Sheba

112
THE KEBRA NAGAST
Missing from all this was any reference to the theological and social
implications of the life of the Queen of Sheba. In the first part of the Sheba-
Menelik Cycle she had been portrayed as vibrant and intelligent; in the later
part, world weary, cynical but strong willed. In the Caleb Cycle she was
reduced to a mere conduit to enable the Israelite royal house to rule Aksum.
The process of the Iron Age states’ subjugation of women to an inferior
status to men had perverted and downgraded her memory. In Jewish
tradition she was remembered merely as an appendage to the greatness of
Solomon. Later, the same heritage would transform her into a hairy-legged
demon. The new Christian religion gave her a new role, that of a sexual
temptress.
A peculiarity of the new Christian religion was its monasticism,
founded largely on the premise that sexual abstinence, extreme isolation,
and self-denial were conducive to spiritual development and insights to the
human condition - spiritual and earthly. Some scholars have linked
Christian monasticism with the work of Buddhist missionaries and have
also drawn attention to earlier forms of monasticism among the Jews. The
father of organized Christian monasticism is generally held to be Anthony
of Egypt (ca. A.D. 251–356), a Monophysite Egyptian monk who
witnessed extraordinary visions and severe psychological torment during
his fifteen years of isolation as a hermit. Among his visitations was the
spirit of the Queen of Sheba. Anthony, like his monastic successors,
seemed to be incapable of interpreting any female contact from the present
or spirit world as anything other than sexual. The queen, thereafter, became
associated in Christian tradition with sexual attraction, despite Christ’s
reminder that she sought wisdom. Culture is constantly reinforced by
images of success, but when they are neglected, denigrated, and suppressed
they can no longer serve as a model for new generations to follow. The
inspirational model of a beautiful and brilliant young woman roaming the
earth for knowledge had long been stamped out in the Aksumite and
southern Arabian collective memory. Intellectual development had become
concomitant with the priorities of a purely male-directed society whose
reasoning was often allied to self-inflicted physical abuse and the real threat
of ostracism, exile, or execution for deviation.
In Aksum there are two Monophysite cathedrals. One dates from the
sixteenth century, following the destruction of a very prestigious older
edifice by the Muslim leader Ahmad Gran. The other cathedral is very large
and was built by Haile Selaisse. Between the two cathedrals is a small
sanctuary with a green-domed roof housing the Ark of the Covenant or its