Ethiopia is most well known as being the possible cradle of humankind.
Fossile remains (famous Lucy) discovered in northeastern Ethiopia have been dated to roughly 3.5 million years, making them the earliest known example of an upright walking hominid.
The oldest known stone tools, dating to 2.5 million years, were also found in this same region.
But Ethiopia has to offer a great variety of more, including the mysterious granite obelisks of Axum: The tallest of the monoliths, now fallen and broken into pieces, was 33.3 meters tall and weighs about five tons (the largest Egyptian obelisk is that of King Tutmosis, 32.16 meters high and now to be found in Rome).
The tallest obelisk still standing at Axum today is 23 meters tall. Carved upon its sides the obelisk gives the illusion that it is a multi-storey, monolithic building decorated with false doors (complete with knockers and locks), windows with timber beams. The vertical distance between each floor is equal and symmetrical. The most amazing part of the megalithic block is that it is hewn out of solid granite that weighs over 500 metric tons.
Besides those obelisks in Axum there are the 12 churches of Lalibäla and - most enigmatic of all - the church of St. Mary of Zion, the probable location of the Holy Ark of the Covenant. It is also the repository of the crowns and royal cloaks of the kings. St. Mary’s Cathedral is taken as the holiest sanctuary in Ethiopia.
According to archaic sources the Ark of the Covenant was a wooden chest measuring three feet nine inches long by two feet three inches high and wide. It was lined inside and out with thin gold and was surmounted by two winged figures of cherubim that faced each other across its heavy gold lid. Many scholars believe it may have contained pieces of meteorites or radioactive rocks.
Me thinks it was the form/measurements (27 x 27 x 45 inches) that was the clue - producing a "force-field" triggered by various mechanisms (the "cheru-beams") for those who know how to use this high-tech device. Just a small hint: Simply study the Phi (golden Means) - cycle (Fibonacchi)... ;-) and the law of Pythagoras leading to the "embedded" resonances that is layed out by the "resonance of the form" that are symbolized by the squareroots of the system.
Anyhow, the Ark was taken from Mt.Sinai (which is to be found actually in Saudi-Arabia!! - Jebel Lawz, the "Mountain of Laws" - and not where it is said to be on the "Sinai peninsula"...) to when it was finally installed in the first great Jewish temple in Jerusalem, then kept for two centuries at Shiloh, was captured by the Philistines for seven months, and then, returned to the Israelites, was kept in the village of Kiriath-Jearim.
During this period it was associated with numerous "strange" phenomena - many of which involved the killing or burning of often large numbers of people. Biblical and other ancient sources speak of the Ark 'blazing with fire and light, inflicting cancerous tumors and severe burns, leveling mountains, stopping rivers, blasting whole armies and laying waste cities'. This all even triggered Mr. Spielburg who made this indeed funny 'Indiana-jones'-thing...
What happened afterwards? Read this - sent in by VKD:
I was told many years ago by one of this nations representatives, a Mr. Imru Zeleke, about one of these Temples having the Tapestry which told the tale of Solomon and Sheba.
The Tapestry recorded Sheba's visit to Solomon. She took all her provisions such as food, servants and so forth. She did not want to be obligated to Solomon.
Solomon seeing her great beauty, bribed her servants to over-season her food with salt.
During the night Sheba became very thirsty. She drank all her water and found it necessary to partake of water from Solomon's well.
As she was drinking the water..Solomon came up and advised Sheba she was beholden to him.
That is how Sheba and Solomon came to be..(or as the story was told).
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=69976
V.K. Durham
(snip)
Another hint may be given by Graham Hancock who was the East Africa correspondent for The Economist and is the author of several previous books on Africa and the Third World. He lives in Devonshire, England. Part fascinating scholarship and part entertaining adventure yarn, tying together some of the most intriguing tales of all time -- from the Knights Templar and Prester John to Parsival and the Holy Grail -- Hancock's book, "The Sign and the Seal" will appeal to anyone fascinated by the revelation of hidden truths, the discovery of secret mysteries....
From an interview with a "guard" of the Ark in Axum/Ethiopia:
....'I have heard of an Ethiopian tradition that the Ark of the Covenant is kept here... in this chapel. I have also heard that you are the guardian of the Ark. Are these things true?'
'They are true.'
'But in other countries nobody believes these stories. Few know about your traditions anyway, but those who do say that they are false.'
'People may believe what they wish. People may say what they wish. Nevertheless we do possess the sacred Tabot, that is to say the Ark of the Covenant, and I am its guardian...'
'Let me be clear about this,' I interjected. 'Are you referring to the original Ark of the Covenant - the box made of wood and gold in which the Ten Commandments were placed by the prophet Moses?'
'Yes. God Himself inscribed the ten words of the law upon two tablets of stone. Moses then placed these tablets inside the Ark of the Covenant - which afterwards accompanied the Israelites during their wanderings in the wilderness and their conquest of the Promised Land. It brought them victory wherever they went and made them a great people. At last, when its work was done, King Solomon placed it in the Holy of Holies of the Temple that he had built in Jerusalem. And from there, not long afterwards, it was removed and brought to Ethiopia...'
'Tell me how this happened,' I asked. 'What I know of your traditions is only that the Queen of Sheba is supposed to have been an Ethiopian monarch. The legends I have read say that when she made her famous journey to Jerusalem she was impregnated by King Solomon and bore him a son - a royal prince - who in later years stole the Ark...'
The monk sighed. 'The name of the prince you are speaking of was Menelik - which in our language means "the son of the wise man". Although he was conceived in Jerusalem he was born in Ethiopia where the Queen of Sheba had returned after discovering that she was carrying Solomon's child. When he had sign and the seal reached the age of twenty, Menelik himself travelled from Ethiopia to Israel and arrived at his father's court. There he was instantly recognized and accorded great honour. After a year had passed, however, the elders of the land became jealous of him. They complained that Solomon showed him too much favour and they insisted that he must go back to Ethiopia. This the king accepted on the condition that the first-born sons of all the elders should also be sent to accompany him. Amongst these latter was Azarius, son of Zadok the High Priest of Israel, and it was Azarius, not Menelik, who stole the Ark of the Covenant from its place in the Holy of Holies in the Temple. Indeed the group of young men did not reveal the theft to Menelik until they were far away from Jerusalem. When at last they told him what they had done he understood that they could not have succeeded in so bold a venture unless God had willed it. Therefore he agreed that the Ark should remain with them. And it was thus that it was brought to Ethiopia, to this sacred city... and here it has remained ever since.'
'And are you telling me that this legend is literally true?'
'It is not a legend. It is history.'
'How can you be so sure of that?'
'Because I am the guardian. I know the nature of the object that has been placed in my care.'...
From: http://www.selamta.net/Ark%20of%20the%20Covenant.htm
(snip)
In "The Sign and the Seal", Graham Hancock writes the following: Based on compelling evidence gathered from years of research, he suggests that Jewish priests from Solomon's temple removed the Ark during the rule of the apostate King Manasseh (687-642 BC). It was then hidden for two hundred years in a Jewish temple on the Egyptian sacred island of Elephantine in the Nile.
Next it was taken to Ethiopia, to the island of Tana Kirkos in Lake Tana, where it remained for over 800 years. When the Axumite kingdom converted to Christianity after 331 AD, the Ark of the Covenant was co-opted by the Christian hierarchy and brought from Tana Kirkos to the new church of St.Mary of Zion in Axum.
The Ark remained in Axum until 1530 when it was removed to a secret hiding place to protect it from approaching Muslim armies. In 1535, the Muslim invader, Ahmed Gragn, swept across the Horn of Africa from the Islamic holy city of Harar (in southern Ethiopia) and destroyed the Church of St. Mary of Zion.
Some 100 years later, with peace restored, the Ark was brought back to Axum. It was installed in a new St. Mary's church built by King Fasilidas (with Portuguese assistance!! Hello, Jesuits!!) on the ruins of the earlier church in 1635.
The Ark remained in this church - called Maryam Tsion Cathedral - until 1965 when Haile Selassie (said to be the 225th descendant of Menelik - son of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon) had it transferred to a more secure chapel, the so-called treasury, ten meters away from the northeast corner of the old church...
Now read THIS, sent in by a vivid reader:
Hi, I am born in Ethiopia and have been in Lalibella. All the churches there are undergrounds. Lalibella is a very famous tourist place.
Noah's Ark is underground in AXUM and none - I repeat NONE is allowed to see it except only the guard.
Nobody has ever been allowed to visit the underground: neither the Americans, nor Queen Elisabeth II (who visited Axum in 1957 and had a church built nearby...) nor the Emperor Haile Selassie - NOBODY...
In Axum there are other obelisks, and very interesting - they stand without foundations. Many many years ago (I think 18 something) an English explorer tried to dig a tunnel from the obelisk to the Noah's Ark. Unfortunatelly he died before reaching the half.
Noah's Ark is in the underground of a monastery where women are not allowed. My husband and a friend of him went inside and visited the tresor room, but nobody is allowed to go downstairs where the Ark of Noah is (I have got a video of the tresor room and the monastery)
Regards,
-A-
Ark of Noah? Ark of the Covenant? I reassured myself whether she wasn't mixing up the both of it. No, she confirmed to me that she meant the ARK OF NOAH.
Writing in his book "Lost Secrets of the Sacred Ark", another famous author - Laurence Gardner - disagrees with Hancock’s assertions, and states that the Axumite Ark
"...Called a manbara tabot, is actually a casket which contains a venerated altar slab known as a tabot. The reality is that, although the Axum chest might be of some particular cultural significance in the region, there are manbara tabotat (plural of tabot) in churches across the breadth of Ethiopia. The tabotat which they contain are rectangular altar slabs, made of wood or stone. Clearly, the prized manbara tabot of Axum is of considerable sacred interest and, by linguistic definition, it is indeed an ark – but it is not the biblical Ark of the Covenant, nor anything remotely like it..."
In the fourth century A.D., the Axumite state became the first nation in the world to adopt Christianity as its official religion. We may assume that therefor that Christanity was preserved here in its "cleanest" form apart of the "holy spin" of the RCC. Orthodox, one might even say - although I am about to state that the RCC is even more "orthodox" in her point of view than anything else - merely labeled as "orthodox".
War on Error, Part 272745.999: "Arcs to the Raiders of the lost Arks"
Far Sight 3
