body’s pain and appeased the gods.
“The queen was said by the ancient scribes to have been a beautiful woman. She was born to great wealth in 1020 B.C. and took the throne at the age of fifteen upon her father’s death. She ruled Axum and Sheba, the ancient texts tell us, for forty years with wisdom and skill. The historian Josephus wrote that she was inquisitive into philosophy, and one that on other accounts also was to be admired . The queen herself wrote in her memoirs, Perhaps many people will say that I am inquisitive, but that is simply because they do not understand me. I am always anxious to learn and serious minded. ”
Dr. Abana, by then, had won a small listenership, even though we had little to no idea where his story was leading us. Already I felt from his telling of it both familiarity and surprise. For years, I had heard unexplained references to “the Queen of Sheba,” a common first cousin to phrases and words like the “Wreck of the Hesperus” and the “Midas touch.” But I had known nothing further, neither that “Sheba” was a misnamed country of the ancient world, nor that the country was the modern Ethiopia of East Africa.
I sat alone midway back in the graduated seating of the vast hall that had been built two years before as a multipurpose facility for large lectures, major theatrical productions, and the commencement exercises that drew thousands in the spring. The high ceiling and walls were clad with an acoustical material of a cut and quality common to state-funded middle–twentieth century architectural expediencies.
“Early in the queen’s reign, while beset with doubt owing to her inexperience in the art of statecraft, she decided to travel to observe and learn from the legendary King Solomon of Israel. One night, after plying the young queen at dinner with a variety of royal wines, King Solomon was to slake his lust upon the defenseless body of his comely guest.
“That night, God revealed to King Solomon in a dream that the line of religious succession and responsibility would be transferred to a new order that was to be realized upon the birth of the king’s son now growing in the queen’s womb.
“Born in Axum, the capital, after the queen’s return from Jerusalem, Menelik traveled to Jerusalem at the age of thirteen, whereupon later wishing to return to Ethiopia, he refused his father’s offer to make him the crown prince of Israel. Upon leaving Jerusalem, Menelik is said to have taken with him the Ark of the Covenant which he stole from King Solomon, his father, with the approval of God, who levitated Menelik and his cargo across the Red Sea before the king’s men could give chase.
“It is written in the Kebra Nagast that Menelik defeated his father and avenged his mother’s humiliation with the consignment by God of his covenant with man to Ethiopia. Thus, according to the writers of Ethiopia’s holiest book, the Kebra Nagast , Ethiopians became God’s chosen people and Ethiopia Israel’s successor.”
During the question-and-answer period that followed Dr. Abana’s remarks, a student named Herbert Brody walked to one of the two standing microphones that had been placed in the hall’s two aisles. The room fell quiet in anticipation. Even in the semidark, we knew it was Herbert from the shape of the large head which rested on his body like a macrocephalic boulder. His nickname was Brain and he was a 4.0 student headed the following year to Harvard Divinity School.
“Do you believe that Menelik really took the Ark of the Covenant to Ethiopia, Dr. Abana? And where is it now?”
Dr. Abana peered through his thick eyeglasses into the gloom at the well-confident Herbert Brody and paused for what seemed an age. Sensing what was to come, Dr. Quarles’s face wore an expression of restrained amusement.
“The Ark of the Covenant, containing God’s decalogue of law, is believed to have been made by Moses. The Ark is said by the historians to be a gold-plated
“The queen was said by the ancient scribes to have been a beautiful woman. She was born to great wealth in 1020 B.C. and took the throne at the age of fifteen upon her father’s death. She ruled Axum and Sheba, the ancient texts tell us, for forty years with wisdom and skill. The historian Josephus wrote that she was inquisitive into philosophy, and one that on other accounts also was to be admired . The queen herself wrote in her memoirs, Perhaps many people will say that I am inquisitive, but that is simply because they do not understand me. I am always anxious to learn and serious minded. ”
Dr. Abana, by then, had won a small listenership, even though we had little to no idea where his story was leading us. Already I felt from his telling of it both familiarity and surprise. For years, I had heard unexplained references to “the Queen of Sheba,” a common first cousin to phrases and words like the “Wreck of the Hesperus” and the “Midas touch.” But I had known nothing further, neither that “Sheba” was a misnamed country of the ancient world, nor that the country was the modern Ethiopia of East Africa.
I sat alone midway back in the graduated seating of the vast hall that had been built two years before as a multipurpose facility for large lectures, major theatrical productions, and the commencement exercises that drew thousands in the spring. The high ceiling and walls were clad with an acoustical material of a cut and quality common to state-funded middle–twentieth century architectural expediencies.
“Early in the queen’s reign, while beset with doubt owing to her inexperience in the art of statecraft, she decided to travel to observe and learn from the legendary King Solomon of Israel. One night, after plying the young queen at dinner with a variety of royal wines, King Solomon was to slake his lust upon the defenseless body of his comely guest.
“That night, God revealed to King Solomon in a dream that the line of religious succession and responsibility would be transferred to a new order that was to be realized upon the birth of the king’s son now growing in the queen’s womb.
“Born in Axum, the capital, after the queen’s return from Jerusalem, Menelik traveled to Jerusalem at the age of thirteen, whereupon later wishing to return to Ethiopia, he refused his father’s offer to make him the crown prince of Israel. Upon leaving Jerusalem, Menelik is said to have taken with him the Ark of the Covenant which he stole from King Solomon, his father, with the approval of God, who levitated Menelik and his cargo across the Red Sea before the king’s men could give chase.
“It is written in the Kebra Nagast that Menelik defeated his father and avenged his mother’s humiliation with the consignment by God of his covenant with man to Ethiopia. Thus, according to the writers of Ethiopia’s holiest book, the Kebra Nagast , Ethiopians became God’s chosen people and Ethiopia Israel’s successor.”
During the question-and-answer period that followed Dr. Abana’s remarks, a student named Herbert Brody walked to one of the two standing microphones that had been placed in the hall’s two aisles. The room fell quiet in anticipation. Even in the semidark, we knew it was Herbert from the shape of the large head which rested on his body like a macrocephalic boulder. His nickname was Brain and he was a 4.0 student headed the following year to Harvard Divinity School.
“Do you believe that Menelik really took the Ark of the Covenant to Ethiopia, Dr. Abana? And where is it now?”
Dr. Abana peered through his thick eyeglasses into the gloom at the well-confident Herbert Brody and paused for what seemed an age. Sensing what was to come, Dr. Quarles’s face wore an expression of restrained amusement.
“The Ark of the Covenant, containing God’s decalogue of law, is believed to have been made by Moses. The Ark is said by the historians to be a gold-plated
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