ON ST. TEKLA HAIMANOT, MONK AND CONFESSOR, IN ETHIOPIA,
ABOUT DCCX
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.
Tekla Haimanot, father of monks in Ethiopia. (Bl.)
BY E. C.
§ I. Of the Saint's cult from the writings of the missionaries.
Before all else we must speak of the holiness and cult of Tecla Haimanot, [His legitimate cult is to be established from the writings of the Catholic missionaries.] that the reader may see that he is not unworthy to obtain a place in our work. In which matter we shall doubtless follow the opinion of those who as Catholic missionaries spent many years in Ethiopia, and at the same time devoted their labour to investigating its ancient history. Among whom the first place is held by Pedro Pays or Paez, Alfonso Mendes, Catholic patriarch of Ethiopia, and Manoel Almeida, all missionaries of our Society and men who wrote diligently on the affairs of Ethiopia. But their writings, because they seemed too ample Tellez, Historia geral, page 89., have not been published, but Balthasar Tellez, likewise a presbyter of our Society, at the urging of the patriarch Mendez himself The same, place cited., who was then living as an exile in India, collected all these monuments and not a few others, compared them among themselves, and from them composed in Portuguese a most true history of Ethiopia. Having read it through, Jerónimo Lobo, who himself too had lived for many years in Ethiopia with the men praised above, did not hesitate to swear on the word of a priest, as he says, that this history of Tellez was most true, and agreed excellently with what the three aforesaid Fathers had written in their memoirs, no less than with what he himself had seen and of which he had been a great part. So he writes on the 16th day of the month of January, in the year 1658 In Tellez, at the beginning of the volume.
[2] Ludolf's judgment on the Ethiopian history of Balthasar Tellez, And since with this sylloge on Blessed Tecla Haimanot we conclude what has been collected in this volume on the saints of Ethiopia, let it be permitted to set down here also the judgment of Job Ludolf on the same historians, a most learned man and sufficiently known among the erudite that there is no need to add more about him; who, although he was a Lutheran, judged the deeds of the Catholics in Ethiopia far more fairly than other heterodox writers who followed in the same century or the next. He has the following, then, among other things, in the preface of his Commentary, on the aforesaid writers: At length in our time there came out the true Ethiopian history of Fr. Balthasar Tellez, composed in Portuguese in a florid and pleasant style, which the above-cited Thévenot considers to have been necessary, and which he reduced to an epitome in French Thevenot, Relation des voyages curieux, part IV, Paris 1672.. Tellez himself followed above all the history of Fr. Manoel Almeida, of whom he was the epitomator. For so he says in the title of the book… Since therefore he composed his work from the Acts and writings of the Fathers, who traversed all the regions of that kingdom in every direction and flourished in it for nearly thirty years, he certainly could relate most true things of the kingdom of the Abyssinians, and certainly, if you look to the facts and deeds, he did relate them, as we said in the preface of our History. For that reason we have with full right trusted him very greatly, both for the causes stated above and because he reported things agreeing with what Gregory the Abyssinian told me, with whom he never had any dealings or conversation.
[3] on the writings of Manoel Almeida, of Pedro Pays or Paez And a little lower down he has the following on the sources from which Tellez drew all his matter: I would certainly have wished to see the whole history of Fr. Manoel Almeida, and to hand on some things from it more fully to the world of letters; for with however great diligence you abridge another's work, there will always be those who wish to see it whole. Manoel Almeida stayed in Ethiopia from the year 1624 to 1633. There are other Fathers of the Society besides him who pursued the affairs of the Abyssinians most accurately. Fr. Pedro Pays, of whom we often make mention in our history, compiled two huge volumes of Ethiopian affairs [Compare Sapeto, Viaggio, page 95; Tellez, Prologo ao leytor, at the beginning of the volume.], on the testimony of Fr. Athanasius Kircher, who drew from them what he reported in his Oedipus and Musurgia on the sources of the Nile and other wonders of Abyssinia. I readily believe that they contain many notable and singular things, because having entered Abyssinia in the year 1603, until the end of his life, which occurred in the year 1622, he flourished in the favour of the king; assiduous in court and camp; and besides thoroughly knowing the language he could fully learn and describe the affairs of the Abyssinians. Tellez here and there cites and follows him, as in book II, chapter 7, page 116, page 209 and following, etc. Tellez says that his manuscript work is preserved at Rome [Place cited; compare H. Salt, Voyage en Ethiopie, volume II, page 278, Paris 1816.].
[4] and of the patriarch Alfonso Mendes, which remained unpublished. No less accurate would I believe the Ethiopian History of Fr. Alfonso Mendes, who, sent to Ethiopia by the Supreme Pontiff with the name of patriarch, spent seven years, or even eight or nine [Tellez, ibid. in the Prologue and page 532, column 2; Jer. Lobo, ibid. at the beginning of Tellez's book.], in it with the highest authority, so that nothing at all concerning the affairs of the Abyssinians could be hidden from him. Besides he was exceedingly learned and endowed with notable judgment, and also of a pleasant wit, as is to be gathered from the fragments which Tellez inserted in his history. But that History has not seen the light, although it is cited here and there by Balth. Tellez. The history of Mendes was written in Latin, and after Tellez had composed his book in Portuguese, it was being preserved at Rome, soon to be given to print, as he believed Tellez in the Prologue.; but it was never published, whatever Henry Salt may have believed, who did not distinguish a certain shorter report, published at Lille in the year 1633, from the far ampler history Salt, place cited, page 280.. Finally Tellez also had in his hands the memoir of Jerónimo Lobo, or Lupus, which at length in the last century was translated into French and brought to light [Jerôme Lobo, Relation historique de l'Ethiopie, Paris 1728; compare Salt, place cited, and volume I, page 260.]. Ludolf greatly complains of these books (Lobo's memoir now excepted) that they have never been published; which is also, as far as Pays or Paez is concerned, the complaint of Sapeto, and he at the same time bestows many praises on the history of Tellez Sapeto, place cited; compare Salt, place cited, page 279.. Sapeto, moreover, went to Ethiopia in the year 1838 Place cited, page VI., published his book at Rome in the year 1857, and then returned to the same kingdom, in which he is perhaps staying even now: that we have not undeservedly made much use of his book in these Lives of the saints of Ethiopia is sufficiently clear by this very fact.
[5] On the holiness and cult of Tecla Haimanot from the history of Tellez; By all these things not only is what we have written up to now on Ethiopia confirmed, but at the same time it will be excellently understood how much worth is
what Tellez will now teach us on the orthodoxy, holiness and cult of Tecla Haimanot; for he borrowed all his matter almost word for word from the writings of Paez, Almeida and Mendes. All Ethiopia, he says, holds Tecla Haimanot for a most holy man. In his Life, which consists of several books, there are narrated his notable penances, the benefits which our Lord bestowed on him, many apparitions and miracles, and how he went several times to Jerusalem, head and leader of innumerable monks: of whom if he was not the author and founder, at the least he enlarged and illumined this religious order of his. And it flourished long and greatly in Ethiopia in the number of monks, heroic virtues and letters, so far, that is, as could be expected from a nation lacking masters from whom they might receive due knowledge of theological matters.
[6] he was not a Monophysite, If we suppose therefore that it is to be granted that Tecla Haimanot was truly a saint, it will necessarily have to be said by us that he was infected with no heresy. And I have sufficient reasons (we are turning all this almost literally from the Portuguese) to persuade myself that in those early times, until the seventh and eighth centuries, heresy did not hold dominion in Ethiopia. For in the year 521 there was living Kaleb, who was a holy king, as we have said, and he obeyed the Catholic patriarch whom the emperor Justin had set over the see of Alexandria, and did not acknowledge the heretic Timothy. In what goes before Tellez follows Metaphrastes and Baronius; of which matter we have written more elsewhere Volume X of October, page 710, numbers 169 to 172.. Moreover we know also from our histories, and Cardinal Baronius likewise relates it At the year 610., in which Tellez here rightly follows him, that in the year 610 there flourished St. Eulogius, patriarch of Alexandria, and after him St. John the Almsgiver. And of Ethiopia indeed similar things can be believed for the first or second following century, since in this land the holy faith had put down good roots, nor could the Alexandrian heresy, from which city we admit that the bishops of Ethiopia came, so swiftly extinguish the faith there.
[7] [which is confirmed from Baronius and Papebroch; miracles falsely ascribed to him take nothing from his holiness.] But far more clearly to this matter is a certain passage of the Annals of Baronius, in which, writing of the schism of an abbot of Monte Cassino, and of the holiness of a certain monk, he says: It is not the case that as soon as some abbot or bishop is schismatic, all his subjects must likewise be schismatics Compare volume X of October, page 166, number 29.. Papebroch, writing of the Russians before the XV century, at which time their bishops were now Catholics, now schismatics, says: Whence we understand how nothing the common people know of schism and of the articles of faith in controversy, learning through tradition received from their elders, at home privately rather than publicly in the church, only those heads of the faith, and would that they were whole, which are necessary for salvation Volume I of May, page V, number 18.. Nor indeed will priests either (for Tecla Haimanot was a priest), when they have drunk in some theological doctrine from boyhood and on growing older have confirmed it according to their talent, easily change it; nor then, if they excel in virtue and please God, will he suffer them to stray from the truth, as the whole history of the saints teaches. Nor, Tellez continues thus, do the many apocryphal things that are narrated in his Life take from me the good opinion I have conceived of this celebrated saint of the Abyssinians, as when it is said that Christ the Lord, appearing to him once, said that to everyone who should kill a serpent on the fifth feria or on Sunday, the sins of forty years would be pardoned; or some other such thing. For among us too they have written apocryphal things about St. George and several other saints, and even about the apostles, without our ceasing on that account to hold them for illustrious saints; since of them we believe what is true, and not the added apocrypha, etc. Tellez, Historia geral, page 84 and following.
[8] He was held for a saint by Catholic missionaries, ancient and present-day. Since Tellez everywhere follows the opinion of the missionaries Pedro Paez, Manoel Almeida, Alfonso Mendes and Jerónimo Lobo, who all stayed long in Ethiopia and afterwards wrote its history, it is manifestly clear that those Catholic missionaries held Tecla Haimanot as a saint. Similarly Joseph Sapeto, apostolic missionary, who no less than the foregoing dwelt long in Ethiopia and perhaps still stays there, in his Journey, which he brought to light in the year 1857, writes that in the city of Gondar, the royal city of Abyssinia, a Catholic Senkessar was found, in which Tecla Haimanot is acknowledged as a saint, but I cannot say, he says, of what century this codex is, which I have not seen Sapeto, Viaggio etc., page 75.. In this place, however, Sapeto does not distinguish Tecla Haimanot, monk of the seventh century, from the monk of the same name of the thirteenth century, who restored to the old dynasty the sceptre seized by the Zaghe family 354 years before, and who is by no means to be enrolled among the saints; of whom we shall speak presently. But from these things it manifestly appears that a place has not undeservedly been given in our work to the earlier Tecla Haimanot, the more so because our forebears (as we have already declared above in this volume) were accustomed to grant a place to all who are met with in the Greek Menaea, as long as it was not established that they were heretics or schismatics.
§ II. The Saint to be distinguished from a monk of the same name of the XIII century: he lived in the seventh century.
[St. Tecla Haimanot is to be altogether distinguished from a monk of the same name of the XIV century, who restored the old dynasty;] It is surprising that Sapeto, otherwise a learned man, and one by whom the ecclesiastical affairs of Ethiopia should have been more deeply examined, did not distinguish between the earlier Tecla Haimanot, whom the old missionaries did not refuse to enrol among the saints, and that recent one, likewise a monk, but at the same time a political man, and perhaps a commander of armies. It is true indeed that civil affairs of this kind are permitted to present-day Ethiopian monks, and that their institutes, to bring in Ludolf speaking here, are very far different from those of the Latins and Greeks Ludolf, Hist. æthiop., book III, chapter 3, number 33.. It is likely too that the present-day Abyssinians fall into the same confusion, as will appear from the synaxarium to be recited below. But in the older ecclesiastical books they do not even mention Tecla Haimanot of the thirteenth century. Moreover if he of whom alone the old missionaries, Tellez and after them Ludolf write had been so recent, how would they have believed him free from heresy and schism, when in his lifetime Ethiopia had already been infected for nearly six centuries with the Monophysite heresy? Here therefore Sapeto and others who have fallen into the same error are to be abandoned. For, if I remember rightly, I have seen the same in some place in the volumes of James Bruce, and that opinion is held also by the distinguished Aug. Dillmann, of whom we must now speak.
[10] the same is shown from a notable passage In the Catalogue, namely, of the oriental manuscript codices preserved in the British Museum, in the third part, which embraces the Ethiopic codices, he recites the title of codex 45 in this way Page 49.: Lives of SS. Tecla-Haimanot and Tecla-Zion (of whom, the latter, the codex in Dillm., page 50, narrates very foolish, indeed horrifying things). First part. The ascetic contest of the saint, our blessed father Tecla (or plant, for that is what the Ethiopic word sounds) of the Father, Tecla of the Son, Tecla of the Holy Spirit, that is, of Abbot Tecla-Haimanot, who bears the name of the Trinity, to be read on the 24th day of the month Nahasse. The scribe of the codex, who was an Abyssinian monk of the eleventh century, noted the following at the foot of the first part: By the order of Abba Peter, who has been placed in the see of our father Tecla-Haimanot, clothed with the purple of his justice, struck with the arrow of his love, we have sent this book, that it may remain for ever. In the year of judgment 6542 (this number agrees with the era of the world. It is perhaps named the era of judgment because of the condemnation of the fallen Angels), from the birth of the son of the carpenter (Christ) 1042, from the conversion of Ethiopia 697, in the year of the martyrs of Antioch 754, of the faith of Nicaea 714, with the epact of the sun 3, of the moon 27, the day of John was 6, in the year of Matthew the evangelist, in the time of the office of our father Peter, in the tenth year of his office, the writing of this book was finished, etc. On which Dillmann notes the following Catalog. cit., page 49, note d.: It is probable that this subscription is to be derived from the primary author. The definitions of time brought forward in it for the most part coincide in the year of Christ 1042.
[11] of the Ethiopic London codex 45. I note in passing, however, since the ecclesiastical reckoning of the Alexandrians begins with the month Pharmuthi, of the Ethiopians Miazya, or with the 27th day of March, that the year of Matthew indeed agrees with the year of Christ 1042, or with the Alexandrian civil year 1041–42, which began with the 29th day of August, as agrees with every third year after a bissextile, or Alexandrian intercalation, but that the epact of the sun 3 and of the moon 27 by no means agree with the said year 1042; whose Alexandrian epact was of the sun 6, of the moon 25. But these three, the year of Matthew, the epact of the sun 3, of the moon 27, agree on all sides in the year of Christ 1034, in which it is manifest from chronological reasons that these things were written. Having obtained this opportunity I note that Ludolf rightly turns from the Ethiopic language into Latin the rule for finding the epact, but altogether wrongly explains it in the added parenthesis Ludolf, Commentary, page 386.. Finally the scribe of this codex, when he sets down the year 6542, followed την ὁμαδα of Constantinople, in which 5508 years are reckoned before the birth of Christ, and for that reason perhaps called that era the year of judgment, but then, forgetful or ignorant of the matter, to find the year of the Christian era he subtracted not 5508 years in the manner of Constantinople, but 5500 in the Ethiopian manner, so that the number 1042 exceeds by eight years. This is namely the fault of the later Ethiopians, that they mix among themselves the three ὁμαδας of the Greeks, 5492, 5500 and 5508, above all the first two, and use them indiscriminately, with other errors intermingled, so that sometimes their calculations seem inextricable Compare ibid. page 385.. Thus in the aforesaid London codex 45 the added numbers 697, 754 and 714 each again exceed by four or five years. But so much on these matters. Dillmann therefore, seeing that the scribe of the codex most certainly signifies the eleventh century, and thinking of a single Tecla Haimanot, writes in this way: But since the Ethiopian chronicles everywhere relate that King Icun-Amlak was raised to the throne by Tecla-Haimanot, which took place about the year of Christ 1268, it follows that the author of the Life either did not know or dissembled the true age of Tecla-Haimanot. The difficulty is solved without any trouble, if you duly distinguish the earlier Tecla Haimanot from the much more recent one. Whose deeds, however, I strongly suspect have been entangled by the Ethiopians themselves.
[12] On the monks and monasteries of Ethiopia from the unpublished history of Mendes. The age of the earlier Tecla Haimanot is easily detected from his Life itself, which Dillmann also had in his hands; from which Mendes has luminously demonstrated it. And Tellez indeed, who had at hand the manuscript books of Pedro Paez, Manoel Almeida and Alfonso Mendes, raises not even the slightest doubt on this matter; as neither does Ludolf, where either in the History or in the Commentary he introduces discussion of the same St. Tecla Haimanot. Tellez, moreover, in the course of his history inserted the demonstration of the patriarch Mendes, which we shall most conveniently transfer here, since it is not long, turning back into the Latin language what Tellez rendered from Latin into Portuguese. Although those monks, says the patriarch Mendes, who came to Ethiopia about the year 470, or 479 or 480, as our opinion has it See above in the Commentary on St. Elesbaas, page 312., in the reign of King Alameda, greatly increased the monastic cause, yet it did not extend outside the kingdom or province of Tigre; in which each of them founded not more than one monastery, and these are distinguished to this day by their names. But Abba Eustatheos, about whom we shall add a little below, and Abba Tecla Haimanot, who had come out from them, were both leaders of a huge fellowship of monks, and established many monasteries in all the provinces. Of whom the latter, Abba Tecla Haimanot, whose name signifies plant of faith, has the more numerous and more illustrious family. The head of the fellowship anciently was Debra Libanos, that is, Mount Lebanon, or monastery of Lebanon, for every monastery is called Debra, in the province of Sjawa, where it had its seat, or the superior of the fellowship, whom they call Itjeghe; but he afterwards moved his seat to the kingdom or province of Begameder, since a certain barbarous nation, called the Gallas, occupied all those lands. On these monks and monasteries the history of Tellez will give much more in chapters 34 and 35 of the same Book I. After this Mendes continues thus.
[13] The age of the Saint is shown from the genealogy of the monks of Ethiopia, It is not difficult to find the time in which Tecla Haimanot flourished, both from what we have said and from what is narrated in his Life, which we have in our possession, faithfully translated from the Amharic language into Portuguese. For he belongs to the school of Abbot Aragawi, who was head among the nine saints, of whom we have spoken at his synaxarium after the Commentary on St. Elesbaas, and companion of St. Pantaleon. For the following is read in the Life of Tecla Haimanot: The tree and progeny of our fathers is this. The holy angel Michael gave the monastic garment to St. Anthony, St. Anthony to St. Macarius, he to St. Pachomius, he to Abbot (or τῳ abba) Aragawi, who was of the nine who came to Ethiopia; he gave the habit to Abbot Christos-Bezana, he to Abbot Masqual-Moa, he to Abbot John, he to Abbot Jesus, he to Abbot Tecla Haimanot; and then Abba Tecla Haimanot gave the cowl or Askema to Abbot Jesus, as we have already said, etc. Thus far the Life of Tecla Haimanot. The Askema is like a scapular, and the first monks, since they were Greeks, seem to have called this habit Askema because it was as it were the σχημα of monasticism and the badge of monks. For in Ethiopia nearly all monks clothe themselves as they can and as they please, but once this scapular is put on, which is made of soft and well-macerated hide, they are now held for Macariuses and Pachomiuses. In the above-written genealogy it is easily seen that between Abbot Aragawi, who came with Abbot Pantaleon, and Abbot Tecla Haimanot there intervene only three generations of men, namely of the abbots Christos-Bezana, Masqal-Moa and Yohanni. For although mention is also made there of Abba Iyasu or Jesus, yet Tecla Haimanot received the cowl and Askema from the hand of Abbot Yohanni. Since however Abba Aragawi entered Ethiopia already advanced in age (which we have elsewhere rightly called into doubt, and have said that he was called Aragawi or old man because he reached so great an age, and extended his life as far as the reign of Gabra-Masqal; but this argumentation of the patriarch Mendes suffers no damage from that), about the year 470, more correctly about the year 480, let us grant that he lived until about the year 500 (but he lived until at least the year 542, namely more than eighty and perhaps more than ninety years old), and let us concede a hundred and twenty years to the other three together, which is certainly too much, but this is compensated by what has been taken from the year of the death of Abbot Aragawi. Whence it will follow that Tecla Haimanot was born about 615 or 620, more or less.
[14] [and from the years in which Benjamin, the Monophysite patriarch of Alexandria, flourished.] And this is shown also by an irrefutable argument, which we draw from his same Life; in which it is read that when he was fifteen years of age, he was carried by his parents to the Abuna or bishop Kirilos, who was patriarch in Ethiopia when Abba Benjamin was patriarch of Alexandria. This Benjamin was a Eutychian heretic, or Monophysite, and at the same time a Monothelite, as is manifest from his letter, which is read in the Ethiopic book Haimanot Abbau, or Faith of the fathers. In which letter he attacks the faith in the two natures of Christ our Lord and at the same time the Synod of Chalcedon. He lived about the year 630, at which time there was also living St. Sophronius, patriarch of Jerusalem, as Cardinal Baronius teaches in the eighth volume At the year 634., and Bellarmine in the book on ecclesiastical writers, where he writes that he died in the year 634 Bellarmine, De scriptor. eccles., at the year 630.. But they now teach more truly that he died in the year 636, on the 11th day of March. For St. Sophronius in the admirable letter which he wrote to Sergius, bishop of Constantinople, and which is recited entire in the sixth ecumenical council, in the eleventh session In Migne, Patrolog. græc., volume LXXXVII, column 3117 and following., after naming and excommunicating all the ancient heretics, adds at the end: Let there be put on with them and let them be wrapped in anathema and catathema Benjamin of Alexandria, and John, and Sergius, and Thomas and Severus the Syrians, who still live an execrable life, and cruelly assail piety Ibid. column 3194.. And if Benjamin was living in the age of St. Sophronius, and he wrote about the year 620 or 630, it is clear that Tecla Haimanot was then a youth. Thus far the patriarch Mendes in Tellez Tellez, pages 83 and 84..
§ III. Of Eustathius the monk and Yared the musician; the Saint's Life and other books of the Ethiopians written in his praise; the year of his death.
Of Eustathius, parent of monks in Ethiopia. Of Eustathius, of whom Mendes made mention above, nothing is known, except that he came from Egypt, that he was the second, besides Tecla Haimanot, author of monks in Ethiopia, but that afterwards he went off to Armenia and there departed this life. It is not even known in what age he lived, and if any Life of his is found among the Ethiopians Compare d'Abbadie, Catalogue raisonné de manuscrits éthiopiens, page 52., it can contain nothing but Ethiopian miracles, so to speak, which, since they are supported by no fair testimony and are often quite ridiculous, deserve to be despised. Eustathius is neglected in the summaries of Lives which Sapeto took from the Ethiopian Senkessar and appended to his Journey; Ludolf according to his custom committed to print in the History and the Commentary his praises and miracles, taken from his metrical menology.
[16] and of Yared, who was called the Musician. Finally another saint is celebrated by the Ethiopians, who is perhaps to be referred to the same seventh century, namely Yared, called the Musician, but who is omitted by both Ludolf and Sapeto, although his name is met with in Ludolf's calendar Commentary, page 415; compare Sapeto, Viaggio, page 81.. Since he was a musician, more recent writers have inquired somewhat about him, as the most learned A. Dillmann teaches me, some of whose words I therefore gladly set down: Of Yared, he says, surnamed the Musician, one may compare Villoteau Description de l'Egypte, volume XIV, page 272 and following, Paris 1826., Isenberg's Lexicon amharicum Ibid., page 209., etc. Yared came from the family of a certain Axumite priest, by name Gideon… He restored music in the Axumite church, and composed chants for all the feasts of the year and the Sabbaths. Toward the end of his life he withdrew from the ministry of the Church and lived as an anchorite in the land of Semen. He is said to have lived under King Caleb (more correctly elsewhere the same Dillmann: in the age of the reign of Gabra-Masqal, son of Caleb) A. Dillmann, Codices æthiopici musei Britannici, page 50, London 1847., in the seventh century after Christ; Isenberg supposes otherwise, relying on I know not what authority Ibidem, page 32.. Thus far Dillmann, who knows very well that both the holy King Caleb or Elesbaas, of whom we have treated at length in this volume, and his son Gabra-Masqal lived in the sixth century, and not in the seventh; so that the indications of time met with in the Life of Yared conflict among themselves. He is by no means to be said to have flourished in the sixth century, but perhaps in the seventh or eighth. The name too is purely Jewish, since the patriarch Iared is adorned in the Bible with no praise of virtue because of which that name should have been taken up by Christians. Wherefore I would say that Yared lived when the Ethiopian Church had begun to judaize more openly. A certain Life of his circulates among the Ethiopians, but it contains nothing worth relating A. d'Abbadie, place cited, page 220..
[17] Where the fuller and more ancient Life of the Saint is preserved, and That our discourse may now turn again to Tecla Haimanot, his Life, which Mendes had in his hands, and which is preserved in Ethiopic in the British Museum at London, as also in the library of the distinguished Antoine d'Abbadie, Dillmann greatly praises in these words: The history of Tecla-Haimanot extant here is by no means so fabulous as other works of this kind are accustomed to be; it seems to contain many true reports A. Dillmann, place cited, page 49.. Nearly the same is held by Antoine d'Abbadie Place cited, page 48. (who in this place however does not rightly write that Tecla Haimanot is the only Ethiopian saint recognized by the Roman Church, since on the contrary only SS. Frumentius and Elesbaas have been inscribed in the Roman Martyrology), but I hardly believe that the book contains much historical matter, since very little was taken from it by Mendes and his associates who wrote on Ethiopian history Compare Tellez, pages 79 and 83., and also by Dillmann in composing the summary of the Life Codices æthiopici musei Brit., place cited., and indeed in the place where he published the catalogues of the kings of Ethiopia, he illustrated them several times from the Life of Abbot Aragawi and other monuments, but nowhere from the Life of Tecla
Haimanot Zeitschrift d. d. morgenl. Gesellschaft, volume VII, pages 345, 348 etc.. This same Life is preserved at Paris in Arabic, and indeed I remember reading in the catalogue of the Arabic codices of the Paris library that the copy which they preserve was sent by Claudius, king of Ethiopia, to the sultan of Egypt. It exists also among the Arabic codices of the Bodleian Library at Oxford Catalog. Cod. oriental. biblioth. Bodleianæ, Uri's edition, page 46. and likewise at Rome.
[18] how much it is worth for illumining the history of Ethiopia. We thought at one time that care should be taken to have it copied, but since it is very long, and Dillmann indicates that in the London codex it contains 118 folios in all Codices æth. mus. Brit., page 49., and it comprises very little that is historical, we considered it enough that a summary of the Life be given here, borrowed from the Ethiopian Senkessar. For Dillmann, who read through the longer Life, since he transcribes nothing in it on the expulsion of the Zaghaeans in the thirteenth century, has also composed a summary of it Ibidem.; but this contains nothing except what we shall presently subjoin from the Ethiopian Senkessar. We wished to know this alone, whether anything is handed down in the greater Life concerning the condition of the Jews in Ethiopia in the seventh century. For the question of the coming of the Jews into this kingdom is a most weighty one, perhaps not so much for clearing up history as for refuting old errors. On which we supposed in the Commentary on St. Elesbaas that from an ancient age some Jews came from Arabia together with the Homerites, but that this took place above all when Abraham, king of the Homerites, in the sixth century, and the Muhammadans in the seventh century and following, began to persecute them. But indeed, if many Jews were in Ethiopia in the seventh century, or if already at that time their Church was judaizing, it is hardly possible that no mention of these things should occur in the most ancient and very long Life of Tecla Haimanot.
[19] The Saint died about the year 710; on what days he is venerated. In this Life, as Dillmann teaches us, St. Tecla Haimanot is said to have lived 99 years, ten months and ten days; which likewise the summary of the Life soon to be published has. And since about the year 620 or 630 the same saint was fifteen years old, he must be said to have died between about the years 705 and 715. By the metrical menologist of Ludolf he is celebrated at the 24th day of the month Tachsas (20 December), likewise at the 24th of the month Nahasse (for the Ethiopians like to celebrate their saints on the same days of the months several times in the year; the latter day coincides with 17 August in the Julian reckoning), and finally at the 12th day of the month Ghinbot (7 May) the translation of his bones is announced.
[20] [Of his translation, and of the books which the Ethiopians composed in his praise.] Of this translation, as of most of the books which the Ethiopians wrote to celebrate St. Tecla Haimanot, more will be taught by what Dillmann adds concerning the cited Ethiopic codex 45 of the British Museum Catalogus etc., page 50.. In the same codex 45, besides his Life, there are contained, he says, 2° the genealogy of Tecla Haimanot, folios 118 and 119; 3° a treatise on the translation of the body of the same, folios 119 to 127. The title is this: Book of the history of the glorious, holy, blessed one, beloved of God (Tecla Haimanot), to be read on the feast of the translation of his body, the twelfth day of the month Ghenbot (as above); this coincides with the feast of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the feast of Michael the archangel, beloved of our father Tecla Haimanot. (Which is true of the feast of St. Michael, as is clear from Ludolf's calendar, but Easter could by no means ever fall on the 12th day of the month Ghenbot, or 7 May in the Julian reckoning.) 4° Various treatises on the miracles of Tecla Haimanot, folios 127 to 164. 5° Finally, another treatise on the translation of the body of Tecla Haimanot and his miracles, folios 164 to 183. Which translation Dillmann has noted took place under King Naod (at the end of the fifteenth century, or the beginning of the following one) and Abbot (or Abuna) Mark, the metropolitan. Now there follows the summary of the Life of St. Tecla Haimanot, borrowed from the Ethiopian Senkessar, which is of slight credit, above all in recounting miracles and prodigies, as will be taught both by the Annotations that follow and by what we have written after the Commentary on St. Elesbaas in the notes added to other such summaries.
SUMMARY OF THE LIFE OF ST. TECLA HAIMANOT,
but of slight credit, from the Ethiopian Senkessar.
Tekla Haimanot, father of monks in Ethiopia. (Bl.)
[The Saint's parents; his mother, led to the tyrant Motalame, is rescued by a miracle.] On the 24th day of the month Nahasse (17 August in the Julian reckoning) a. On this day there died the teacher of the world, Abuna b Tecla Haimanot. The name of the father of this saint was Tzagga-Za-Ab, and of the mother Egzie-Haraya c. Tzagga-Za-Ab was of the progeny of those priests who illumined Ethiopia with their faith d. Since Egzie-Haraya was barren, they were sad, and they asked God to grant them a son. At that time Satan stirred up Motalame e, governor of the province of Damot, who occupied all the borders of the region of Sjawa f as far as the region of Djama; and all the governors of those tracts came to him in turn, offering their wives and maidservants, that he might choose concubines for himself. At that time he came to the province of Tzellesj and killed all its Christians; but Tzagga-Za-Ab, fearing that he would be killed, gave himself to flight; and his wife Egzie-Haraya was captured and brought to Motalame. Seeing that she was most beautiful he rejoiced greatly; he gave her much adornment, and prepared a banquet, ordering all the rulers and governors to come together for the wedding. But Egzie-Haraya, on hearing this, prayed God to free her from marriage with a pagan. Suddenly Michael the archangel came, and, placing her on his shining wings g, at the third hour of the day, he carried her from the province of Damot as far as the province of Zarare, at the ninth hour, and set her down in the church. Her husband Tzagga-Za-Ab, then, coming out from the sanctuary with a thurible, saw her standing there and most adorned, and was astonished, and said: Who is this woman and who has brought her here? But when he had finished his prayer, looking at her more diligently, he recognized that she was his wife: and she told him whatever God had done for her from beginning to end.
[2] [The Saint's birth, baptism, miracles from boyhood; he receives the diaconate from Cyril the metropolitan.] One night the angel of God appeared to them, and announced that they would have a son, whose holy fame would be spread through the whole world. Not long afterwards (Egzie-Haraya) conceived this saint, who was born on the 21st day of the month Tachsas h, and great gladness arose in the house of his father and mother and among all their relatives. In baptism he was called Fesha-Tzion, and he grew in the Holy Spirit and in the strength of wisdom, working innumerable miracles and prodigies, so that all who saw him or heard of him wondered. Then they led him to the bishop Abba Ghirellos i, that he might consecrate him deacon, and at that time the patriarch of Alexandria was Benyami k and the kingdom was Zaghaean in faith l. While they stood before the bishop, he prophesied of him, saying: This youth will be a certain chosen good; and having received the diaconate, he returned to his family. Having become a young man he went to the wilderness, to hunt wild beasts, and one day, about noon, our Lord appeared to him, sitting on the wings of Michael and with the appearance of a comely young man, and said: Do not fear, my beloved, from now on you will not hunt wild beasts, but with nets you will take many sinful souls, and you will be called Tecla Haimanot (Plant of faith), because I chose you from your mother's womb and sanctified you like Jeremiah the prophet and John the Baptist [m]. Behold, I have given you power of healing the sick and of expelling unclean spirits from every place. And having said this he vanished.
[3] [Having been made priest, he converts innumerable men to the faith and baptizes them;] After this he returned home, distributed all his substance to the poor and needy, and taking a staff he went away by night, leaving the house open, and said: What does it profit a man if he gain the whole world, but suffer the loss of his soul? Then he was made a priest and began to preach the faith and the Gospel in all Sjawa. He baptized in one day as many as 10,000 men, he destroyed all the temples of the idols, he cut down their trees n, and the demons that dwelt in them were put to flight. Then in the province of Damot many sorcerers and magicians believed. He also disputed for many days with the unbelieving Motalame on the right faith, until he persuaded him, and at the same time many others who were with him, to believe in Christ.
[4] [he puts on the monastic garment; his disciples; for six years he lived in a very narrow enclosure.] Thereafter he hid himself away, put on the monastic garment in Sjawa, giving himself to fasts and prayer without measure, and to such a degree indeed that he stirred up emulation in other monks. After which he went off to the province of Amhara, carried in the chariot of Elias, and came to Abba Ba-Tzalota-Michael o, a penitent monk, with whom he spent much time, serving him as a servant and devoted to fasting and prayer. Then he returned to the region of Sjawa, and meeting Mark, the son of his father's brother, they dwelt together in the monastery of Wagda, and there six disciples attached themselves to the saint, and he clothed them with the monastic garment. From there he went off to the region of Gherarya and made a cave in the midst of precipitous places, without going out of it either by night or by day, taking nothing for food but leaves and water for drink. When many men and women, monks and widows, had come to him, they inhabited the same house without knowing one another. At the time of prayer and sacrifice all were together, because Satan in that age of Tecla Haimanot had been bound [p]. Then in his place he made himself a certain enclosure, in which he fixed sharp nails behind, on the right and on the left, so that he could lean nowhere, and in the middle he stood for six years, until his shins broke [q], and for four years he tasted nothing and did not drink water.
[5] His death is foretold and the Kidan is handed to him, he dies. Finally there came to him our Lord Jesus Christ the blessed, with our Lady Mary, the twelve apostles, and the martyrs and SS. Michael and Gabriel, saying to him: My beloved, you have been made like me in sufferings, and I will make you like (me) in my kingdom. Behold, all your suffering in this world is completed, and it has been accepted in my sight; now therefore come to eternal life. Then he gave him the Kidan [r] in favour of those who should invoke him and keep his memory. And falling sick with a certain slight fever, he rested, very old, aged 99 years, 10 months and 10 days [s]. And then he was clothed with splendour and magnificence and buried in his hut.
ANNOTATIONS.
m. See note g.
p. See note g and marvel at the simplicity, not to say rather the stupidity, of the writer.
q. See note g.
r. Kidan is God's pact with the saints of granting this or that which the Ethiopians ask of them; of which we have already spoken above. See the Commentary, page 330, note e.
s. See the Commentary above, number 19.