, A Voyage to Abyssinia, tr. S. Johnson, (1735), 59.
3
E. ULLENDORFF, "Hebraic-Jewish Elements in Abyssinian (Monophysite) Christianity", Journal of
Semitic Studies 1(1956), 216-256; Ethiopia and the Bible, London 1968.
4
M. RODINSON, "Sur la question des “Influences Juives” en Éthiopie", Journal of Semitic Studies
9(1964), 11-19.
5
J.T. PAWLIKOWSKI, "The Judaic Spirit of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church", Journal of Religion in
Africa 4 (1971-72), 178-99.
6
G. HAILE, "The 49 Hour Sabbath of the Ethiopian Church", Journal of Semitic Studies 23(1988)
nr 2, 233-54.
204 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

other Churches, eastern as well as western. It is this background which might give us
the hope that she might be able to cast a new ray of light upon that ancient problem.
In order to get a better view of the matter, we shall consider it from four points of
view, namely the ones of customs, of liturgy, of dogma and of historical tradition.

JUDAIC CUSTOMS IN ETHIOPIAN CHRISTIANITY

1. Circumcision/excision

One of the most conspicuous and well-known judaic customs observed among
Ethiopian christians is the practice of circumcision. About this C.H.Walker tells us,
“For a boy the circumcision will be on the seventh day, unless it is a Wednesday or a
Friday or a day of fast; yet during the Lenten fast, which is of fifty-five days, it is
ordained that the ceremony need not wait. If the babe is a female, it should be on the
fifth day, but many will wait twenty days or more till a female circumciser be found.
But if the mother is diseased, the babe must wait one year or two years, lest the dis-
ease come forth and settle upon the body.
When a man or a woman of mature age is raised up in Christianity, there need be
no circumcision, nor is there shame”7.
There can be no doubt that the Ethiopian christians see their circumcision as a
sign of “the covenant of Abraham”. That became quite clear to me, when in 1971 one
of my students - an Eritrean monk from the monastery of Däbrä Damo - in class
asked me, if it were true that European christians were not in general circumcised.
When I answered that so indeed is the case, he expressed his worry about their eter-
nal salvation. “How can they be saved, when they are not in the covenant of Abra-
ham?” Bishop Josef, however, who was also present in the class room, set our minds
at peace by pointing to St. Paul's teaching concerning the circumcision:
“Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the
commandments of God” (1 Cor 7,19);
“For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision;
but faith which worketh by love”(Ga 5,6)8.
That circumcision (and excision) is carried out by Ethiopian christians at such an
early time in life really points to an Old Testament origin of the custom. But on the
other hand the practice of excision rather suggests a non-Jewish, possibly Cushitic,
origin. The date might have been changed when the Bible became known to the
Ethiopians, at whichever period that has taken place.
It is well known that both circumcision and excision are common in a great num-
ber of tribes and ethnic groups in Africa, but in general they are connected with pu-

7
C.H. WALKER, The Abyssinian at Home, London 1933, 2-3.
8
See also Phil 3,3; Col 3,11.
IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA A JUDAIC CHURCH ? 205

berty rites and carried out on adolescents, not - as the case is among Ethiopian chris-
tians as well as in Judaism - on newly born children.
It should furthermore be remarked, that circumcision is not carried out in church
or by church officials and is not a sacrament.

2. Timing of infant baptism

One of the seven sacraments is instead, of course, baptism. But - quite apart from
the fact that Christian baptism in general has its root in Jewish ritual ablutions - the
Ethiopian timing of that important act must again remind us of an Old Testament law.
It is said that “If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child; then she
shall be unclean seven days; according to the days of the separation for her infirmity
shall she be unclean. And in the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circum-
cised. And she shall then continue in the blood of her purifying three and thirty days;
she shall touch no hallowed thing, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her
purifying be fulfilled. But if she bear a maid child, then she shall be unclean two
weeks, as in her separation; and she shall continue in the blood of her purifying three
score and six days.” (Lv 12,2-5). After this the woman shall bring her offerings pre-
scribed for the occasion to the Tabernacle, and the priest shall offer them before the
Lord and make an atonement, whereafter “she shall be cleansed from the issue of her
blood” (Lv 12,6-7).
In the Ethiopian Orthodox Church a male child is therefore baptized 40 days after
its birth, and a female child 80 days after birth. This allows the mother to be present
in church for that solemn occasion. And it is pointed out, that Jesus Himself observed
that law by being presented in the Temple in Jerusalem in accordance with that law
of Moses.
Ehiopian Orthodox catechisms indicate another reason, this time apocryphic in
character, for the usage of baptizing a boy on the 40th, a girl on the 80th day after
their birth. That reason is, that Adam, the father of all mankind, was created in a
place in Asia called Elda, and there he spent the first 40 days of his life. Thereafter
he was “born in grace”, and angels brought him into paradise. Eve had to wait 80
days for that favour, and the reason why they were not simply created in paradise
was that God wanted them to desire and ask for the gift of grace themselves9.

3. Other ritual purity/impurity

The understanding of ritual purity and impurity in other sexual matters is among
Ethiopian christians based on Leviticus 15. People who are ritually unclean accord-
ing to those laws may well approach the church building while they are still in their

9
See e.g. Amest A’emedä Mestir, Addis Ababa 1952 E.C. (=1960 A.D.) or Serwä Haymanot, Addis
Ababa 1968.
206 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

uncleanness, but they must not enter. They can be seen standing in prayer outside the
church door during the services.
The Ethiopian Church is, however, not alone among the christians in observing
those laws. That is common in all the ancient oriental Churches, although in the oth-
ers people rather tend to stay home during such periods of ritual uncleanness.
The laws concerning ritual uncleanness of a woman who has given birth are also
still observed by other oriental christians, and they were so even in the Latin Church
until the middle of this century. There existed a special prayer to welcome back to
the parish church a mother at the end of her period of uncleanness when she was re-
ceived at the church door by the priest.

4. Dietary laws

It is true that grosso modo the Ethiopian Orthodox christians observe the Old Tes-
tament dietary laws, and it is not easy to accept emperor Gelawdewos' assurance in
his famous confession, that their absolute abstinence from eating pork is just a matter
of taste. On the other hand that abstinence is a general Semitic and not just Judaic
custom.
That the Ethiopian christians do not keep meat and milk apart, a law which is so
prominent in a Jewish household of our days, is due to the fact that they - quite like
the Qaraites - interpret Ex 23,19 (and 34,26; Deut14,21) quite literally: “Thou shalt
not seethe a kid in his mother's milk”. To cook it in milk from another animal is not
seen as being an infringement upon that commandment.
But, as we shall soon be seeing, the Ethiopian and other eastern christians have
added numerous other dietary taboos to those we know from the Old Testament.
Absolutely un-kosher from a biblical point of view is of course the ancient Ethio-
pian custom of honouring guests by cutting a piece of meat from a live animal and
serving it to them. The Jewish lawyer Nathan Marein, who for 25 years lived in Ad-
dis Ababa and served there as a juridical adviser to emperor Haylä Sellassie I (1930-
74) told with horror that well-meaning Ethiopians tried to honour him in that way at
his arrival in the country. He avoided it by telling his hosts that as a Jew he was
strictly forbidden to eat such meat.

5. Fasting

The non-biblical dietary taboos are connected with the observance of fasting,
which is very common in the life of Ethiopian orthodox christians. On such days
these christians do not eat or drink anything from the evening meal until the follow-
ing early afternoon, and when they eat, no food is allowed which is derived from
animals, with the exception of honey.
Ullendorff points to Hiob Ludolf as having suggested that the two weekly days of
fasting observed in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church should be a remnant of the two
IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA A JUDAIC CHURCH ? 207

days of fasting each week observed by Jews10. That may well be. But two things
should be considered in that connection, namely: 1) that this custom is observed not
only by Ethiopian christians, but also by all the other eastern Churches, Byzantines
as well as non-Byzantines; and 2) that Ullendorff is not very likely to be right in his
belief that “the change from Monday and Thursday to Wednesday and Friday was no
doubt meant to invalidate accusations of imitating the Jews”11. Friday being the day
of the passion and death of Jesus, it seems natural that His disciples should choose
that day for fasting rather than Thursday, on which the Last Supper took place ac-
cording to tradition.
Apart from that, Ethiopians as well as all other oriental christians observe far
more days of fasting than what has ever been known in Judaism - in the case of the
Ethiopians as many as some 200 days annually.

6. The Sabbath

On two days during the week during a period of fasting, the abstinence from food
is somewhat mitigated, and those days are Sunday and Saturday. The mitigation con-
sists only in the custom of taking a light breakfast already well before noon on those
days. Also in that the Ethiopian Church follows the custom of the other oriental
Churches.
Special for the Ethiopian christians is the custom of celebrating the Eucharist -
always on Sundays, of course, and on Saturdays, if for some reason the Eucharist is
celebrated on that particular Saturday - in the morning. On all other days of fasting
the Eucharist is celebrated only at noon, and the first meal of the day is taken after
the celebration.
Another feature which is special to the Ethiopian Church is that some of its mem-
bers celebrate “the two Sabbaths”, i.e. both the Old Testament Sabbath on Saturday,
and what the Ethiopians call Sänbätä Krestiyan, the Sabbath of the christians, i.e.
Sunday.
When exactly that custom came up is still uncertain. Getatchew Haile has ex-
pressed the opinion that the question whether or not the Old Testament Sabbath
should be observed “was a very serious problem, probably throughout the history of
the local church, but definitely during the time from the fourteenth to the seventeenth
century”12.
The latter is a well-known fact: the 14th-15th- century in particular was a period
of strong religious fermentation in Ethiopia, and several sects came up with opinions
which were deviating from those of the official national Church. One of these, which

10
E. ULLENDORFF, "Hebraic-Jewish Elements", op. cit., 247; HIOB LUDOLF, Historia Aethiopica
(1681), III, 6,90 ff.
11
ULLENDORFF, op. cit.
12
See G. HAILE, op .cit. 233-234.
208 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

however did not entirely leave the Church and was reconciled with the rest of the
orthodox believers already in the 15th century, were the followers of a monastic
leader from the north of the country, Abba Ewostatewos. They insisted on observing
the two Sabbaths, and since the See of Alexandria would only allow the observance
of Sunday as the weekly day of feast and rest, Abba Ewostatewos was expelled from
Ethiopia and died in exile in Armenia in 1352.
His movement, however, is still persisting today, although its teachings concern-
ing the “49 hour Sabbath” is not binding for all Ethiopian orthodox christians.

7. Personal names

Old Testament names like Abreham (sic), Yeshaq, Yaëqob, Sara, David, Solo-
mon, Isayas, Ermeyas are fairly common among Ethiopian orthodox christians, but
hardly more so than in other Churches. As baptismal names combinations like Haylä
Iyäsus (Power of Jesus), Gäbrä Maryam (Servant of Mary), Wäldä Sellassie (Son of
the Trinity), Bekurä Seyon (the Firstborn of Sion) etc. are far more usual, and as
secular names such ones as Dässeta (joy), Täsfaye (my hope), Bälaynäh (fem. -näsh,
you are superior) etc. serve more than do the biblical ones.

LITURGY

1. The New Year feast

Ullendorff and others have pointed to the Jewish origin of the Ethiopian New
Year feast, Enqwetatash, however without mentioning it by this name. It is cele-
brated on Mäskäräm 1st, which corresponds to September 11th in the Gregorian cal-
endar, and in a leap year to September 12th. As is well known, the Jewish Rosh ha-
Shana is also celebrated in the early autumn, although it is not -as the case is in
Christian Ethiopia - fixed to a date which will always be the same in e.g. the Gregor-
ian or the Julian calendar.
The custom of taking a bath of purification on the morning of New Year's day in
the nearest river as Ullendorff describes it is also common in rural Christian Ethio-
pia, as is the slaughtering of a bullock or a goat, quite as a sheep is slaughtered for
the festive meal of Easter. If this should be connected with the Old Testament Jewish
atonement sacrifice (Yoma IV 2,3) as Ullendorf does it, is not quite clear. That the
time around New Year should be given to expiation and atonement is rather rooted in
general human religious feeling - the desire of leaving all that was wrong and bad
and begin again afresh with the new year. Together with thanksgiving these are the
thoughts which are also being expressed in Christian religious services in mainly
Lutheran countries in connection with January 1st, though such celebrations are of a
very new date only. In fact the ecclesiastical New Year nowhere takes its beginning
on January 1st, a date on which until the 2nd Vatican Council in the early 1960's the
IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA A JUDAIC CHURCH ? 209

Roman Catholics of Latin rite were by the way used to celebrating the circumcision
of Jesus Christ.
What Ullendorff forgets to mention is the fact that not only the Ethiopian Church
but also other eastern Churches, Byzantine and non-Byzantine, begin the new Church
year in September. Surely, this custom has Jewish origin, but it should be pointed out
that it is not limited to Ethiopia. What is special to the Ethiopians is the custom of
celebrating the coming of the new year with a eucharistic service in church, and that
the ecclesiastical and the secular new year begins on the same date.

2. Mäsqäl - feast of the Cross

About the feasts of Enqwetatash and Mäsqäl Ullendorff says, “The New Year
feast (1st Mäskäräm = 11th September) is undoubtedly of Jewish origin, and its date,
as well as that of Mäsk’äl, corresponds closely to the Hebrew season of the Yamim
nora’im. There is, of course, no clear consciousness in Ethiopia of the original re-
spective functions of each of these days, but the idea of purification and atonement is
prominently present”13.
The latter is without any doubt true. But if the feast of Mäsqäl is not understood
as a kind of Christian Yom Kippurim (Day of the Atonement), this is not necessarily
due to a lack of clear consciousness. The feasts of the finding and the exaltation of
the Holy Cross are by no means limited to Ethiopia. In the Latin Church, these two
events were even until the early 1960's celebrated on two diferent days. On May 3rd,
the Latin christians were commemorating St.Helena's finding of the Holy Cross of
Christ near Golgotha in Jerusalem around the year 330. And on September 14th was
and still is celebrated the exaltation of the Cross which took place when the Byzan-
tine emperor Heraklios in the year 629 brought the Cross back after the Persians had
removed it from the basilica of the Holy Sepulchre during their invasion of Jerusalem
in 614. The Byzantines celebrate the feast with great solemnity on September 14th
according to the Julian calendar, and that corresponds to the 17th of Mäskäräm in the
Ethiopian calendar. There is thus a period of 17 days between the Ethiopian New
Year and Mäsqäl - not ten days like there is between the Jewish New Year Rosh ha-
Shana and Yom ha-Kippurim.
The Mäsqäl feast is not a day of fasting in Ethiopia, which it would undoubtedly
have been, had it been seen as a day of atonement. It is rather a feast of the triumph
of the Cross, and the dominating hymns in the liturgical prayer services speak of that
typically Christian paradox and put forth prayers that God may protect the believers
through the Holy Cross.
Ullendorff mentions the well-known story of emperor David I of Ethiopia (1380-
1409) receiving the right arm of the Cross of Christ from Jerusalem. But the feast of
the exaltation of the Holy Cross goes much further back in history than that, as we
have just been seeing.

13
E. ULLENDORFF, "Hebraic-Jewish Elements", op. cit. 245-246.
210 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

The custom of kindling a bonfire - the damera - on the Mäsqäl feast is very likely
to be of pre-Christian and non-Jewish origin. But even that popular custom is not
limited to Ethiopia. When I was staying in Nazareth in the Galilee for a few weeks
during the summer of 1967, the Greek catholic nuns there told me, how on the feast
of the Holy Cross the Christian families in that mainly Christian town lit bonfires on
the flat roofs of their houses in joyful celebration.

3. The Bible

The study and the daily use of biblical texts is very eminent in the Ethiopian Ortho-
dox Church. It is a well-known fact, that what is studied and learned in the traditional
Ethiopian Church school, the nebab bet (house of reading) is above all biblical texts,
and that the reading - for many students the recital by heart - of the Psalms of David
marks the completion of that school. The Psalms are used very much in liturgical as
well as in private prayer, which is often refered to as Dawit lä-mädgäm (to repeat or
recite David). The Ethiopian way of dividing the Psalter into seven portions, one for
each day of the week, comes very close to the Jewish way of doing that.

Traditional Jewish Ethiopian Christian

Distribution
Sunday Ps 1-29 OT and NT cantica
Monday Ps 30-50 Ps 1-30
Tuesday Ps 51-72 Ps 31-60
Wednesday Ps 73-89 Ps 61-80
Thursday Ps 90-106 Ps 81-110
Friday Ps 107-119 Ps 111-130
Shabbath Ps120-150 Ps 131-150 (151)

But again, the recital of the Psalms is of course not limited to the Ethiopian Or-
thodox Church. The usage of singing or reciting all the 150 Psalms is common to all
the ancient Churches, western as well as eastern.
Ethiopian christendom has never known Marcionism – Marcion’s heresy with its
hatred of the Old Testament and of Judaism had already been condemned before the
national Church of Ethiopia became officially organized around the year 325. Its Bi-
ble exegesis shows great understanding for the importance of the Old Testament and
a tendency in the direction of the rather rationalistic, Antiochene exegesis, which
avoids exaggerated typological interpretations14.

14
Concerning this matter, see K. STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN, Traditional Ethiopian Exegesis of the Book
of Psalms, Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, 1994.
IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA A JUDAIC CHURCH ? 211

So much more must it astonish us, that - apart from the Psalms - relatively few
texts from the Old Testament are used in the liturgical prayer services. In the Qed-
dase - the Eucharistic service, which is central in all Christian prayer - none at all.
Only New Testament readings are heard there, where instead the Latin rite after
the liturgical reforms of the early 1960’s has taken up a considerable number of Old
Testament readings.
The liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is a purely Semitic
language, Ge’ez, which is closely related to Hebrew and Aramaic. This is of course a
great advantage for the understanding of texts, which are originally of Semitic ex-
pression. But on the other hand, nations who are linguistically much further away
from the original language may earlier have come to feel a greater need of learning
Hebrew and Aramaic than what has until now been common in Ethiopia. That can
certainly be said of the Lutheran Church with its Germanic background, where the
theologians are demanded to learn the biblical languages.

4. The megillah of Pesah

One very curious and interesting feature of the Ethiopian orthodox liturgical
prayer is the custom of reciting, early in the morning of Holy Saturday15, the Song of
Songs. This is the one of the five megilloth which in the synagogue is read on the
feast of Pesah (Easter).
The custom of reading the five megilloth aloud in the synagogue on five feasts of
the year did not come up at one and the same time. It seems to have begun with the
scroll of Esther already during the second Temple period, while instead the reading
of the Song of Songs at Pesah is mentioned only as late as in the post-talmudic trac-
tate Soferim which is believed to have been composed in the middle of the 8th cen-
tury A.D. (Soferim 14,18).
In the Holy Land, the recital of the Song of Songs at the spring festival is quite
logical: the rains are about to stop, and the land is arrayed in an abundance of green-
ery and flowers - quite as the season described in the Song of Songs.
But in Ethiopia the text is - from the point of view of the season - quite out of its
place. There the heavy rains are just about to begin in April-May. It is autumn - not
spring!
The recitation of the Song of Songs on the feast of Fasika seems to be a clearly
Judaic influence upon or heritage in the Ethiopian Church, but it is not yet known
how and when that usage was taken up by the Ethiopian Christians.

15
The Saturday before Easter Sunday.
212 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

DOGMA

1. The creed

The easiest way to come to know the dogmatic teachings of the Ethiopian Church
must be to study its official creed.
Like the case is in most of the Churches, also the Ethiopians have various creed
texts, which however differ only slightly from each other. Let us have a look at the
so-called “Amakniyou of the Apostles”, which is recited towards the end of the pre-
paratory service, just before the Eucharistic anaphora.
“We believe in one God, maker of all creation. Father of our Lord and our God
and our Saviour Jesus Christ, because his nature is unsearchable.
As we have before declared16, he is without beginning and without end, but he is
ever living, and he has light which is never extinguished, and he can never be ap-
proached.
He is not two or three, and no addition can be made to him; but he is only one,
living forever, because he is not hidden that he cannot be known, but we know him
perfectly through the law and the prophets, that he is almighty and has authority over
all the creation.
One God, Father of our Lord and our Saviour Jesus Christ, who was begotten be-
fore the creation of the world, the only-begotten Son, co-equal with him, creator of
all the hosts, the principalities and the dominions.
Who in the last days was pleased to become man, and took flesh from our Lady
Mary, the holy Virgin, without the seed of man, and grew like men, yet without sin
or evil. Neither was guile found in his mouth17.
Then he suffered, died in the flesh, rose from the dead on the third day, ascended
into heaven to the Father who sent him, sat down at the right hand of Power, sent to
us the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, who proceedeth from the Father, and saved all the
world, and who is co-eternal with the Father and the Son.
We say further that all the creatures of God are good and there is nothing to be re-
jected, and the spirit, the life of the body, is pure and holy in all.
And we say that marriage is pure, and childbirth is undefiled, because God cre-
ated Adam and Eve to multiply. We understand further that there is in our body a
soul, which is immortal and does not perish with the body.
We repudiate all the works of heretics and all schisms and transgression of the
law, because they are for us impure.
We also believe in the resurrection of the dead, the righteous and sinner; and in
the day of judgement, when everyone will be recompensed according to his deeds.

16
In the Didaskalia
17
1Pe 2,22
IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA A JUDAIC CHURCH ? 213

We also believe that Christ is not in the least degree inferior because of his incar-
nation, but he is God, the Word who truly became man, and reconciled mankind to
God being the High Priest of the Father.
Henceforth let us not be circumcised like the Jews. We know that he who had to
fulfil the law and the prophets has already come.
To him, for whose coming all people looked forward, Jesus Christ, who is de-
scended from Judah, from the root of Jesse, whose government is upon his shoul-
der18: to him be glory, thanksgiving, greatness, blessing, praise, song, both now and
ever and world without end. Amen”19.
The creed is obviously orthodox christian. Nothing in it is deviating from the Ni-
cene-Constantinopolitan text used in the Latin and the Byzantine rites, but Ethiopian
theologians have found it necessary to stress four things: the goodness of all God's
creatures, the holiness of marriage, the belief that circumcision is no more necessary,
and Christ's descendence from Judah and Jesse. The other orthodox Churches share
these beliefs, as do indeed the christians in general. But they have not taken an ar-
ticulation of them into their creed.
How shall we understand the exhortation “Henceforth let us not be circumcised
like the Jews” in a society, where it is in actual fact a common practice and is being
seen as “the sign of the covenant of Abraham”? It may be, that the stress should be
on the phrase “like the Jews”, and that it should be seen as a warning against the dry
legalism of which rabbinical Judaism has been accused by the christians ever since
the days of the compilation of the New Testament. As we have already seen, the in-
junction has by no means led to an abolition of circumcision in practice.

2. The catechisms

An examination of the Ethiopian orthodox catechisms like e.g. the classical

Amestu A’emadä Mestir (The Five Pillars of Mystery) or the more modern Serwä
Haymanot (Order of the Faith) leaves us with the same impression of clearly ortho-
dox christian teaching. What is called “The Five Pillars of Mystery” are five of the
well-known christian principles of faith: The Trinity, the Incarnation, Baptism, the
Sacrifice (i.e. the Eucharist), and the Resurrection of the dead, the latter of course
having been taken over from Pharisaic Judaism. And the subjects of the Serwä Hay-
manot are practically the same: The Creation, the Trinity, the Incarnation, Baptism
and Eucharist, the Resurrection of the dead. Usages like circumcision or the obser-
vance of the 49 hour Sabbath -which as we have seen is not generally observed by all
orthodox christian Ethiopians - are not at all treated. The authors of the catechisms
can not possibly have been ignorant of the fact that they are practiced. They just are
not part of the doctrine of the Church.

18
Is 9,6
19
The translation is taken from Marcus Daoud's English edition The Liturgy of the Ethiopian
Church, Addis Ababa, February 27th, 1954, 51-52.
214 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

HISTORICAL TRADITIONS

That there has been a very strong Semitic influence in Ethiopia already in pre-
Christian times is quite clear. Not only is its classical language, Ge’ez, purely Se-
mitic, and its alphabet taken over from Sabean letters, which the Ethiopians have
developed further. And there is an abundance of archeological and historical evi-
dence of close ties between the Ethiopian kingdom of Aksum and Southern Arabia.
But “the Land of Kush” which in the Septuagint text is translated with the name
Ethiopia is mentioned no less than 48 times in one form or other in the Old Testa-
ment.
One very popular tale in Ethiopia has grown out of the biblical story about the
meeting of King Solomon of Judah and the Queen of Sheba. It has been written
down in the royal chronicle which goes under the name of Kebrä Nägäst (Glory of
the Kings), and according to which the imperial dynasty that has reigned longest in
the country, the so-called Solomonic dynasty, should be descended from King Solo-
mon through the Queen of Sheba, who is seen as Queen of Ethiopia. Also in Jewish
tradition legends have grown out of the same biblical text (1 Kgs 10,1-13; 2 Chr 9,1-
12), although they are not identical with the story told in the Kebrä Nägäst. Accord-
ing to the Ethiopian version, the son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba,
Menilek, visited his father in Jerusalem and brought with him home to Aksum not
only all the first-born of Israel and among them many young priests from the Jewish
temple, but also the Ark of the Covenant. This is believed to be kept still in our time
in the Church of St. Mary in Aksum. And the tabot, the wooden tablet which - like in
the Syrian and the Coptic churches - is found on the altar of all Ethiopian churches, is
seen as a replica of the Ark of the Covenant.
Pawlikowski dwells upon the Jewish midrashic material which can be found in
the Kebrä Nägäst (and it is good to see that he also mentions the presence of such
material in the Qur’an!)20. What he forgets to mention is that Mary is seen as the Ark
of the New Covenant not only in Ethiopia, but also in ancient Christian poetry and
theology in general. That is the reason why the Ark is kept in the church of St.Mary,
and the very popular Ethiopian feast of Seyon (Sion) is a feast of Mary, celebrating
the Arks of the Old and the New Testament simultaneously.
Another thing, which Pawlikowski does not deal with, is the thought that the story
of the transfer of the Ark of the Covenant to Ethiopia from the Temple in Jerusalem
unfortunately can be seen as a case of heavy replacement theology. The chosen peo-
ple of Israel is replaced by the Ethiopian people even prior to the birth of Christian-
ity, the sign of which is exactly that transfer of the Ark of the Covenant!
Such a teaching is fortunately not being expressed in the Ethiopian Church. In-
stead it was of course politically very convenient for the Solomonic dynasty to stress
the importance of the Kebrä Nägäst which “proved” its descendence from David and
its close relationship to Jesus Christ, himself a son of David! And it was far easier for

20
See PAWLIKOWSKI, op. cit.
IS THE CHURCH OF ETHIOPIA A JUDAIC CHURCH ? 215

that dynasty with its Semitic roots to claim such a relationship than it was for the
royal dynasty of Georgia which has the same tradition about itself21.
The famous motto of the Solomonic dynasty with which the reigning monarch
begins every letter he or she issues, is a quotation from the Bible: Mo’a anbässa zä
emnägädä Yehuda (The Lion of the Tribe of Judah hath prevailed). Its origin is of
course Gn 49,9: “Judah is a lion's whelp. From the prey, my son, thou art gone up.
He stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion. Who shall rouse him up?”
It is interesting to see that, basing themselves on that verse, Hebrew speaking,
non-christian Jews invariably speak of the Ethiopian emperor as gur aryeh Yehuda
(the whelp of the lion (of) Judah), probably because the direct quotation is unknown
to them. This is taken from Revelation, the last book of the New Testament, where
we read: “And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to read
the book, neither to look thereon. And one of the elders saith unto me, Weep not:
behold, the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the
book and to loose the seven seals thereof.” (Re 5,4-5). The Lion of Juda is here obvi-
ously Jesus Christ.

CONCLUSION

From what we have seen in our present deliberation, Ethiopian christians truly are
clinging to some Jewish observances. But on the other hand, so do all other Christian
Churches. And this can hardly astonish anybody. The Church in its entirety is and
remains a messianic Jewish sect, firmly built on the Bible which - in the Christian
view - comprises the Old as well as the New Testament.
Why, then, does the Ethiopian Church appear to be “Judaic” more than any other
Christian group?
This probably has to do with the kind of Jewish customs being observed by the
Ethiopian Christian people in addition to teachings of the Church. These are almost
all outward signs which can easily be observed. And while such outward signs have
not been accepted in Europe where there was no cultural antecedent for them, they
have been eagerly grasped upon and retained by the Semitic-African people which
form the core of Ethiopian christendom. Everywhere in the world Christian mission-
aries are confronted by the problem of inculturalization. In most cases they have been
quite clever in overcoming the difficulties and utilizing the existing cultural possibili-
ties. One example is the importance Christmas has acquired and kept in Scandinavia.
The ancient Germanic Juleblot was a sacrificial feast, which took place in mid-
winter to celebrate the turning of the sun in the depth of the Nordic winter night. It

21
Pawlikowski's description of the Kebrä Nägäst as being “the principal work of Ethiopian literature”
(op. cit. 187) must be said to be exaggerated. He is here following Ullendorff. Aläqa Tayyä is by no
means, as Pawlikowski has it “the sole native Ethiopian historian”! (op. cit., 180). And as for the tripar-
tite division of the Ethiopian church building (ibid. 189), that reminds me of any Danish village church
quite as much as of the Temple in Jerusalem.
216 KIRSTEN STOFFREGEN PEDERSEN

received a new Christian interpretation: Jesus Christ is the true light of the world, the
sol iustitiae. His birth can very conveniently be celebrated instead of the ancient sun
feast.
In Ethiopia outward signs like the circumcision were already existing before the
Bible or biblical ideas reached the country. The Semitic-African inhabitants felt very
well at home with such usages and have been clinging on to them even when they are
passed by in silence by the official Church or -like in the case of the observance of
the Old Testament Sabbath - being openly forbidden by the then highest Church au-
thority for the Ethiopian christians, the Patriarchate of Alexandria.
If the Judaic elements in Ethiopian Christanity are truly a sign of Jewish presence
in the region prior to the arrival of Christianity is still not clear. But it would without
any doubt be prudent to follow the example of the Ethiopian Church in other African
Churches, because those Judaic elements seem to meet so naturally also with the
feelings of other Africans, even of those who have no direct Semitic heritage in their
culture.