{"id":778,"date":"2008-07-01T17:11:57","date_gmt":"2008-07-01T17:11:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav.php"},"modified":"2008-07-01T17:11:57","modified_gmt":"2008-07-01T17:11:57","slug":"maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav","title":{"rendered":"Maybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia…"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Ron Csillag
\nReligion News Service<\/strong>
\nAxum, Ethiopia — “And they shall make an ark of acacia wood; two
\nand a half cubits shall be its length, a cubit and a half its width, and
\na cubit and a half its height.”
\nSuch was God’s commandment to Moses in the book of Exodus after
\ndelivering the Israelites from slavery in Egypt.
\nAlong with the Holy Grail (the cup Jesus used at the Last Supper),
\nthe fabled Ark of the Covenant has become not only an icon of modern
\nculture, thanks mainly to Indiana Jones, but the most revered religious
\nrelic of all time.
\nAnd in Ethiopia, people really believe it’s here, resting in the
\nChapel of the Tablet in this northern town just miles from the troubled
\nborder with Eritrea.
\nArk lore runs deep in this country. Copies of a 1993 book by British
\njournalist Graham Hancock, “The Sign and the Seal,” are displayed
\neverywhere. And every church in Ethiopia has a set of tabots (pronounced
\nTA-bots), replicas of the Ten Commandments that were once housed in the
\nArk.
\nFor one of the poorest countries on Earth to lay claim to the Ark
\ndoes much to boost its image, not to mention its tourism.
\nThe Ark was the portable wooden chest, gilded inside and out,
\nadorned with cherubs and topped with a throne, that was constructed by
\nthe Israelites to house the Ten Commandments during their 40 years of
\ndesert wanderings to the Promised Land.
\nBut it was also a kind of super-charged electric capacitor — a
\ntelephone line directly to God, who instructed that if the device was
\nset up just right, “There, I will meet with thee.”
\nWhoever possessed the Ark was invincible. “Biblical and other
\nsources speak of the Ark blazing with fire and light … stopping
\nrivers, blasting whole armies,” Hancock writes in his book.
\nThe Bible says the Philistines had it for a while but were smitten
\nby “swellings” for their troubles.
\nTaken to King Solomon’s first Jewish temple, it lay in the inner
\nsanctum, the Holy of Holies. But according to Jewish tradition, it
\nvanished during (or after) the Babylonian sack of Jerusalem and
\ndestruction of the Temple in 586 B.C., creating one of the greatest
\nmysteries of all time.
\nExcept in Ethiopia, where many educated people believe the real Ark
\nrests in the Chapel of the Tablet, where it was moved from an adjacent
\n10th-century cathedral because divine “heat” from the relic had cracked
\nthe stones of its previous sanctum.
\nAs the story goes, the Queen of Sheba, one of Ethiopia’s first
\nrulers, traveled to Jerusalem to partake of King Solomon’s wisdom. On
\nher way home, she bore the king’s son, Menelik.
\nAfter Menelik went to Jerusalem to visit his father the king,
\nSolomon gave him a copy of the Ark, and commanded that officials of his
\nkingdom travel back to Ethiopia to settle there.
\nBut the royal entourage that was traveling to Ethiopia could not
\nbear to be away from the Ark, so they switched the copy with the
\noriginal and smuggled the real thing out of the country. Menelik learned
\nof this only on his way home, and reasoned that since the Ark’s awesome
\npowers hadn’t destroyed his entourage, it must be God’s will that it
\nremain in Ethiopia.
\nThe Chapel of the Tablet is part of a larger compound known as the
\nChurch of Our Lady Mary of Zion. The area contains an airy modern church
\ncompleted in 1960 by former Emperor Haile Selassie; the 10th-century
\nstone cathedral featuring breathtaking frescoes of a black Jesus and
\nMary; and the Chapel of the Tablet, set behind an iron fence, its trim
\npainted a sky blue.
\nDuring a recent visit, a group of grim-faced tourists from Holland,
\nthe U.S. and Germany — all of them women — stood at a distance from
\nthe cathedral.
\n“I’m sorry, women have to wait here,” explained a tour guide, Addis.
\nFour women in the group smiled and proceeded. “No, really,” Addis said,
\nmore firmly. “Wait here.”
\nFemale tourists, beware: Women are not allowed near the old
\ncathedral or the chapel. These are the holiest sites in Ethiopia, the
\nguide explained, and since women give off an “aura,” they distract the
\ncountry’s most senior — and celibate — monk, the Ark’s guardian.
\nThe guardian is hand-picked by other senior monks, sort of like a
\npapal election. And only he knows his successor.
\n“He prays constantly by the Ark, day and night,” Addis explained.
\n“He fasts. He burns incense before it, paying tribute to God. Only he
\ncan see it.” All others are forbidden to lay eyes on it or even go close
\nto it.
\nHe’s not kidding.
\nMen may not get closer to the Chapel of the Tablet than about 25
\nyards. The monk comes out now and then to get some air and take delivery
\nof provisions, but those ventures outside are never planned.
\nThe Ark has been in the news of late. This spring, the University of
\nHamburg said researchers had found the remains of the 10th century B.C.
\npalace of the Queen of Sheba, also in Axum, and an altar that, at one
\ntime, held the Ark.
\nThe guide scoffed at the idea. “Why would she have kept it at home?”
\nOver the centuries, a few Western travelers claimed to have seen the
\nArk, and their descriptions have mirrored those in the Book of Exodus.
\nBut the Ethiopians say that is inconceivable.
\n“If anyone has said he has seen the Ark,” Addis said with a wide
\nsmile, “it must have been a fake.”
\nCopyright 2008 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of
\nthis transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written
\npermission.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ron Csillag Religion News Service Axum, Ethiopia — “And they shall make an ark of acacia wood; two and a half cubits shall be its length, a cubit and a half its width, and a cubit and a half its height.” Such was God’s commandment to Moses in the book of Exodus after delivering…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nMaybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia...<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Maybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Ron Csillag Religion News Service Axum, Ethiopia — “And they shall make an ark of acacia wood; two and a half cubits shall be its length, a cubit and a half its width, and a cubit and a half its height.” Such was God’s commandment to Moses in the book of Exodus after delivering…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-07-01T17:11:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"akornfeld\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Maybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia...","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Maybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia...","og_description":"By Ron Csillag Religion News Service Axum, Ethiopia — “And they shall make an ark of acacia wood; two and a half cubits shall be its length, a cubit and a half its width, and a cubit and a half its height.” Such was God’s commandment to Moses in the book of Exodus after delivering…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2008-07-01T17:11:57+00:00","author":"akornfeld","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav","name":"Maybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia...","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-07-01T17:11:57+00:00","dateModified":"2008-07-01T17:11:57+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/da3acea0a48aaeb7e77474c2f29f849a"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/07\/maybe-indiana-jones-should-hav#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Maybe Indiana Jones Should Have Looked in Ethiopia…"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/","name":"Beliefnet News","description":"Top Religious News From Around the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/da3acea0a48aaeb7e77474c2f29f849a","name":"akornfeld","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/dd2\/dd26f111fd1fab06b546769e3bf834f3x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/dd2\/dd26f111fd1fab06b546769e3bf834f3x96.jpg","caption":"akornfeld"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author\/akornfeld"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}