Post by synchronicity on Oct 7, 2008 8:14:43 GMT 10
I am posting this in honour of Tamrin and also because it is a nice resource to have.
DOWNLOAD: www.yorku.ca/inpar/kebra_budge.pdf
By the way, if you go to the parent directory www.yorku.ca/inpar you will find quite a nice collection there.
The Kebra Nagast (var. Kebra Negast, Ge'ez ,ክብረ ነገሥት, kəbrä nägäst), or the Book of the Glory of Kings, is an account written in Ge'ez of the origins of the Solomonic line of the Emperors of Ethiopia. The text, in its existing form, is at least seven hundred years old, and is considered by many Ethiopian Christians and Rastafarians to be an inspired and a reliable account. Not only does it contain an account of how the Queen of Sheba met Solomon, and about how the Ark of the Covenant came to Ethiopia with Menelik I, but contains an account of the conversion of the Ethiopians from the worship of the sun, moon, and stars to that of the "Lord God of Israel". As Edward Ullendorff explained in the 1967 Schweich Lectures, "The Kebra Nagast is not merely a literary work, but -- as the Old Testament to the Hebrews or the Qur'an to the Arabs -- it is the repository of Ethiopian national and religious feelings."
The Kebra Nagast is divided into 117 chapters, and even after a single reading one can see that it is clearly a composite work; Ullendorff describes its narrative "a gigantic conflation of legendary cycles."[2] The document is presented in the form of a debate by the 318 "orthodox fathers" of the First Council of Nicaea. These fathers pose the question, "Of what doth the Glory of Kings consist?" One Gregory answers with a speech (chapters 3-17) which ends with the statement that a copy of the Glory of God was made by Moses and kept in the Ark of the Covenant. After this, the archbishop Domitius[3] reads from a book he had found in the church of "Sophia" (possibly Hagia Sophia), which introduces what Hubbard calls "the centerpiece" of this work, the story of Makeda (better known as the Queen of Sheba), King Solomon, Menelik I, and how the Ark came to Ethiopia (chapters 19-94).
Although the author of the final redaction identified this Gregory with Gregory Thaumaturgus, who lived in the 3rd century before this Council, the time and the allusion to Gregory's imprisonment for 15 years by the king of Armenia make Gregory the Illuminator a better fit.
Queen Makeda learns from Tamrin, a merchant based in her kingdom, about the wisdom of King Solomon, and travels to Jerusalem to visit him...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kebra_Nagast
The Kebra Nagast is divided into 117 chapters, and even after a single reading one can see that it is clearly a composite work; Ullendorff describes its narrative "a gigantic conflation of legendary cycles."[2] The document is presented in the form of a debate by the 318 "orthodox fathers" of the First Council of Nicaea. These fathers pose the question, "Of what doth the Glory of Kings consist?" One Gregory answers with a speech (chapters 3-17) which ends with the statement that a copy of the Glory of God was made by Moses and kept in the Ark of the Covenant. After this, the archbishop Domitius[3] reads from a book he had found in the church of "Sophia" (possibly Hagia Sophia), which introduces what Hubbard calls "the centerpiece" of this work, the story of Makeda (better known as the Queen of Sheba), King Solomon, Menelik I, and how the Ark came to Ethiopia (chapters 19-94).
Although the author of the final redaction identified this Gregory with Gregory Thaumaturgus, who lived in the 3rd century before this Council, the time and the allusion to Gregory's imprisonment for 15 years by the king of Armenia make Gregory the Illuminator a better fit.
Queen Makeda learns from Tamrin, a merchant based in her kingdom, about the wisdom of King Solomon, and travels to Jerusalem to visit him...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kebra_Nagast
DOWNLOAD: www.yorku.ca/inpar/kebra_budge.pdf
By the way, if you go to the parent directory www.yorku.ca/inpar you will find quite a nice collection there.