This article is mainly written as an introductory information for every Oromo, Afar, Sidama, Ogadeni, Hadiya, Berta, Agaw, Anuak, Nuer, Kaffa, Kmabata, Shekacho, Gedeo and other Eastern African whose nation has been subjugated, persecuted and oppressed within the tyrannical colonial state of Amhara & Tigray-led Abyssinia (i.e. Fake Ethiopia). Abyssinia has no historical right to the fair name of Ethiopia which is the term by which Ancient Greeks and Romans denoted the kingdom and the nation immediately south of the Egyptian border, i.e. Cush (today’s Sudan). Many among the aforementioned oppressed nations of Abyssinia are of Cushitic ancestry and originate from the northern part of today’s Sudan.
What follows is not a proper and concise historical presentation; it is only my recent exchange of messages and emails with an Oromo scholar, who happens to be a faithful Waaqeffatta, i.e. one of the followers of Waaqeffannaa, which has been the traditional monotheistic religion of the Oromos, Eastern Africa’s greatest and most ancient Cushitic nation. As he asked me few points about the diffusion and the survival of Christianity in Eastern Africa, I felt obliged to prepare a brief diagram and add a few links for any Oromo to make his own search. All Oromos must learn about the History of Christianity in Egypt, Sudan (i.e. the only true, historical Ethiopia), and Axumite Abyssinia, so that they don’t fall victims of colonial forgeries diffused by the French, the English and the Americans or of pseudo-historical narratives of the ominous Abyssinian debteras.
Whereas there was Christian continuity in Sudan (Ethiopia) until the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th, there was Christian disruption and discontinuity in Abyssinia. Axum collapsed in the 7th c. due to the early Islamic expansion. Agaw Christianity is Cushitic, brief, and totally unrelated to Axum, as the Agaw kingdom rose to power no less than 500 years after the dismantlement of Axum. And the rise of the Amhara pseudo-Christian bogus-kingdom (in the 2nd half of the 13th c.) does not consist in continuity but complete disruption from the Agaw dynasty. Based on a forged trash named ‘Kebra Negast’, the Amhara pseudo-kingdom represents the most ludicrous invention of the World History: the fabrication of the otherwise nonexistent ‘Solomonic’ dynasty. In other words, Axum has nothing to do with Lalibela, Lalibela has nothing to do with Gondar, and Gondar is not Christian, but Satanic.
—- MESSAGE SENT TO ME BY AN OROMO SCHOLAR ——
Dear Prof. Shamsaddin,
I admire your academic rigor in dispelling the Abyssinian and Ethiopian myth, and describing the Oromos in their true demographic and cultural context, one of the few or the only scholar to do justice for the Oromo case.
G. F.
————- MY RESPONSE TO THE MESSAGE ——————-
Dear G.,
Thank you very much for your kind words and message!
I don’t know what articles of mine you read here except for the one that you currently downloaded.
I published extensively about Ancient History of Egypt, Sudan (: Ethiopia/Kush), Abyssinia, Somalia and also North-Northwestern Africa – in many languages.
About Biyya Oromo, the Oromos and Christian-Islamic and Modern History of Africa, I published hundreds of online articles during the period 2004-2012 (in three different portals). Many of those articles were reproduced in Oromo and other portals, blogs and fora. The three portals closed down for one reason or another in the period 2014-2016, and consequently only my republished articles remained available online. Thank God, I had kept copies of all of them, and I started my account here in 2016, having as main target to re-upload all of my online articles (ca. 1800 until 2012) here. Unfortunately, I progressed slowly over the past years, due to new projects, and until now I re-published only ca. 300-350 (of my 1800 online articles of the period 2004-2012). However, I am persistent and I will try to re-upload more in the years to come.
Meanwhile, I have also almost ready new articles to publish about various topics, Oromos and Biyya Oromo included. Many Oromos and others write to me, asking me interesting topics, and sometimes my responses are very long and fit to publish. So, when I have time, I edit them for clarity and upload them. I recently (October) had a long conversation with a US-based Oromo who asked me about the chances of Oromos cooperating with Egypt (a country that I know very well for having lived and worked for 20 years).
To explain what the fake state of Modern Egypt is, I needed many thousands of words and soon this exchange of emails will become one article (or a series of articles). Of course, I know that you must not expect any substantive help from Egypt, but my response to that of your compatriots will take you by surprise because in it I explain also why I believe that it is still better to be an Oromo in Occupied Biyya Oromo than an Egyptian in the so-called ‘independent’ Egypt where the colonization simply took another, worse form.
You can contact me here: megalommatis@inbox.ru
I also believe that the Oromo Diaspora constitutes a major threat for Biyya Oromo’s national independence. The reason for this is that Oromos (and others) generate terrible delusions in their minds, create fake dreams that lead to nowhere, trust their Western interlocutors (who all say lies to Oromos and others), and end up becoming tools of the criminal Western countries against Biyya Oromo’s without even understanding it.
Oppression in Abyssinia (and Occupied Biyya Oromo) is less evil than oppression in US, UK, EU, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the Western World in general.
In Abyssinia you only risk to lose your body. In the West, you inevitably lose your soul. This is the worst death of all!
Many thanks
——- EMAIL SENT TO ME BY AN OROMO SCHOLAR ——–
Thank you Prof for raising the delusion of many Diaspora Oromo’s . I was also shocked by the scale of delusion about Ethiopianism among Orthodox Christian practicing Oromos when I went home in 2019 after three decades.
The Orthodox Church has been the caretaker of all the evils perpetrated by Abyssinian elite. Being Orthodox is synonymous to being Abyssinian and renouncing your Oromo identity (name, language, religion, values) and even name of the land.
European scholars are always keen to support Christians and minority as gate way to keep their colonial boundaries intact. Most of the deluded Oromo’s weather in diaspora or back home fall for the fake stories and fall pray for such nonsense.
We are trying hard to decipher the myth of Ethiopian and false legendary ties to the Kingdom of Judea. Menelik is a slave and who eventually end up owning 70,000 slaves. But European elevated him to king and wrote stories for illiterate through the blessing of Orthodox Church to believe he is God anointed.
The TPLF also injected another virus into the Oromo youth called Pentecostal church, This is the virus and whoever catch it will feel immune from the trial and tribulation of Oromo’s sadly denouncing they are not concerned about this life, what a perverse way to look and live. This virus cost millions to lose life and hope and focus hence didn’t help the struggle.
We are working on multiple fronts. As for Egypt, I don’t -for an iota of a second- believe they would ever be an alliance to anyone. They failed Palestinians and why should I believe they would be alliance to Oromo, I am too old to believe in this sort of conundrum,
We are organizing conference in February; it would be good if you could present even paper via remote.
G. F.
————— MY RESPONSE TO THE EMAIL ———————-
Dear G.,
Thank you for the important points that you raise here!
They are truly crucial not only for the Oromos, but the entire African continent and the Mankind! You can call me Shamsaddin!
Please let me know more about you, your age, origin (Arsi, Borana, Wollega, etc.), town/city of birth, and place(s) of study! I did not find any CV in your profile; that’s why I am asking you all these points, so that I better picture your background.
I guess you are living in … now; correct me if I am wrong!
I wrote much about the Oromos, Ancient Cush and N-NE Africa, Ogadenis, Somalia, and Abyssinia, but -as you can understand- there is always a moment, when you realize that «much» is still «little» or sometimes «next to nothing». And this is what you made me feel with what you write here. Thank you!
Christological divisions in Africa – Egypt, Sudan (: Ethiopia), and Abyssinia
Christianity in Eastern Africa south of Egypt is an enormous issue – very complex, very concealed, and very useful to colonial France, England, US, the Vatican and the Protestants, when it is worldwide unknown or diffused in a wrong and confusing manner.
The complexity already starts in Egypt. You call the Abyssinian Church «Orthodox»; and so is also called the Coptic Patriarchate of Alexandria.
But do you know that the Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople (and consequently that of Moscow) does not recognize the Copts as ‘Orthodox’, but as «Monophysitic» (the currently prevailing term is «Miaphysitic», which is fairer, taking into consideration the fact that in its origin the term «Monophysitic», coined by the Constantinopolitan Patriarchate, was very pejorative)?
Aramaeans of Syria, SE Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan and Copts of Egypt from one side and from the other side Romans and Constantinopolitan bishops were mutually excommunicated and did not accept one another as «Christian». The Axumite Abyssinians however followed the Copts.
This issue is a vast topic that exploded in the 5th c. (so before more than 1500 years) under the form of Christological disputes. It hinged on major events of the Christian Church, namely the Council of Ephesus (449 CE) and the Council of Chalcedon (451 CE). In the former, Nestorius and his followers were condemned (Nestorianism). In the latter, the Monophysites were condemned (Monophysitism was viewed as heresy) by the Constantinopolitan and Roman stooges, who were for them heretics as Dyophysites (Dyophysitism being the belief that Jesus had two natures, namely human and divine). General info about the Monophysites you can find here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Council_of_Ephesus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Chalcedon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chalcedonian_Definition
https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chalcedonian_Creed
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monophysitism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oriental_Orthodox_Churches
And the following links are about the Nestorians:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestorius
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_the_East
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyophysitism
Attention: the «Oriental Orthodox Churches», which are the Monophysitic churches (so, not the Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople), have nothing to do with the «Church of the East», which encompasses the Nestorians (Aramaeans and other followers of Nestorian Christianity in Iran, Yemen, Central Asia, India and China).
These terrible divisions cost the Eastern Roman Empire half of its territory, which was lost to the early armies of Islam. The reason is simple: Aramaean and Egyptian Monophysites and Aramaean and other Nestorians were oppressed by the Eastern Roman soldiers and governors, because of their religious rejection of the capital (Constantinople) city’s clergy and theologians. They were penalized with heavy taxes; that’s why they preferred to be ruled by Muslims and thus be free from the Constantinopolitan Orthodox Patriarchate’s armies that they considered heretic, identifying themselves as Orthodox Christians.
The Coptic Chronicles (a valuable historical source) describe in great words the Caliphs, whereas they curse the Eastern Roman Emperors who imposed the Constantinopolitan theology on them. I am referring mainly to two chronicles, namely John of Nikiû’s Chronicle and Severus of Al’Ashmunein (=Hermopolis) and his History of the Patriarchs of the Coptic church of Alexandria (Ta’rikh Batarikat al-Kanisah al-Misriyah). More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_of_Niki%C3%BB
http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/nikiu2_chronicle.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Severus_ibn_al-Muqaffa
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Patriarchs_of_Alexandria
http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/severus_hermopolis_hist_alex_patr_00_eintro.htm
Severus (known in Arabic as Sawiris ibn al Maqaffa) narrates also the miraculous levitation of the mountain al Muqattam (east of Islamic Cairo) that was performed by St. Simon the Tanner (Sam’ān al-Kharrāz/ سمعان الخراز) in 975, during the reign of the Fatimid Caliph Al-Muizz.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_the_Tanner
The Christian Cushitic Kingdoms of Eastern Africa south of Roman Egypt: Nobatia, Makuria and Alodia in Sudan (: Ethiopia) opposite Axumite Abyssinia
Around the middle of the 5th c. another serious development took place and it highlighted this theological division in Christian Cush (Ancient Ethiopia, i.e. today’s Sudan). After the collapse of Meroe and the depopulation that characterized the period 370-450 CE across Cush, three independent Christian kingdoms emerged in the territory of today’s Sudan:
1- Nobatia: with capital at Faras, presently under the waters of the Nubian Lake, close to the borderline between Egypt and Sudan,
2- Makuria: with capital at Dongola Agouza, ca. 550 km south of the Egyptian-Sudanese border alongside the Nile.
3- Alodia: with capital at Soba, 30 km east-southeast of Khartoum.
These kingdoms followed different Christian patriarchates:
Nobatia (the only Nubian state in the History of the Mankind) accepted the authority of the Coptic (self-styled «Orthodox», called «Monophysitic» by Constantinople and Rome) Patriarchate of Alexandria. Coptic was the official religious and state language of Nobatia.
In contrast with Nobatia, Makuria accepted the religious authority of the Eastern Roman (self-styled «Orthodox», called «heretic» by the Copts) Patriarchate of Alexandria. Alexandrian Koine (i.e. Biblical Greek) was the religious language of Makuria. Makurian (written in Greek characters) was the official language of the kingdom. Makurian writing is not yet fully deciphered (due to the scarcity of the preserved documentation), but it appears to be the Christian language of the Meroitic Cushites who remained in their land, after the Axumite invasion of Meroe by Ezana of Axum (370 CE). Consequently, it must have (like Ancient Meroitic) linguistic affinities with Afaan Oromoo.
Alodia, like Nobatia, was linked to the Coptic Patriarchate. About:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobatia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Makuria
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alodia
The above three Christian Kingdoms constituted the true, Christian Ethiopia.
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FRECOES FROM THE CATHEDRAL OF FARAS, CAPITAL OF NOBATIA AND OTHER UNEARTHED REMAINS OF CHRISTIAN NOBATIA
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Christian Abyssinia is Axum, as you know. They were more linked to Yemen than to the Other Berberia and Azania (Somalia) and the three Christian Sudanese / Ethiopian kingdoms.
With the arrival of Islam, Axum collapsed. This was due to the fact that the entire East African coast of the Red Sea and the Horn of Africa region were occupied by the Islamic Caliphate; this development occurred because Eastern Roman rule in Egypt disappeared and the Yemenites, who were the greatest seafarers of the southern seas, accepted Islam and became part of the Islamic Caliphate. Axumite Abyssinia’s trade and royal wealth had depended mainly on the Red Sea trade; being cut off Adulis (not far from today’s Massawa), its main trade center and port of call, Axum was left in the inland with no income.
Contrarily to Axumite Abyssinia, Nobatia’s, Makuria’s, and Alodia‘s trade hinged mainly on Egypt, Sahara, Central and West Africa; that’s why contrarily to Axumite Abyssinia, Nobatia, Makuria, and Alodia continued to exist for several centuries.
Nobatia merged with Makuria in the 8th c., after having successfully stopped the advance of the Islamic armies in the North of Egypt. For more than 250 years, the Islamic Caliphate controlled in Egypt only the following regions: the Red Sea coast, the Mediterranean coast, the Delta, and the northern end of the valley of the Nile for ca. 300 km south of Cairo.
Very few people know today that, when Spain, Senegal, Sicily, Samarqand, Central Asia and the NW confines of today’s India were parts of the Islamic world (in let’s say ca. 800 or 850 CE), the ancient great capital of Egypt at today’s Luxor was a great Christian monastic center and belonged to the merged Kingdom of Nobatia and Makuria.
Makuria remained an independent Christian kingdom until ca. the middle of the 14th c. The Islamization of Cush proved to be difficult and lasted some time, because after the collapse of the capital of Makuria, Dongola Agouza, descendants of the Nobatian and Makurian nobles shaped new Christian kingdoms in various locations alongside the Nile, and escaped the Islamic rule for decades. Only around the end of the 15th c. the old territory of Makuria was exclusively and irreversibly under Islamic control.
Last, Alodia continued existing until the early 16th c. when it collapsed because of the expansion of the Muslim Funj. Also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faras
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Dongola
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soba_(city)
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WALL PAINTINGS FROM THE CATHEDRAL OF DONGOLA AGOUZA, CAPITAL OF MAKURIA AND FROM OTHER CHRISTIAN MONUMENTS OF THE KINGDOM OF MAKURIA
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SOBA, CAPITAL OF ALODIA
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Christian Discontinuity and Disruption in Abyssinia: the Fallacy of the ‘Solomonic’ dynasty
Contrarily to the Christian continuity in Sudan (Ethiopia/Cush), there is Christian discontinuity in Abyssinia.
Axum Abyssinia disintegrated in the first decades of the Islamic Caliphate (ca. 650) having lost its coast, revenue, and reason to exist. Certainly, small Christian communities survived in the inland, but we have no contemporaneous historical sources and all foreign references, mainly Coptic, are minimal too. There was no substantial central authority there.
The so-called Semien kingdom is a delusional tradition that is not reconfirmed by any solid historical or archaeological evidence; it therefore consists in a modern propagandistic reconstruction whereby every bribed author can add whatever he likes — or if you want the story of his grandmother!
The Christian Agaw kingdom (the Zagwe dynasty) rose in the middle of the 12th c. (ca. 1150). This means 500 years after the collapse of Axum. There is no continuity or relationship at all. This kingdom had nothing to do with Ethiopia (Sudan) and it was also unrelated to the various, disparate Axumite Abyssinian remnants. Extremely few sources have been left from that period, and only few historical points can be truthfully crosschecked. At the end, even Mararah and Takla Haymanot may be two different persons, one historical and the other forged later and projected onto the historical one. The Amhara hatred against the Christian Agaw was enormous; this means that the Amhara distortion of Agaw History must have been extensive and very deleterious.
There is no Solomonic dynasty. Kebra Negast is a forged document prepared on the basis of instructions given by some Talmudist Jews and first written in Arabic. Like many others, I reject the Coptic hypothesis. It was translated from Arabic to Ge’ez prior to the rise of Yekuno Amlak. It was the reason for it. Kebra Negast is a viciously Anti-Christian propagandist text written only to serve Talmudist eschatological targets. The original composition must be placed within the entire context of the Crusaders’ decline in the Orient, and certainly after the Conquest of Jerusalem by Saladin (1187). It reached the hands of the Amhara debteras, who hated the Agaw priests and monks, and wanted to destroy Cushitic Christianity in order to replace it by their pseudo-religion and barbarism. The entire plot of Kebra Negast is un-Biblical and un-Christian. It is a distortion that suits an eschatological agenda.
Dynasty means noble family. The fake Solomonic dynasty has no earlier noble ancestry, and does not constitute any royal family. There is no royalty and nobility among Amharas; this is due to the fact that the Amharas do not have «family» properly speaking. What the Amharas call «family» is not a Christian rite. The fake ‘kings’ of the Amharas were petty peddlers and monstrous criminals. Linked to this forged dynasty (which was protected and saved by early 16th c. Portuguese) is the fallacy of the Ark of Covenant.
The area of Axum, as you know, was for many centuries part of the Ottoman eyalet of Habesh (the province of Ottoman Abyssinia). This province was much larger than the tiny Amhara kingdom. Why is there not a single reference to the issue of the Ark of Covenant, as supposedly located in Axum, in any Ottoman document or text (official or not), since this religious object is also considered holy by the Muslims? Clearly, because there was no such object in that location! This concludes the case for the pseudo-ark of covenant that is said to be there; there are references to it only after the formation of the colonial state of Abyssinia, starting with the pseudo-Menelik II bogus-king of the Amharas. It is a fake.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyalet#Eyalets_in_1609 and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habesh_Eyalet
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ark_of_the_Covenant#Ethiopia
Indication of the Anti-Christian nature of the Amhara and their debteras is also the high number of Catholic monks whom they killed during the centuries. For many centuries, Islamic lands were safer for Catholic priests and monks to travel than the pseudo-kingdom of the bogus-Solomonic dynasty. And this is extensively published.
Contrarily to what you say, the colonial expansion of the tiny state of Amhara Abyssinia was prepared long before pseudo-Menelik II was born. The critical fact was the notorious travel of James Bruce.in 1770.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Bruce#The_Nile_and_Ethiopia
He prepared the foundations of everything that followed. It was a major colonial achievement.
He arrived in Abyssinia almost 30 years before Napoleon arrived in Alexandria. Of course, Bruce did not have an army, but important things can also be prepared without armies sometimes.
It was the stupidity of the Ottomans to allow Westerners to circulate free across their own empire — as if it were possible for Westerners to think positively for anything or anyone in this world!
Yes, I know about the Pentecostals and their heresy. Those who have money try to be everywhere.
However, I am glad you don’t have illusions about the «broken reed of Egypt»!!!!
Prophet Isaiah -before more than 2700 years- said:
« Lo, thou hast trusted on the staff of this broken reed — on Egypt — which a man leaneth on, and it hath gone into his hand, and pierced it — so is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all those trusting on him.» (Isaiah 36:6)
Thank you for your invitation that I accept!
Best regards,
Shamsaddin
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