Africa, East Africa Folder.kmz

Africa, East Africa Folder

East Africa
East Africa; Blessed Elesbaan the King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Fathers slain at Sinai and Raithu, Commemorated on January 14; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); Venerable Mark the Anchorite of Athens, Commemorated on April 5; MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983) THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886); ROLAND ALLEN, MISSION STRATEGIST, Commemorated June 8 ;

Albertine Rift

East African Rift

Mount Elgon, between Uganda and Kenya
Mount Elgon

Africa, East Africa 1000BC-2005, Folder

Africa, East Africa, 1000BC-700, East African Arabs

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 910 BC-870 BC, Dot 7, Prophet Azariah, Juda King Asa's Ethiopian War story
Jerusalem, 910-870 BC, Prophet Azariah, oJudea (South of Benjamin, Samaria, and Galilee, mountainous southern part of Israel), w King Asa, fSembatha Land, urged no false god worship, remain Lord's covenant faithful, One True God, removed Altars, pilars& groves down, told people seek God of tFathers& obey The Commandments, people removed altars&idols, commanded them fortify city w walls&towers, Asa's war wEthiopia, Asa's 300k from Judah &280K from Benjamin, against Zera's 1Million. A's fervent prayer, Lord Smote them, A perused them to E & destroyed towns&pillaged cities, A returned to J, Lord's spirit came on Az, Hear me Asa&all people, Lord with you as you with him & vise-versa. When seek him you w find him, Az died old man; Judea; Prophet Azariah, Commemorated on February 3; Holy Prophet Azariah1 was son of Oded (or Addo) lived during the reign of King Asa (910-870 B.C. See 2 Chronicles 15:1) was the son and successor of Abijah in the kingdom of Judah. came from the land of Sembatha and urged the people not to worship false “gods,” but to remain faithful to the Covenant with the Lord. worshiped the one true God, and removed the altars of foreign “gods” from his land, tearing down the pillars and cutting down their sacred groves. told the people to seek earnestly the God of their fathers, and to obey the Law and the Commandments. removing the pagan altars and idols from all the cities of Judah he commanded his people to fortify their cities with walls and towers. Asa had 300,000 warriors in Judah, and 280,000 mighty warriors in the land of Benjamin. to the narratives of 2 Chronicles chapters 14 and 15, Zerah the Ethiopian2 went out against Judah with a million men. prayed fervently to God, asking that he might prevail, even against such overwhelming odds. Lord smote the Ethiopians and Asa’s army pursued them and crushed them. He destroyed their towns and pillaged their cities, and then he returned to Jerusalem. King Asa had won the victory, the Spirit of the Lord came upon Azariah. went out to meet Asa and said, “Hear me, King Asa, and all the people of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. Lord will be with you as long as you are with Him, worshiping His name and observing His commandments. When you seek Him you will find Him; if you forsake Him, He will also forsake you.” These words ought to be esteemed by every State and by all people. Prophet Azariah reposed in peace and was buried in his field. In iconography he is depicted as an old man with curly hair. The name Azariah means “whom God helps.” 1 It is said that Azariah was actually son of Ananias (Tobit 5:12); perhaps an error for Zachariah the son of Addo (1 Esdras 6:1). 2 Zerah is a Hebrew name, and is not Ethiopian or Egyptian, as some have said.

Africa, East Africa, 600 BC - 8th Century, East African Egyptian Arabs, Blemmyes Nubian Kingdom
East African Egyptian Arabs, 600 BC - 8th Century, Blemmyes Nubian Kingdom; Fathers slain at Sinai and Raithu, Commemorated on January 14;

Africa, East Africa, 000, 1st Century Folder, Arabs, Apostles Thomas, Matthew

Ethiopia, 30-38, THOMAS, Madras, Doubting Thomas, p loyal, aTouching greatest apostle, many places&arab icon appearances
India, 38-72, Apostle Thomas, Madras, absent when Jesus appeared on Easter Day, refused tBelieve resurrection, until he saw him and said My Lord..., Doubting Thomas, but previously proven loyal, let us also go..., at last supper said we don't know where you go, How do we know the way, Jesus said I am the way, preached in india, Kerla district, Madras, still Christians there connected to Thomas, From OCA Thomas fPansata Galilee, fisherman, hearing Jesus he left all and followed him, one of the 12, not present Pascha, unless I see his hands, 8days later My Lord My God, Thomas toiled more bravely zealously tirelessly than them all, he went to nearly al the earth's people, tPalestine Mesopotamia Parthia Ethiopia and India, died as martyr after converting wife son Perfect oMelipur, his relics to India Hungary Mt Athos, Arabian Icon appeared to him in Ethiopia Arabia & India; Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6, ; East Africa, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Thomas is commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" because he doubted Jesus' resurrection when first told of it (as related in the Gospel of John alone); later, he confessed his faith ("My Lord and my God") on seeing Jesus' crucifixion wounds. to traditional accounts of the Saint Thomas Christians of modern-day Kerala in India, Thomas is believed to have travelled outside the Roman Empire to preach the Gospel, travelling as far as the Tamilakam which is in South India.[1][5][6][7] According to their tradition, Thomas reached Muziris of Tamilakam (modern-day North Paravur and Kodungalloor in Kerala State, India) in AD 52.[8][9][1] In 1258, some of the relics were brought to Ortona, in Abruzzo, Italy, where they have been held in the Church of Saint Thomas the Apostle.[10] He is often regarded as the patron saint of India among its Christian adherents,[11][12] and the Feast of Saint Thomas on July 3 is celebrated as Indian Christian Day by believers belonging to many Christian denominations.[13][14] The name Thomas remains quite popular among the Saint Thomas Christians of the Indian subcontinent. Arapet Icon of the Mother of God, Commemorated on September 6; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6, From OCA Thomas fPansata Galilee, fisherman, hearing Jesus he left all and followed him, one of the 12, not present Pascha, unless I see his hands, 8days later My Lord My God, Thomas toiled more bravely zealously tirelessly than them all, he went to nearly al the earth's people, tPalestine Mesopotamia Parthia Ethiopia and India, died as martyr after converting wife son Perfect oMelipur, his relics to India Hungary Mt Athos, Arabian Icon appeared to him in Ethiopia Arabia & India; Holy and Glorious Apostle Thomas was born in the Galilean city of Pansada was a fisherman. the good tidings of Jesus Christ, he left all and followed after Him. Apostle Thomas is included in the number of the holy Twelve Apostles of the Savior. to Holy Scripture, the holy Apostle Thomas did not believe the reports of the other disciples about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ: “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). the eighth day after the Resurrection, the Lord appeared to the Apostle Thomas and showed him His wounds. “My Lord and my God,” the Apostle cried out (John 20:28). “Thomas, being once weaker in faith than the other apostles,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “toiled through the grace of God more bravely, more zealously and tirelessly than them all, that he went preaching over nearly all the earth, not fearing to proclaim the Word of God to savage nations.” icons depicting this event are inscribed “The Doubting Thomas.” is incorrect. In Greek, the inscription reads, “The Touching of Thomas.” Slavonic, it says, “The Belief of Thomas.” Saint Thomas touched the Life-giving side of the Lord, he no longer had any doubts. to Church Tradition, the holy Apostle Thomas founded Christian churches in Palestine, Mesopotamia, Parthia, Ethiopia and India. the Gospel earned him a martyr’s death. having converted the wife and son of the prefect of the Indian city of Meliapur [Melipur], the holy apostle was locked up in prison, suffered torture, and finally, pierced with five spears, he departed to the Lord. of the relics of the holy Apostle Thomas are in India, in Hungary and on Mt. Athos. name of the Apostle Thomas is associated with the Arabian (or Arapet) Icon of the Mother of God (September 6). THOMAS THE APOSTLE, (21 DEC NT); Apostle Thomas (Hebrew or Aramaic for "twin") was also called "Didymus" (Greek for "twin"). was absent when the Risen Lord appeared to the other apostles on the evening of Easter Day, refused to believe that Christ had indeed risen until he had seen him for himself, when he had seen Him, he said to Him, "My Lord and My God." (John 20:19-29) of this episode, he has been known ever since as "Doubting Thomas." we ought also to remember his earlier words, when Jesus announced His intention of going to the Jerusalem area, aside the protests of His disciples that His life was in danger there, at which Thomas said to the others: us also go, that we may die with him." (John 11:7,8,16) Thomas was pessimistic, he was also sturdily loyal. the Last Supper, Jesus said: "I go to prepare a place for you.... And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know." replied: "Lord, we know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way?" this Jesus answered: "I am the way, the truth and the life." (John 14:1-6) Thomas is mentioned again (John 21) as one of the seven disciples who were fishing on the Sea of Galilee (Sea of Tiberias) when the Risen Lord appeared to them. from this he appears in the New Testament only as a name on lists of the Apostles. couple of centuries later a story was circulating in the Mediterranean world that he had gone to preach in India; there is a Christian community in India (the Kerala district) that claims descent from Christians converted by the the preaching of Thomas. tradition among Christians in India is that Thomas was speared to death near Madras, accordingly he is often pictured holding a spear. Paintings of martyrs often show them holding or accompanied by the instruments with which they were put to death. recently discovered work called the Gospel of Thomas is a collection of sayings attributed to Jesus. I know of no scholarly support for the notion that it is the work of the Apostle Thomas, but some scholars think that some of the sayings in it may be authentic sayings of Jesus. POEM These things did Thomas hold for real: the warmth of blood, the chill of steel, the grain of wood, the heft of stone, the last frail twitch of blood and bone. His brittle certainties denied that one could live when one had died, until his fingers read like Braille the markings of the spear and nail. May we, O God, by grace believe and, in believing, still receive the Christ who held His raw palms out and beckoned Thomas from his doubt. (Thomas Troeger, 1984, Psalter/Hymnal of the Christian Reformed Church) by James Kiefer

Africa, East Africa, 33-72, Apostle Thomas
Ethiopia, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; East Africa, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Thomas is commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" because he doubted Jesus' resurrection when first told of it (as related in the Gospel of John alone); later, he confessed his faith ("My Lord and my God") on seeing Jesus' crucifixion wounds. to traditional accounts of the Saint Thomas Christians of modern-day Kerala in India, Thomas is believed to have travelled outside the Roman Empire to preach the Gospel, travelling as far as the Tamilakam which is in South India.[1][5][6][7] According to their tradition, Thomas reached Muziris of Tamilakam (modern-day North Paravur and Kodungalloor in Kerala State, India) in AD 52.[8][9][1] In 1258, some of the relics were brought to Ortona, in Abruzzo, Italy, where they have been held in the Church of Saint Thomas the Apostle.[10] He is often regarded as the patron saint of India among its Christian adherents,[11][12] and the Feast of Saint Thomas on July 3 is celebrated as Indian Christian Day by believers belonging to many Christian denominations.[13][14] The name Thomas remains quite popular among the Saint Thomas Christians of the Indian subcontinent. Arapet Icon of the Mother of God, Commemorated on September 6; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6; Holy and Glorious Apostle Thomas was born in the Galilean city of Pansada and was a fisherman. Hearing the good tidings of Jesus Christ, he left all and followed after Him. The Apostle Thomas is included in the number of the holy Twelve Apostles of the Savior. to Holy Scripture, the holy Apostle Thomas did not believe the reports of the other disciples about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ: “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). the eighth day after the Resurrection, the Lord appeared to the Apostle Thomas and showed him His wounds. “My Lord and my God,” the Apostle cried out (John 20:28). “Thomas, being once weaker in faith than the other apostles,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “toiled through the grace of God more bravely, more zealously and tirelessly than them all, so that he went preaching over nearly all the earth, not fearing to proclaim the Word of God to savage nations.” icons depicting this event are inscribed “The Doubting Thomas.” This is incorrect. In Greek, the inscription reads, “The Touching of Thomas.” In Slavonic, it says, “The Belief of Thomas.” When Saint Thomas touched the Life-giving side of the Lord, he no longer had any doubts. to Church Tradition, the holy Apostle Thomas founded Christian churches in Palestine, Mesopotamia, Parthia, Ethiopia and India. Preaching the Gospel earned him a martyr’s death. For having converted the wife and son of the prefect of the Indian city of Meliapur [Melipur], the holy apostle was locked up in prison, suffered torture, and finally, pierced with five spears, he departed to the Lord. Part of the relics of the holy Apostle Thomas are in India, in Hungary and on Mt. Athos. The name of the Apostle Thomas is associated with the Arabian (or Arapet) Icon of the Mother of God (September 6).

Africa, East Africa, 33-38, Arab Icon, Appeared to Apostle Thomas
Arabs, 38-43, Arab Icon, Appeared to Apostle Thomas; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). East Africa, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Thomas is commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" because he doubted Jesus' resurrection when first told of it (as related in the Gospel of John alone); later, he confessed his faith ("My Lord and my God") on seeing Jesus' crucifixion wounds. to traditional accounts of the Saint Thomas Christians of modern-day Kerala in India, Thomas is believed to have travelled outside the Roman Empire to preach the Gospel, travelling as far as the Tamilakam which is in South India.[1][5][6][7] According to their tradition, Thomas reached Muziris of Tamilakam (modern-day North Paravur and Kodungalloor in Kerala State, India) in AD 52.[8][9][1] In 1258, some of the relics were brought to Ortona, in Abruzzo, Italy, where they have been held in the Church of Saint Thomas the Apostle.[10] He is often regarded as the patron saint of India among its Christian adherents,[11][12] and the Feast of Saint Thomas on July 3 is celebrated as Indian Christian Day by believers belonging to many Christian denominations.[13][14] The name Thomas remains quite popular among the Saint Thomas Christians of the Indian subcontinent. Arapet Icon of the Mother of God, Commemorated on September 6; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6; Holy and Glorious Apostle Thomas was born in the Galilean city of Pansada and was a fisherman. Hearing the good tidings of Jesus Christ, he left all and followed after Him. The Apostle Thomas is included in the number of the holy Twelve Apostles of the Savior. to Holy Scripture, the holy Apostle Thomas did not believe the reports of the other disciples about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ: “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). the eighth day after the Resurrection, the Lord appeared to the Apostle Thomas and showed him His wounds. “My Lord and my God,” the Apostle cried out (John 20:28). “Thomas, being once weaker in faith than the other apostles,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “toiled through the grace of God more bravely, more zealously and tirelessly than them all, so that he went preaching over nearly all the earth, not fearing to proclaim the Word of God to savage nations.” icons depicting this event are inscribed “The Doubting Thomas.” This is incorrect. In Greek, the inscription reads, “The Touching of Thomas.” In Slavonic, it says, “The Belief of Thomas.” When Saint Thomas touched the Life-giving side of the Lord, he no longer had any doubts. to Church Tradition, the holy Apostle Thomas founded Christian churches in Palestine, Mesopotamia, Parthia, Ethiopia and India. Preaching the Gospel earned him a martyr’s death. For having converted the wife and son of the prefect of the Indian city of Meliapur [Melipur], the holy apostle was locked up in prison, suffered torture, and finally, pierced with five spears, he departed to the Lord. Part of the relics of the holy Apostle Thomas are in India, in Hungary and on Mt. Athos. The name of the Apostle Thomas is associated with the Arabian (or Arapet) Icon of the Mother of God (September 6).

Africa, East Africa, 80-90, Apostle Matthew, tax c, Gospel early in 50, many lands, Ethiopia, Fulvian-Matthew story
Galilee, 30-90, Apostle Matthew, Capernaum, Sea of Galilee; the Apostle,[a] also known as Saint Matthew and possibly as Levi, was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve apostles of Jesus. to Christian traditions, he was also one of the four Evangelists as author of the Gospel of Matthew, and thus is also known as Matthew the Evangelist, a claim rejected by the majority of modern biblical scholars, though the "traditional authorship still has its defenders."[3] New Testament records that as a disciple, he followed Jesus, and was one of the witnesses of the Ascension of Jesus. Later Church fathers such as Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria claim that Matthew preached the Gospel to the Jewish community in Judea, before going to other countries. Capernaum; MATTHEW, APOSTLE AND EVANGELIST (21 SEP NT); day Jesus was walking and saw a tax collector named Matthew sitting at a tax collection post, and said to him, "Follow me." And Matthew stood up and followed Him, and became one of His twelve apostles. (See M 9:9-13 = P 2:13-17 = L 5:27-32) Tax collectors in those days were social outcasts. Devout Jews avoided them because they were usually dishonest (the job carried no salary, and they were expected to make their profits by cheating the people from whom they collected taxes). Patriotic and nationalistic Jews hated them because they were agents of the Roman government, the conquerors, and hated them with a double hatred if (like Matthew) they were Jews, because they had gone over to the enemy, had betrayed their own people for money. Thus, throughout the Gospels, we find tax collectors (publicans) mentioned as a standard type of sinful and despised outcast. Matthew brought many of his former associates to meet Jesus, and social outcasts in general were shown that the love of Jesus extended even to them. (Jesus numbered among his disciples persons of widely different backgrounds. They included not only Matthew, a former agent of the Roman government, but Simon the Zealot (not to be confused with Simon Peter). Josephus tells us that the Zealots were fanatical nationalists, determined to drive out the Romans by guerrilla tactics, ambushes, assassinations, terrorist methods, or whatever worked. Their motto was, "No king but Messiah, no tax but the Temple, no friend but the Zealot." It is not clear that Simon was, or had been, a member of the group that Josephus describes, but it seems clear that he would have regarded himself as at the opposite end of the political spectrum from Matthew.) The name "Matthew" means "gift of the LORD." Mark and Luke, in the story of his calling, name him "Levi." Perhaps this was his original name, and he received a new name from Jesus when he became a disciple. (It has also been suggested that he was simply a member of the tribe of Levi.) Of Matthew's life after Pentecost the Scriptures tell us nothing. Later accounts of his life vary, some reporting that he was martyred, others that he died a natural death. The Christian community since early times has commemorated him as a martyr. the Apostle Matthew is also the Evangelist Matthew -- that is, whether the Apostle Matthew wrote the Gospel that bears his name -- is disputed. The Gospel itself does not say who wrote it, but the designation "according to Matthew" is very old. In favor of his authorship it may be noted that (1) while Mark and Luke give the fourth pair of Apostles as "Matthew and Thomas," the Gospel of Matthew gives them as "Thomas and Matthew"; and (2) while Luke 5:29 explicitly states, and Mark 2:15 suggests, that Matthew gave a banquet for Jesus, Matthew 9:10 in describing the same banquet does not indicate who the host was. Both of these variations would be routine touches of modesty if Matthew was the author. On the other hand, the gospel (1) does not have the manner of an eyewitness, and (2) is thought by many scholars to contain material borrowed from Mark, whereas one would not expect someone who had been an eyewitness to borrow from someone who had not. (NOTE: The view that Mark is an older Gospel than Matthew is widespread and not long ago many scholars regarded the matter as settled. However, there is respectable opinion holding that Matthew is the earliest Gospel after all. See, for example, the comments in the Matthew volume of The Anchor Bible.) the Gospel was written by some early Christian, not an apostle, whose name was Matthew, and about whom nothing else is known. Early Christian readers, hearing the Gospel ascribed to "Matthew," would naturally associate it with the Apostle of that name, and so the ascribing of the work to the Apostle Matthew becomes common at an early date, by a perfectly natural misunderstanding. of Hierapolis, writing in the late first or early second century, says that Matthew compiled the sayings (Logia) of Jesus in Hebrew. Now the material common to Matthew and Luke, but not to Mark, includes sayings of Jesus but almost no narrative. It has therefore been conjectured that there was once a document (usually called Q), now lost, that is basically a collection of speeches by Jesus, and that Matthew (the evangelist) and Luke, had access to it while Mark did not. It has been suggested that Matthew (the apostle) is the author of this document Q, which may well have been first written in Hebrew (or Aramaic). Scripture readings associated with the day bear the themes of Matthew as a Gospel-writer (hence readings that speak of the Scriptures), Matthew as an Apostle, and Matthew as a sinner called by God's grace. by James Kiefer Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, Commemorated on November 16; Holy Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, was also named Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27); he was one of the Twelve Apostles (Mark 3:18; Luke 6:45; Acts 1:13), and was brother of the Apostle James Alphaeus (Mark 2:14). was a publican, or tax-collector for Rome, in a time when the Jews were under the rule of the Roman Empire. lived in the Galilean city of Capernaum. Matthew heard the voice of Jesus Christ: “Come, follow Me” (Mt. 9:9), left everything and followed the Savior. and His disciples did not refuse Matthew’s invitation and they visited his house, where they shared table with the publican’s friends and acquaintances. Like the host, they were also publicans and known sinners. event disturbed the pharisees and scribes a great deal. who collected taxes from their countrymen did this with great profit for themselves. Usually greedy and cruel people, the Jews considered them pernicious betrayers of their country and religion. The word “publican” for the Jews had the connotation of “public sinner” and “idol-worshipper.” To even speak with a tax-collector was considered a sin, and to associate with one was defilement. the Jewish teachers were not able to comprehend that the Lord had “come to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mt. 9:13). acknowledging his sinfulness, repaid fourfold anyone he had cheated, and he distributed his remaining possessions to the poor, and he followed after Christ with the other apostles. Matthew was attentive to the instructions of the Divine Teacher, he beheld His innumerable miracles, he went together with the Twelve Apostles preaching to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt. 10:6). was a witness to the suffering, death, and Resurrection of the Savior, and of His glorious Ascension into Heaven. received the grace of the Holy Spirit, which descended upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, Saint Matthew preached in Palestine for several years. the request of the Jewish converts at Jerusalem, the holy Apostle Matthew wrote his Gospel describing the earthly life of the Savior, before leaving to preach the Gospel in faraway lands. the order of the books of the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew comes first. Palestine is said to be the place where the Gospel was written. Saint Matthew wrote in Aramaic, and then it was translated into Greek. The Aramaic text has not survived, but many of the linguistic and cultural-historical peculiarities of the Greek translation give indications of it. Apostle Matthew preached among people who were awaiting the Messiah. His Gospel manifests itself as a vivid proof that Jesus Christ is the Messiah foretold by the prophets, and that there would not be another (Mt. 11:3). preaching and deeds of the Savior are presented by the evangelist in three divisions, constituting three aspects of the service of the as Prophet and Law-Giver (Ch. 5-7), over the world both visible and invisible (Ch. 8-25), finally as High Priest offered as Sacrifice for the sins of all mankind (Ch. 26-27). theological content of the Gospel, besides the Christological themes, includes also the teaching about the Kingdom of God and about the Church, which the Lord sets forth in parables about the inner preparation for entering into the Kingdom (Ch. 5-7), about the worthiness of servers of the Church in the world (Ch. 10-11), about the signs of the Kingdom and its growth in the souls of mankind (Ch. 13), about the humility and simplicity of the inheritors of the Kingdom (Mt. 18:1-35; 19 13-30; 20:1-16; 25-27; 23:1-28), and about the eschatological revelations of the Kingdom in the Second Coming of Christ within the daily spiritual life of the Church (Ch. 24-25). Kingdom of Heaven and the Church are closely interconnected in the spiritual experience of Christianity: the Church is the historical embodiment of the Kingdom of Heaven in the world, and the Kingdom of Heaven is the Church of Christ in its eschatological perfection (Mt. 16:18-19; 28:18-20). holy Apostle brought the Gospel of Christ to Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia, finishing his preaching in Ethiopia with a martyr’s death. land was inhabited by tribes of cannibals with primitive customs and beliefs. The holy Apostle Matthew converted some of the idol-worshippers to faith in Christ. He founded the Church and built a temple in the city of Mirmena, establishing there his companion Platon as bishop. the holy apostle was fervently entreating God for the conversion of the Ethiopians the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of a youth. He gave him a staff, and commanded him to plant it at the doors of the church. The Lord said that a tree would grow from this staff and it would bear fruit, and from its roots would flow a stream of water. the Ethiopians washed themselves in the water and ate the fruit, they lost their wild ways and became gentle and good. the holy apostle carried the staff towards the church, he was met by the wife and son of the ruler of the land, Fulvian, who were afflicted by unclean spirits. In the Name of Christ the holy apostle healed them. This miracle converted a number of the pagans to the Lord. But the ruler did not want his subjects to become Christians and cease worshiping the pagan gods. He accused the apostle of sorcery and gave orders to execute him. put Saint Matthew head downwards, piled up brushwood and ignited it. When the fire flared up, everyone then saw that the fire did not harm Saint Matthew. Then Fulvian gave orders to add more wood to the fire, and frenzied with boldness, he commanded to set up twelve idols around the fire. But the flames melted the idols and flared up toward Fulvian. The frightened Ethiopian turned to the saint with an entreaty for mercy, and by the prayer of the martyr the flame went out. The body of the holy apostle remained unharmed, and he departed to the Lord. ruler Fulvian deeply repented of his deed, but still he had doubts. his command, they put the body of Saint Matthew into an iron coffin and threw it into the sea. In doing this Fulvian said that if the God of Matthew would preserve the body of the apostle in the water as He preserved him in the fire, then this would be proper reason to worship this One True God. night the Apostle Matthew appeared to Bishop Platon in a dream, and commanded him to go with clergy to the shore of the sea and to find his body there. righteous Fulvian and his retinue went with the bishop to the shore of the sea. The coffin carried by the waves was taken to the church built by the apostle. Then Fulvian begged forgiveness of the holy Apostle Matthew, after which Bishop Platon baptized him, giving him the name Matthew in obedience to a command of God. Saint Fulvian-Matthew abdicated his rule and became a presbyter. Upon the death of Bishop Platon, the Apostle Matthew appeared to him and exhorted him to head the Ethiopian Church. Having become a bishop, Saint Fulvian-Matthew toiled at preaching the Word of God, continuing the work of his heavenly patron.

Africa, East Africa, 80-90, Saint Fulvianus, Mirmena, Jesus, wooden rod, spring, Matthew burned at stake, Fulvianus-Matthew
Africa, East Africa, 80-90, Saint Fulvianus, Mirmena (Asmara or Massawa), Jesus, wooden rod, plant it in Mirmena, sprouted immediately, delicious fruit, spring welled up, healing waters, Matthew burned at stake, Fulvianus-Matthew ; Saint Fulvianus (in Baptism Matthew), Prince of Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 16; is believed that after the day of Pentecost, the Apostle and Evangelist Matthew preached the Gospel first in Palestine, and then in Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia and finally, Ethiopia. holds that the Lord appeared to Saint Matthew, giving him a wooden rod and instructing him to plant it in a particular place in Ethiopia. his arrival at the place in Ethiopia described by the Lord, he met a Bishop named Platon. rod was planted, as the Lord had instructed, and almost immediately it sprouted leaves and grew into a beautiful tree, the fruit of which was delicious. spring also welled up nearby, the water of which could heal the sick. Ethiopians were won over to Christ, although the local sovereign Prince, Fulvianus, a dedicated pagan, was violently opposed to this and, by his order, Saint Matthew was arrested and burned at the stake. time, however, Fulvianus came to doubt his action and agonized over his horrific act. His conscience beckoned him towards Christ. Ultimately, he embraced the Christian faith and was baptized, taking the name "Matthew." the elderly Bishop Platon reposed, Saint Fulvianus-Matthew was consecrated to the episcopacy and succeeded him. He spent his remaining years preaching the Gospel and winning his people to the Church.

Africa, East Africa, 80-90, Apostle Matthew, Jesus gave him staff, plant it, spring for washing wild ways, Fluvian's story
Africa, East Africa, 80-90, Apostle Matthew, finished in Mirmena, Ethiopia, Jesus gave him staff, plant it, fruit and spring from tree, for washing, lost wild ways, Fluvian's wife and Son but F executed M, F saved w coffin comes to shore, bishop F ; Ethiopia, 1st Century, Apostle Matthew; Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6 ; Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, Commemorated on November 16; Holy Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, was also named Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27); was one of the Twelve Apostles (Mark 3:18; Luke 6:45; Acts 1:13), was brother of the Apostle James Alphaeus (Mark 2:14). was a publican, or tax-collector for Rome, in a time when the Jews were under the rule of the Roman Empire. lived in the Galilean city of Capernaum. Matthew heard the voice of Jesus Christ: “Come, follow Me” (Mt. 9:9), he left everything and followed the Savior. and His disciples did not refuse Matthew’s invitation and they visited his house, where they shared table with the publican’s friends and acquaintances. the host, they were also publicans and known sinners. This event disturbed the pharisees and scribes a great deal. who collected taxes from their countrymen did this with great profit for themselves. Usually greedy and cruel people, the Jews considered them pernicious betrayers of their country and religion. word “publican” for the Jews had the connotation of “public sinner” and “idol-worshipper.” To even speak with a tax-collector was considered a sin, and to associate with one was defilement. the Jewish teachers were not able to comprehend that the Lord had “come to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mt. 9:13). acknowledging his sinfulness, repaid fourfold anyone he had cheated, and he distributed his remaining possessions to the poor, and he followed after Christ with the other apostles. Matthew was attentive to the instructions of the Divine Teacher, he beheld His innumerable miracles, he went together with the Twelve Apostles preaching to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt. 10:6). He was a witness to the suffering, death, and Resurrection of the Savior, and of His glorious Ascension into Heaven. received the grace of the Holy Spirit, which descended upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, Saint Matthew preached in Palestine for several years. the request of the Jewish converts at Jerusalem, the holy Apostle Matthew wrote his Gospel describing the earthly life of the Savior, before leaving to preach the Gospel in faraway lands. the order of the books of the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew comes first. Palestine is said to be the place where the Gospel was written. Matthew wrote in Aramaic, and then it was translated into Greek. The Aramaic text has not survived, but many of the linguistic and cultural-historical peculiarities of the Greek translation give indications of it. Apostle Matthew preached among people who were awaiting the Messiah. His Gospel manifests itself as a vivid proof that Jesus Christ is the Messiah foretold by the prophets, and that there would not be another (Mt. 11:3). preaching and deeds of the Savior are presented by the evangelist in three divisions, constituting three aspects of the service of the Messiah: Prophet and Law-Giver (Ch. 5-7), over the world both visible and invisible (Ch. 8-25), finally as High Priest offered as Sacrifice for the sins of all mankind (Ch. 26-27). theological content of the Gospel, besides the Christological themes, also the teaching about the Kingdom of God and about the Church, which the Lord sets forth in parables about the inner preparation for entering into the Kingdom (Ch. 5-7), the worthiness of servers of the Church in the world (Ch. 10-11), the signs of the Kingdom and its growth in the souls of mankind (Ch. 13), the humility and simplicity of the inheritors of the Kingdom (Mt. 18:1-35; 19 13-30; 20:1-16; 25-27; 23:1-28), about the eschatological revelations of the Kingdom in the Second Coming of Christ within the daily spiritual life of the Church (Ch. 24-25). Kingdom of Heaven and the Church are closely interconnected in the spiritual experience of Christianity: Church is the historical embodiment of the Kingdom of Heaven in the world, the Kingdom of Heaven is the Church of Christ in its eschatological perfection (Mt. 16:18-19; 28:18-20). holy Apostle brought the Gospel of Christ to Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia, finishing his preaching in Ethiopia with a martyr’s death. land was inhabited by tribes of cannibals with primitive customs and beliefs. The holy Apostle Matthew converted some of the idol-worshippers to faith in Christ. He founded the Church and built a temple in the city of Mirmena, establishing there his companion Platon as bishop. the holy apostle was fervently entreating God for the conversion of the Ethiopians the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of a youth. gave him a staff, and commanded him to plant it at the doors of the church. The Lord said that a tree would grow from this staff and it would bear fruit, and from its roots would flow a stream of water. When the Ethiopians washed themselves in the water and ate the fruit, they lost their wild ways and became gentle and good. the holy apostle carried the staff towards the church, he was met by the wife and son of the ruler of the land, Fulvian, who were afflicted by unclean spirits. the Name of Christ the holy apostle healed them. This miracle converted a number of the pagans to the Lord. But the ruler did not want his subjects to become Christians and cease worshiping the pagan gods. He accused the apostle of sorcery and gave orders to execute him. put Saint Matthew head downwards, piled up brushwood and ignited it. When the fire flared up, everyone then saw that the fire did not harm Saint Matthew. Then Fulvian gave orders to add more wood to the fire, and frenzied with boldness, he commanded to set up twelve idols around the fire. But the flames melted the idols and flared up toward Fulvian. The frightened Ethiopian turned to the saint with an entreaty for mercy, and by the prayer of the martyr the flame went out. The body of the holy apostle remained unharmed, and he departed to the Lord. ruler Fulvian deeply repented of his deed, but still he had doubts. By his command, they put the body of Saint Matthew into an iron coffin and threw it into the sea. In doing this Fulvian said that if the God of Matthew would preserve the body of the apostle in the water as He preserved him in the fire, then this would be proper reason to worship this One True God. night the Apostle Matthew appeared to Bishop Platon in a dream, and commanded him to go with clergy to the shore of the sea and to find his body there. The righteous Fulvian and his retinue went with the bishop to the shore of the sea. The coffin carried by the waves was taken to the church built by the apostle. Then Fulvian begged forgiveness of the holy Apostle Matthew, after which Bishop Platon baptized him, giving him the name Matthew in obedience to a command of God. Saint Fulvian-Matthew abdicated his rule and became a presbyter. Upon the death of Bishop Platon, the Apostle Matthew appeared to him and exhorted him to head the Ethiopian Church. Having become a bishop, Saint Fulvian-Matthew toiled at preaching the Word of God, continuing the work of his heavenly patron.

Africa, East Africa, 100, 2nd-10th Century Folder, Arabs, Christian Axum Kingdom, Orthodox

Africa, East Africa, 100-940, Abyssinian (Ethiopian) Kingdom of Axum, Christian
East Africa, Abyssinia, 100-940, Ethiopian Kingdom of Axum, Christian; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Blessed Elesbaan the King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24;

Africa, East Africa, Arabs, 300-399, St Frumentius and Kings Ella Amida, Ezana,

Africa, East Africa, Arabs, 320-333, King, Ella Amida aka Ousanas
East Africa, 320-333, King, Ella Amida aka Ousanas; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30;

Africa, East Africa, Arabs, 323-383, Frumentius t Archbishop of Abyssinia, Northwest Ethiopia, miracles from priesthood grace
Africa, East Africa, 323-383, Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia (Ethiopian Empire, Northwest Ethiopia, north of the rift, Ethiopian Highlands), miracles from grace of priesthood; Abyssinia: the Ethiopian Empire. Ethiopian Highlands ; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated November 30 ; Frumentius, Archbishop of Inda (Ethiopia, formerly Abyssinia), a native of the city of Tyre. still a child, he came to Abyssinia by divine Providence. up near the imperial court, he became a friend and chief counselor of the Abyssinian emperor, and afterwards tutor to his son, who ascended the throne while still a minor after the death of his father. the consent of the new emperor, Saint Frumentius journeyed to his native land and afterwards visited Alexandria and its patriarch, Saint Athanasius the Great (May 2). the blessing of Saint Athanasius, Frumentius was elevated to become Bishop of Abyssinia and he returned to that country, which had sheltered him from his childhood. he returned from his consecration, Frumentius began to perform miracles, bringing many people to the Church. emperor said to him, “You have lived among us for many years, yet we never saw you perform such wonders. is it that you do so now?” saint replied, “This has nothing to do with me, but is due to the grace of the priesthood.” the emperor and many of his subjects received holy Baptism. accomplished the apostolic task of converting the Abyssinian nation to Christ, Saint Frumentius zealously and fruitfully guided the Church entrusted him by God for many years, then peacefully departed to the Lord in great old age.

Africa, East Africa, Arabs, 333-356, King, Ezana of Axum
East Africa, 333-356, King, Ezana of Axum; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30;

Africa, East Africa, Arabs, 500-599, 6th Century Folder, Elesbaan and Abyssinia

Africa, East Africa, 501-555, Saint Gregory of Homer or Omrits, many detailed accurate prophecies & visions, many travels, Ethiopia, converts fourfold people
Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 501-555, Saint Gregory of Homer or Omrits was the purported archbishop of Ẓafar, the capital of the kingdom of Ḥimyar, in the mid-6th century, according to a hagiographical dossier compiled in the 10th century. This compilation is essentially legendary and fictitious, although a few parts of it are of historical value. Written in Greek, it survives also in a Slavonic translation.[2] The three works in the dossier are conventionally known as the Bios (Life), Nomoi (Laws) and Dialexis (Debate).[3] The whole dossier is sometimes known as the Acts of Gregentios.[4] name Gregentios is unknown apart from the Bios and related texts. According to the Bios, he received his name from a local holy man. Several later scribes, encountering an unheard of name, changed it to Gregorios (Gregory).[5] This is the name that appears in all the Slavonic versions, as well as an Arabic translation of the Dialexis.[2][5] It also appears in the fresco depicting Gregentios in the monastery of Koutsovendis on Cyprus, painted between 1110 and 1118.[6] Other scribal emendations are Gregentinos and Rhegentios.[5] name has a Latin ending, which may indicate a western origin for the name, but such suffixes had entered vernacular Greek by the time the Bios was written. The name may be derived from Agrigentius, "man from Agrigento", or from a combination of the name Gregory with either Agrigentius or the name of Saint Vincentius. The biography of Gregory of Agrigento was a major source used by the author of the Bios, and an itinerary of Vincentius may also have been used.[5] only known persons named after Gregentios are two 19th-century monks of Mount Athos. The first was the archimandrite of Vatopedi in April 1842 and the second a monk of the Skete of Saint Anne who died in 1879 aged 69. Both monastic communities had copies of the Bios and Dialexis of Gregentios.[5] Bios, which Jean-Marie Sansterre called a "hagiographical romance", is divided into nine chapters. While the first eight are vague in their chronology and geography, the ninth draws on superior historical sources and contains more precise details.[7] The early part, which includes an Avar raid on his hometown, may also reflect authentic conditions in the northern Balkans during the later 6th century.[8] The Bios was completed either at Constantinople in the 10th century or in Rome in the 9th century.[7] The Nomoi and Dialexis are later additions. The whole collection, which presents as a unity, was not brought together before the 10th century. The Nomoi may contain some authentic information, since it shares characteristics with legal inscriptions from pre-Islamic South Arabia.[2] The Dialexis, which is a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban, was the most popular part of the work and circulated independently into modern times.[4] life in Avaria start of the Bios of Gregentios, from a copy made in 1180 and now in Saint Catherine's Monastery, Sinai[9] to his Bios, Gregentios was born on 6 December in the late 5th century in the town of Lyplianes (Ljubljana) in the land of the Avars.[2][7][10] father was named Agapios and his mother Eusebia. At his baptism, he was named after a sage who lived on a nearby mountain. His schooling begins at the age of seven. At the age of ten, he is pushed into a river by a deer. Miraculously saved from drowning, he retires to the desert, where he receives instruction and prophecies about his future from a holy man.[11] his mother dies, Gregentios is placed in the custody of the married but childless priest who baptised him. During a barbarian invasion, the townspeople flee to the fortress of Korada. Gregentios, who was in the vineyards at the time, manages to sneak in through the Rhomanesios gate while the fortress is besieged. After the barbarians retreat, both Gregentios and his foster mother have prophetic dreams about him. At the urging of a certain Sergios, his foster mother tells her dream to an elder named Niketas, who interprets it as saying that Gregentios will one day convert a fourfold people.[11] next traveled extensively in northern and central Italy and Sicily before sailing to Alexandria in Egypt.[2][7] The Bios presents him as travelling from Lyplianes to Moryne (Murano), Antenora (Padua) and Agrigento, then by boat to Pavia, then to Milan and Carthage, then by foot to Rome, then to Augustopolis (either Augusta or Koper) and finally Alexandria. In its order, timing and means of travel, this itinerary is absurd.[12] and Sicily first departs with the holy man from the desert. They reach Moryne in a single day. There they stay with a man named Sabbatios, where a holy fool named Peter informs Gregentios that his foster parents are searching for him. The holy man and Gregentios leave Moryne after the local bishop learns of the latter's spiritual gifts. In Antenora, they stay in the house of Theodoretos, while the bishop of Moryne searches for him. Bishop Eulogios of Antenora makes Gregentios a deacon and lector. A holy woman named Theodora informs him again of his foster parents' search.[10] the holy man, Gregentios moves on to Agrigento, leaving the bishop of Antenora also to send searchers after him. He is hosted by the priest Stephanos in the church of the Mother of God outside the walls. He visits the grave of the hermit Eirene, who appears to him and talks to him. He visits two churches in the city, and a woman preaching to a crowd from a balcony predicts that he will go to Egypt and Ḥimyar. The holy man then appears and whisks Gregentios away to Milan. Going by boat, they pass Rome on the way.[10] Milan, Gregentios stays with one Niketas, while the holy man moves on to Largention (Piacenza). He visits the grave of Saint Ambrose and begins reading his works. He takes on as a disciple a boy of fourteen named Leon, who later becomes governor of Melike (either Ravenna or the land of the Melingoi) and is assassinated. Gregentios has a vision of the underworld in which he sees Leon among those who died before their time awaiting the Last Judgement. The holy man then returns and the two travel to Carthage, where they stay with one Constantine.[10] and Rome Carthage, Gregentios meets a woman named Philothea who is regarded as a mute who only barks and sighs. The holy man reveals that this is merely a gift God gave her to ward off a man who tried to seduce her. She speaks to Gregentios clearly and lucidly. his time in Carthage, he befriends a young man named George and they visit a church dedicated to Saint Anastasia. There, a holy woman identifies Gregentios by name and birthplace. When George asks for the same treatment, she reproaches and names the women he has been sinning with. young man, a Thracian named Pothetos, asks Gregentios for spiritual advice. Gregentios writes sixteen homilies that make Pothetos regret his marriage, but Gregentios convinces him to go home to his wife.[10] Carthage, the holy man takes Gregentios to Rome. On the way, he has a vision of the devil in the valley of Patherolymna. Rome, they stay with a man named Benedict near the Great Portico. He owns a slave named Elizabeth, who is sexually abused by a demon every night. After Gregentios writes a formula on a piece of papyrus and gives it to her, she is freed from the demon.[10] day, Gregentios is visited by Saint Peter, who had been absent from his grave when Gregentios visited it, for he had gone to give comfort to the persecuted Christians of Negra (Najrān). tells Gregentios that the time has not yet come for the holy man's identity to be revealed. a woman identifies Gregentios by name as the prophet of the Ḥimyarites. He is also identified by name by the monk Abramios. At the request of a beggar named Zacharias, he heals the eye of a youth named Basil. In ecstasy at the tomb of Saint Paul, he sees a vision of the saint bringing him a pallium.[10] visits a church dedicated to Saint Boniface, whose feast day he will come to share. He meets a fool for Christ named John who throws stones at passersby. visits a hermit named Michael, who sends him on to a hermit named Artados, who lives atop a mountain beyond the Dry Lakes. Artados prophesies in detail about Gregentios' future in Egypt and Ḥimyar, where he will convert four peoples: pagans, Jews, Ḥimyarites and Maurousians. a stay of two days, Gregentios returns to Rome, where he meets Pope Felix IV (526–530). The holy man rejoins him and they go to Augustopolis.[10] Augustopolis, Gregentios stays with a widow named Euphemia. In the market, he meets an Armenian from Artazat (Artaxata), who prophesies his future. a few days, the holy man and Gregentios board a ship from Leukas for Alexandria. There, Gregentios is greeted by name by a female slave, whose prophesies how the patriarch will call him to be an archbishop. He stays in the house of one Leontios. In Alexandria, he visits a monastery led by a eunuch-abbot named Epiphanios. His prayers chase away a devil who throws stones at a monk named Kosmas. A woman named Archontia greets him by name.[10] in South Arabia last part of the Bios "contains the only clear historical information scattered through the whole" of the Gregentios materials.[13] 523, the Ḥimyarite king Dhū Nuwās massacres the Christians of Najrān and its leader, Arethas. Emperor Justin I asks the Ethiopian (Aksumite) king Elesboam (Caleb) to lead an expedition against Dhū Nuwās. writes to the patriarch of Alexandria, Proterios, for a bishop to evangelize the Ḥimyarites.[14] (The actual patriarch at this time was Timothy IV.[2]) Mark informs Proterios of Gregentios in a dream. The patriarch consecrates Gregentios as bishop and send him back with the Ethiopian envoys.[14] This takes place after the successful Ethiopian conquest of Ḥimyar (525).[2] Ethiopia, Gregentios stays for a time in the capital, Amlem (Aksum), before crossing the sea to Medekion (Maddaban) and then heading to Taphar (Ẓafār) and finally Najrān, where he meets the king. consecrates the churches that the kings has built and installs priests in them at Najrān, Ẓafār, Akana, Atarph, Legmia , Azaki and Iouze.[14][15] Bios describes Elesboam's retirement to a monastery and the miraculous invocation of his name. Gregentios threatens the Ḥimyarites with the death penalty for all those who do not convert, whereupon the hole country becomes Christian. The Dialexis is interposed here, and the end of the Bios follows.[14] remains in Ḥimyar for thirty years, assisting Elesboam's appointed viceroy, Abraha, in building churches. Shortly after Abraha dies and is succeeded by his son Seridos (Masrūq), Gregentios dies on 19 December. He is buried in the cathedral.[16] He is commemorated in the Synaxarion of Constantinople on 19 December.[2] Start of the Nomoi in a manuscript copied in Gaza in 1487[17] Nomoi ton Homeriton, also known in Latin as Leges Homeritarum,[18] is usually regarded as a fictional law code containing some amount of authentic pre-Islamic South Arabian material. The laws are not arranged thematically, but may be subsumed under eight headings: (1) morals, marriage and family; (2) slavery; (3) right of employment; (4) culture and social life; (5) cruelty against animals; (6) rental laws; (7) officeholders; and (8) miscellaneous. Within the last class are laws concerning sorcery, poisoning, perjury, theft, extrajudicial punishments, infringing ecclesiastical asylum, workhouses for criminals and prohibitions on begging. The Nomoi do not come near to being a comprehensive law code. There is, for example, no law of inheritance.[19] Nomoi prescribes harsh punishments for transgressions, often mutilation, and mitigating factors are nowhere admitted. Its strong prohibitions of wife-beating and cruelty to animals stand out, however, since Byzantine law knew no restriction on the treatment of animals. The laws seem concerned strictly with an urban community like Najrān. Administration and taxation are governed in a clearly Byzantine manner. The prohibitions on dancing, singing, gambling and gaming may be taken from the canons of the Quinisext Council (691/692). On the whole, the influence of canon law is limited, but Christian theological justifications are provided for the laws. Although the Nomoi is a civil law code, it presents itself as having been promulgated by a supernatural force to the geitoniarchai (administrators of Najrān's 36 districts). It bears the unmistakable stamp of a Christian monk of a strong ascetic spirit. In the words of J. B. Bury, the laws "illustrate the kind of legislation at which the ecclesiastical spirit, unchecked, would have aimed."[20] and authorship authenticity of the Nomoi was first put in doubt by Cardinal Jean-Baptiste-François Pitra in 1864. He was followed by many, including Louis Duchesne, but in 1969 Nina Pigulevskaya defended a 6th-century origin. She thought the code was written in the Byzantine Empire and never actually came into force in Ḥimyar. Irfan Shahîd and A. K. Irvine have also defended the authenticity of the code.[21] Garth Fowden considers that it contains some authentic material.[18] It mentions a slave market at a place called Trikanos or Trikanon, a place not attested anywhere else.[21] features of the Nomoi that would be unusual in 6th-century Byzantium have been ascribed to South Arabian influence. They may, however, reflect a later date of composition. Mutilation was an uncommon punishment in Byzantine law prior to Leo III's Ecloga (741). One of the most unusual and cruel punishments in the Nomoi—suspending a convict upside down and smoking him to death with burning hay—is actually attested in an 8th-century Byzantine source (Nikephoros's Breviarium). Some prescriptions regarding marriage in the Nomoi became a part of Byzantine law during the reign Leo VI (886–912).[22] Similarities between the Najrān of the Nomoi and Constantinople under the Macedonian dynasty suggest that the Nomoi was probably written at Constantinople in the 10th century.[23] The Nomoi may be compared with other pseudepigraphal texts of supposed supernatural origin from Byzantium, such as the Didascalia Apostolorum and Letter of Christ Fallen from Heaven.[24] earliest manuscript witness to the Nomoi, a copy made in 1180 on Cyprus, shows some Western influence in its terminology. It is probable that it was copied from a manuscript made shortly before in Crusader Syria. Some of its terminology does not appear in Greek again until the Assizes of Cyprus in the 14th century.[24] Dialexis purports to be a record written around 550 or 560 of a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban that took place before the royal court of Ḥimyar around 520 or 530. The author does not claim to have been present or to have known Gregentios, but does claim to have had access to a record of the proceedings written at the time by the notary Palladios. [25] The text, however, shows clear evidence of having been composed after the start of the controversies over monothelitism (7th century), iconoclasm (8th century) and the filioque clause, which only became a live controversy in the Byzantine Empire after 860.[26] is a treatise against the Azymites in the form of a letter that is ascribed to Gregentios in one manuscript. Given the issue it discusses, it can have no connection to the time in which Gregentios supposedly lived. In 1660, some "letters of Gregentios"—possibly the same treatise—were catalogued as part of the library of Denis Pétau that had been purchased after his death by Queen Christina of Sweden. There is no further record of these letters and they appear to be lost.[27] Afar, Ethiopia (Semara) ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar.

Africa, East Africa, 501-555, Elesbaan of Ethiopia, E lost Dunaan war, recluse visit, revenge, vow, victory, crown to J
Africa, East Africa, 501-555, Elesbaan of Ethiopia, Dunaan ruled Arabia & killed christians, E unsuccessful war against D, revelation to visit recluse, lost because unrighteous revenge, vow to serve then victory, then abdication, service, and crown to Jerusalem Christ's Tomb; Ethiopia; Blessed Elesbaan the King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24 ; Elesbaan1 was the Emperor of what is now Ethiopia, lived when Arabia was ruled by Dunaan, an oppressor of Christians. pious Elesbaan was unable to stand by while those who believed in Christ were being massacred. declared war on Dunaan, but his first military campaign was not successful. to learn the reason for his defeat, Elesbaan, inspired by a revelation from above, visited a recluse named Zenon. revealed to the Emperor that he had acted unrighteously in his desire to take revenge against Dunaan, for the Lord has said, “Vengeance is mine, I shall repay!” (Hebrews 10:30). holy ascetic urged Elesbaan to promise that he would devote the rest of his life to God, if he wished to escape His wrath for his self-willed revenge, and then he would defeat Dunaan. Elesbaan made that vow to the Lord, in 520 he and his army confronted the enemy. This time, he defeated, captured, and executed Dunaan. to the Roman Martyrology, after Elesbaan defeated the enemies of Christ, he sent his royal diadem to Jerusalem to be hung near the Life-Giving tomb of Christ, during the reign of Emperor Justin. his victory, the Saint kept his word and abdicated as Emperor, himself in a monastery. the next fifteen years he lived a life of strict fasting and asceticism. Elesbaan reposed around 553-555. His name is given as Kaleb on his coins and inscriptions.

Africa, East Africa, 520-540, Elesbaan, King, Ethiopia, pious christian, took revenge, defeated, vow, victory, monastery
Ethiopian King, 520-540, Elesbaan (Caleb or Kaleb), Christian Kingdom of Axum (100-940); Blessed Elesbaan, King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24; Elesbaan, King of what is now Ethiopia lived when Arabia was ruled by Dunaan, the oppressor of Christians. pious Elesbaan was unable to look on indifferently as believers in Christ were being massacred. He declared war on Dunaan, but his military campaign was unsuccessful. to learn the reason for his defeat, Elesbaan, with prompting from above, turned to a certain hermit. He revealed to the emperor that he had proceeded unrighteously in deciding to take revenge against Dunaan, since the Lord had said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay!” (Heb 10:30). hermit counseled Saint Elesbaan make a vow to devote his final days of life to God, to escape the wrath of God for his self-willed revenge, and then to defeat Dunaan. Elesbaan made a vow to the Lord, and marching off with his army against the enemy, he defeated, captured and executed him. After the victory the saint resigned as emperor, secluded himself within a monastery and for fifteen years he dwelt in strict fasting and asceticism. Elesbaan reposed around 553-555. St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ;

Africa, East Africa, 523-540, Saint Gregory of Homer, during this time Gregory with Elesbaan, Ethiopia, Jesus revealed to Jews
Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 523-540, Saint Gregory of Homer, during time Gregory with Elesbaan ; -------------------During this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar. Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar. Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 523-540, Saint Gregory of Homer or Omrits was the purported archbishop of Ẓafar, the capital of the kingdom of Ḥimyar, in the mid-6th century, according to a hagiographical dossier compiled in the 10th century. This compilation is essentially legendary and fictitious, although a few parts of it are of historical value. Written in Greek, it survives also in a Slavonic translation.[2] The three works in the dossier are conventionally known as the Bios (Life), Nomoi (Laws) and Dialexis (Debate).[3] The whole dossier is sometimes known as the Acts of Gregentios.[4] name Gregentios is unknown apart from the Bios and related texts. According to the Bios, he received his name from a local holy man. Several later scribes, encountering an unheard of name, changed it to Gregorios (Gregory).[5] This is the name that appears in all the Slavonic versions, as well as an Arabic translation of the Dialexis.[2][5] It also appears in the fresco depicting Gregentios in the monastery of Koutsovendis on Cyprus, painted between 1110 and 1118.[6] Other scribal emendations are Gregentinos and Rhegentios.[5] name has a Latin ending, which may indicate a western origin for the name, but such suffixes had entered vernacular Greek by the time the Bios was written. The name may be derived from Agrigentius, "man from Agrigento", or from a combination of the name Gregory with either Agrigentius or the name of Saint Vincentius. The biography of Gregory of Agrigento was a major source used by the author of the Bios, and an itinerary of Vincentius may also have been used.[5] only known persons named after Gregentios are two 19th-century monks of Mount Athos. The first was the archimandrite of Vatopedi in April 1842 and the second a monk of the Skete of Saint Anne who died in 1879 aged 69. Both monastic communities had copies of the Bios and Dialexis of Gregentios.[5] Bios, which Jean-Marie Sansterre called a "hagiographical romance", is divided into nine chapters. While the first eight are vague in their chronology and geography, the ninth draws on superior historical sources and contains more precise details.[7] The early part, which includes an Avar raid on his hometown, may also reflect authentic conditions in the northern Balkans during the later 6th century.[8] The Bios was completed either at Constantinople in the 10th century or in Rome in the 9th century.[7] The Nomoi and Dialexis are later additions. The whole collection, which presents as a unity, was not brought together before the 10th century. The Nomoi may contain some authentic information, since it shares characteristics with legal inscriptions from pre-Islamic South Arabia.[2] The Dialexis, which is a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban, was the most popular part of the work and circulated independently into modern times.[4] life in Avaria start of the Bios of Gregentios, from a copy made in 1180 and now in Saint Catherine's Monastery, Sinai[9] to his Bios, Gregentios was born on 6 December in the late 5th century in the town of Lyplianes (Ljubljana) in the land of the Avars.[2][7][10] father was named Agapios and his mother Eusebia. At his baptism, he was named after a sage who lived on a nearby mountain. His schooling begins at the age of seven. At the age of ten, he is pushed into a river by a deer. Miraculously saved from drowning, he retires to the desert, where he receives instruction and prophecies about his future from a holy man.[11] his mother dies, Gregentios is placed in the custody of the married but childless priest who baptised him. During a barbarian invasion, the townspeople flee to the fortress of Korada. Gregentios, who was in the vineyards at the time, manages to sneak in through the Rhomanesios gate while the fortress is besieged. After the barbarians retreat, both Gregentios and his foster mother have prophetic dreams about him. At the urging of a certain Sergios, his foster mother tells her dream to an elder named Niketas, who interprets it as saying that Gregentios will one day convert a fourfold people.[11] next traveled extensively in northern and central Italy and Sicily before sailing to Alexandria in Egypt.[2][7] The Bios presents him as travelling from Lyplianes to Moryne (Murano), Antenora (Padua) and Agrigento, then by boat to Pavia, then to Milan and Carthage, then by foot to Rome, then to Augustopolis (either Augusta or Koper) and finally Alexandria. In its order, timing and means of travel, this itinerary is absurd.[12] and Sicily first departs with the holy man from the desert. They reach Moryne in a single day. There they stay with a man named Sabbatios, where a holy fool named Peter informs Gregentios that his foster parents are searching for him. The holy man and Gregentios leave Moryne after the local bishop learns of the latter's spiritual gifts. In Antenora, they stay in the house of Theodoretos, while the bishop of Moryne searches for him. Bishop Eulogios of Antenora makes Gregentios a deacon and lector. A holy woman named Theodora informs him again of his foster parents' search.[10] the holy man, Gregentios moves on to Agrigento, leaving the bishop of Antenora also to send searchers after him. He is hosted by the priest Stephanos in the church of the Mother of God outside the walls. He visits the grave of the hermit Eirene, who appears to him and talks to him. He visits two churches in the city, and a woman preaching to a crowd from a balcony predicts that he will go to Egypt and Ḥimyar. The holy man then appears and whisks Gregentios away to Milan. Going by boat, they pass Rome on the way.[10] Milan, Gregentios stays with one Niketas, while the holy man moves on to Largention (Piacenza). He visits the grave of Saint Ambrose and begins reading his works. He takes on as a disciple a boy of fourteen named Leon, who later becomes governor of Melike (either Ravenna or the land of the Melingoi) and is assassinated. Gregentios has a vision of the underworld in which he sees Leon among those who died before their time awaiting the Last Judgement. The holy man then returns and the two travel to Carthage, where they stay with one Constantine.[10] and Rome Carthage, Gregentios meets a woman named Philothea who is regarded as a mute who only barks and sighs. The holy man reveals that this is merely a gift God gave her to ward off a man who tried to seduce her. She speaks to Gregentios clearly and lucidly. his time in Carthage, he befriends a young man named George and they visit a church dedicated to Saint Anastasia. There, a holy woman identifies Gregentios by name and birthplace. When George asks for the same treatment, she reproaches and names the women he has been sinning with. young man, a Thracian named Pothetos, asks Gregentios for spiritual advice. Gregentios writes sixteen homilies that make Pothetos regret his marriage, but Gregentios convinces him to go home to his wife.[10] Carthage, the holy man takes Gregentios to Rome. On the way, he has a vision of the devil in the valley of Patherolymna. Rome, they stay with a man named Benedict near the Great Portico. He owns a slave named Elizabeth, who is sexually abused by a demon every night. After Gregentios writes a formula on a piece of papyrus and gives it to her, she is freed from the demon.[10] day, Gregentios is visited by Saint Peter, who had been absent from his grave when Gregentios visited it, for he had gone to give comfort to the persecuted Christians of Negra (Najrān). tells Gregentios that the time has not yet come for the holy man's identity to be revealed. a woman identifies Gregentios by name as the prophet of the Ḥimyarites. He is also identified by name by the monk Abramios. At the request of a beggar named Zacharias, he heals the eye of a youth named Basil. In ecstasy at the tomb of Saint Paul, he sees a vision of the saint bringing him a pallium.[10] visits a church dedicated to Saint Boniface, whose feast day he will come to share. He meets a fool for Christ named John who throws stones at passersby. visits a hermit named Michael, who sends him on to a hermit named Artados, who lives atop a mountain beyond the Dry Lakes. Artados prophesies in detail about Gregentios' future in Egypt and Ḥimyar, where he will convert four peoples: pagans, Jews, Ḥimyarites and Maurousians. a stay of two days, Gregentios returns to Rome, where he meets Pope Felix IV (526–530). The holy man rejoins him and they go to Augustopolis.[10] Augustopolis, Gregentios stays with a widow named Euphemia. In the market, he meets an Armenian from Artazat (Artaxata), who prophesies his future. a few days, the holy man and Gregentios board a ship from Leukas for Alexandria. There, Gregentios is greeted by name by a female slave, whose prophesies how the patriarch will call him to be an archbishop. He stays in the house of one Leontios. In Alexandria, he visits a monastery led by a eunuch-abbot named Epiphanios. His prayers chase away a devil who throws stones at a monk named Kosmas. A woman named Archontia greets him by name.[10] in South Arabia last part of the Bios "contains the only clear historical information scattered through the whole" of the Gregentios materials.[13] 523, the Ḥimyarite king Dhū Nuwās massacres the Christians of Najrān and its leader, Arethas. Emperor Justin I asks the Ethiopian (Aksumite) king Elesboam (Caleb) to lead an expedition against Dhū Nuwās. writes to the patriarch of Alexandria, Proterios, for a bishop to evangelize the Ḥimyarites.[14] (The actual patriarch at this time was Timothy IV.[2]) Mark informs Proterios of Gregentios in a dream. The patriarch consecrates Gregentios as bishop and send him back with the Ethiopian envoys.[14] This takes place after the successful Ethiopian conquest of Ḥimyar (525).[2] Ethiopia, Gregentios stays for a time in the capital, Amlem (Aksum), before crossing the sea to Medekion (Maddaban) and then heading to Taphar (Ẓafār) and finally Najrān, where he meets the king. consecrates the churches that the kings has built and installs priests in them at Najrān, Ẓafār, Akana, Atarph, Legmia , Azaki and Iouze.[14][15] Bios describes Elesboam's retirement to a monastery and the miraculous invocation of his name. Gregentios threatens the Ḥimyarites with the death penalty for all those who do not convert, whereupon the hole country becomes Christian. The Dialexis is interposed here, and the end of the Bios follows.[14] remains in Ḥimyar for thirty years, assisting Elesboam's appointed viceroy, Abraha, in building churches. Shortly after Abraha dies and is succeeded by his son Seridos (Masrūq), Gregentios dies on 19 December. He is buried in the cathedral.[16] He is commemorated in the Synaxarion of Constantinople on 19 December.[2] Start of the Nomoi in a manuscript copied in Gaza in 1487[17] Nomoi ton Homeriton, also known in Latin as Leges Homeritarum,[18] is usually regarded as a fictional law code containing some amount of authentic pre-Islamic South Arabian material. The laws are not arranged thematically, but may be subsumed under eight headings: (1) morals, marriage and family; (2) slavery; (3) right of employment; (4) culture and social life; (5) cruelty against animals; (6) rental laws; (7) officeholders; and (8) miscellaneous. Within the last class are laws concerning sorcery, poisoning, perjury, theft, extrajudicial punishments, infringing ecclesiastical asylum, workhouses for criminals and prohibitions on begging. The Nomoi do not come near to being a comprehensive law code. There is, for example, no law of inheritance.[19] Nomoi prescribes harsh punishments for transgressions, often mutilation, and mitigating factors are nowhere admitted. Its strong prohibitions of wife-beating and cruelty to animals stand out, however, since Byzantine law knew no restriction on the treatment of animals. The laws seem concerned strictly with an urban community like Najrān. Administration and taxation are governed in a clearly Byzantine manner. The prohibitions on dancing, singing, gambling and gaming may be taken from the canons of the Quinisext Council (691/692). On the whole, the influence of canon law is limited, but Christian theological justifications are provided for the laws. Although the Nomoi is a civil law code, it presents itself as having been promulgated by a supernatural force to the geitoniarchai (administrators of Najrān's 36 districts). It bears the unmistakable stamp of a Christian monk of a strong ascetic spirit. In the words of J. B. Bury, the laws "illustrate the kind of legislation at which the ecclesiastical spirit, unchecked, would have aimed."[20] and authorship authenticity of the Nomoi was first put in doubt by Cardinal Jean-Baptiste-François Pitra in 1864. He was followed by many, including Louis Duchesne, but in 1969 Nina Pigulevskaya defended a 6th-century origin. She thought the code was written in the Byzantine Empire and never actually came into force in Ḥimyar. Irfan Shahîd and A. K. Irvine have also defended the authenticity of the code.[21] Garth Fowden considers that it contains some authentic material.[18] It mentions a slave market at a place called Trikanos or Trikanon, a place not attested anywhere else.[21] features of the Nomoi that would be unusual in 6th-century Byzantium have been ascribed to South Arabian influence. They may, however, reflect a later date of composition. Mutilation was an uncommon punishment in Byzantine law prior to Leo III's Ecloga (741). One of the most unusual and cruel punishments in the Nomoi—suspending a convict upside down and smoking him to death with burning hay—is actually attested in an 8th-century Byzantine source (Nikephoros's Breviarium). Some prescriptions regarding marriage in the Nomoi became a part of Byzantine law during the reign Leo VI (886–912).[22] Similarities between the Najrān of the Nomoi and Constantinople under the Macedonian dynasty suggest that the Nomoi was probably written at Constantinople in the 10th century.[23] The Nomoi may be compared with other pseudepigraphal texts of supposed supernatural origin from Byzantium, such as the Didascalia Apostolorum and Letter of Christ Fallen from Heaven.[24] earliest manuscript witness to the Nomoi, a copy made in 1180 on Cyprus, shows some Western influence in its terminology. It is probable that it was copied from a manuscript made shortly before in Crusader Syria. Some of its terminology does not appear in Greek again until the Assizes of Cyprus in the 14th century.[24] Dialexis purports to be a record written around 550 or 560 of a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban that took place before the royal court of Ḥimyar around 520 or 530. The author does not claim to have been present or to have known Gregentios, but does claim to have had access to a record of the proceedings written at the time by the notary Palladios. [25] The text, however, shows clear evidence of having been composed after the start of the controversies over monothelitism (7th century), iconoclasm (8th century) and the filioque clause, which only became a live controversy in the Byzantine Empire after 860.[26] is a treatise against the Azymites in the form of a letter that is ascribed to Gregentios in one manuscript. Given the issue it discusses, it can have no connection to the time in which Gregentios supposedly lived. In 1660, some "letters of Gregentios"—possibly the same treatise—were catalogued as part of the library of Denis Pétau that had been purchased after his death by Queen Christina of Sweden. There is no further record of these letters and they appear to be lost.[27] Afar, Ethiopia (Semara) ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar.

Africa, East Africa, 900-1270, Christian Ethiopian Zagwe Dynasty

Africa, East Africa, 900-1270, Ethiopian Zagwe dynasty, Christian
East Africa, Abyssinia, 900-1270, Ethiopian Zagwe dynasty, Christian; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30;

Africa, East Africa, 1137-1974, Christian Ethopian Empire, Orthodox

Africa, East Africa, Abyssinia, 1137-1974, Ethiopian Empire, Christian, Orthodox
East Africa, Abyssinia, 1137-1974, Ethiopian Empire, Christian, Orthodox; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30;

Africa, East Africa, Uganda History Folder, 1856-1979

Africa, East Africa, 1800, 19th 20th Century Folder, Uganda, Homosexual Mwanga War, British Protectorate

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1856-1884, Ugandan King, Muteesa I of Buganda, Christian
Ugandan King, 1856-1884, Muteesa I of Buganda; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885); THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886);

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1884-1897, Ugandan King, Mwanga II of Buganda, Pagan
Ugandan King, 1884-1897, Mwanga II of Buganda; THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886);

Africa, East Africa, 1884-1886, JAMES HANNINGTON & MARTYRS OF UGANDA, East Africa, Anglican & Catholic martyrs killed by Mwanga
Africa, East Africa, 1884-1886, JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, East Africa, Anglican and Catholic martyrs killed by Mwanga, after Christian father Mutesa; Uganda; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885) ; the new nations of Africa, Uganda is the most predominantly Christian. work began there in the 1870's with the favor of King Mutesa, who died in 1884. his son and successor, King Mwanga, opposed all foreign presence, including the missions. Hannington, born 1847, was sent out from England in 1884 by the Anglican Church as missionary Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa. he was travelling toward Uganda, he was apprehended by emissaries of King Mwanga. and his companions were brutally treated and, a week later, 29 October 1885, most of them were put to death. last words were: "Go tell your master that I have purchased the road to Uganda with my blood." first native martyr was the Roman Catholic Joseph Mkasa Balikuddembe, who was beheaded after having rebuked the king for his debauchery and for the murder of Bishop Hannington. 3 June 1886, a group of 32 men and boys, 22 Roman Catholic and 10 Anglican, were burned at the stake. of them were young pages in Mwanga's household, from their head-man, Charles Lwanga, to the thirteen-year-old Kizito, who went to his death "laughing and chattering." and many other Ugandan Christians suffered for their faith then and in the next few years. 1977, the Anglican Archbishop Janani Luwum and many other Christians suffered death for their faith under the tyrant Idi Amin. largely to their common heritage of suffering for their Master, Christians of various communions in Uganda have always been on excellent terms. by James Kiefer THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886) ; 3 June 1886, thirty-two young men, pages of the court of King Mwanga of Buganda, were burned to death at Namugongo for their refusal to renounce Christianity. the following months many other Christians throughout the country died by spear or fire for their faith. martyrdoms totally changed the dynamic of Christian growth in Uganda. by a handful of Anglican and Roman missionaries after 1877, the Christian faith had been preached only to the immediate members of the court, by order of King Mutesa. successor, Mwanga, became increasingly angry as he realized that the first converts put loyalty to Christ above the traditional loyalty to the king. began in 1885. first forbade anyone to go near a Christian mission on pain of death, finding himself unable to cool the ardor of the converts, resolved to wipe out Christianity. Matryrs of Uganda Namugongo martyrdoms produced a result entirely opposite to Mwanga's intentions. example of these martyrs, who walked to their deaths singing hymns and praying for their enemies, so inspired many of the bystanders that they began to seek instruction from the remaining Christians. a few years the original handful of converts had multiplied many times and spread far beyond the court. martyrs had left the indelible impression that Christianity was truly African, not simply a white man's religion. of the missionary work was carried out by Africans rather than by white missionaries, and Christianity spread steadily. now has the largest percentage of professed Christians of any nation in Africa. years ago I heard an African clergyman, born of pagan parents, tell of his conversion. He said: afternoon I was bicycling along a road and met a young man about my own age bicycling in the opposite direction. He promptly turned about and began to ride beside me and to talk. spoke with great enthusiasm about Jesus, whom I had never heard of before, and how He had destroyed the power of death and evil by dying and rising again, and how He was God become man to reconcile man with God. heard what my companion had to say, and before we parted I had accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. Now, the young man who preached the Good News of Jesus Christ to me that afternoon had himself heard of Jesus for the first time that morning. persecution of Christians in the 1970's by the military dictatorship of Idi Amin proved the vitality of the example of the Namugongo martyrs. the thousands of new martyrs, both Anglican and Roman, was Janani Luwum, Archbishop of the (Anglican) Church of Uganda. by James Kiefer

Africa, East Africa, 1885-1897, Homosexual War of King Mwanga
Uganda, 1885-1897, Homosexual War of King Mwanga ; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885) ; THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886);

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1894-1962, British Protectorate
Uganda, 1894-1962, British Protectorate; THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886);

Africa, East Africa, 1900, 20th Century Folder, Uganda, Milton Obote, Idi Amin

Africa, East Africa, 1942-1977, JANANI LUWUM, Revival, independence 1962, 1966 Obote, 1971 Idi Amin, 1974 J archbishop, killed
Africa, East Africa, 1942-1977, JANANI LUWUM, Buwalasi Theological College, Sironko District, Uganda, Revival Movement, Bishop, independent country 1962, 1966 Obote control, 1971 General Idi Amin, repression, Asians expulsion, christians killed, 1974 J archbishop, widespread terror, killed, centennial, return to christianity ; Buwalasi Theological College, Sironko District, Uganda, East Africa; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); Luwum was born in 1922. His father was a convert to Christianity. Janani was sent to school and eventually became a schoolteacher. In 1948 he was converted. He became very active in the East African revival movement, and became a lay reader, then a deacon, and then a priest in 1956. He was chosen to study for a year at St Augustine's College in Canterbury, England. He returned to Uganda, worked as a parish priest, and then taught at Buwalasi Theological College. He made a second visit to Britain to study at the London College of Divinity, returning to Uganda to become Principal of Buwalasi. In 1969 he was consecrated bishop of Northern Uganda. Church in Uganda began with the deaths of martyrs (see Martyrs of Uganda, 3 June 1886, and James Hannington and his Companions, Martyrs, 29 October 1885). Around 1900, Uganda became a British protectorate, with the chief of the Buganda tribe as nominal ruler, and with several other tribes included in the protectorate. In 1962 Uganda became an independent country within the British Commonwealth, with the Bugandan chief as president and Milton Obote, of the Lango tribe, as Prime Minister. In 1966, Obote took full control of the government. In 1971, he was overthrown by General Idi Amin, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces. Almost immediately, he began a policy of repression, arresting anyone suspected of not supporting him. Hundreds of soldiers from the Lango and Acholi tribes were shot down in their barracks. Amin ordered the expulsion of the Asian population of Uganda, about 55,000 persons, mostly small shopkeepers from India and Pakistan. Over the next few years, many Christians were killed for various offenses. A preacher who read over the radio a Psalm which mentioned Israel was shot for this in 1972. 1974 Janani Luwum he became Archbishop of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Boga-Zaire. As we have seen, it was a time of widespread terror. Archbishop Luwum often went personally to the office of the dreaded State Research Bureau to help secure the release of prisoners. between Church and state worsened in 1976. Religious leaders, including Archbishop Luwum, jointly approached Idi Amin to share their concern. They were rebuffed. But Archbishop Luwum continued to attend Government functions. One of his critics accused him of being on the Government side and he replied: "I face daily being picked up by the soldiers. While the opportunity is there I preach the Gospel with all my might, and my conscience is clear before God that I have not sided with the present Government which is utterly self-seeking. I have been threatened many times. Whenever I have the opportunity I have told the President the things the churches disapprove of." in 1977, there was a small army rebellion that was put down with only seven men dead. However, Amin determined to stamp out all traces of dissent. His men killed thousands, including the entire population of Milton Obote's home village. On Sunday, 30 January, Bishop Festo Kivengere preached on "The Preciousness of Life" to an audience including many high government officials. He denounced the arbitrary bloodletting, and accused the government of abusing the authority that God had entrusted to it. The government responded on the following Saturday (5 February) by an early (1:30am) raid on the home of the Archbishop, Janani Luwum, ostensibly to search for hidden stores of weapons. Archbishop called on President Amin to deliver a note of protest, signed by nearly all the bishops of Uganda, against the policies of arbitrary killings and the unexplained disappearances of many persons. Amin accused the Archbishop of treason, produced a document supposedly by former President Obote attesting his guilt, and had the Archbishop and two Cabinet members (both committed Christians) arrested and held for military trial. 16 February, the Archbishop and six bishops were tried on a charge of smuggling arms. Archbishop Luwum was not allowed to reply, but shook his head in denial. The President concluded by asking the crowd: "What shall we do with these traitors?" The soldiers replied "Kill him now". The Archbishop was separated from his bishops. As he was taken away Archbishop Luwum turned to his brother bishops and said: "Do not be afraid. I see God's hand in this." three (the Archbishop and the two Cabinet members) met briefly with four other prisoners who were awaiting execution, and were permitted to pray with them briefly. Then the three were placed in a Land Rover and not seen alive again by their friends. The government story is that one of the prisoners tried to seize control of the vehicle and that it was wrecked and the passengers killed. The story believed by the Archbishop's supporters is that he refused to sign a confession, was beaten and otherwise abused, and finally shot. His body was placed in a sealed coffin and sent to his native village for burial there. However, the villagers opened the coffin and discovered the bullet holes. In the capital city of Kampala a crowd of about 4,500 gathered for a memorial service beside the grave that had been prepared for him next to that of the martyred bishop Hannington. In Nairobi, the capital of nearby Kenya, about 10,000 gathered for another memorial service. Bishop Kivengere was informed that he was about to be arrested, and he and his family fled to Kenya, as did the widow and orphans of Archbishop Luwum. following June, about 25,000 Ugandans came to the capital to celebrate the centennial of the first preaching of the Gospel in their country, among the participants were many who had abandoned Christianity, but who had returned to their Faith as a result of seeing the courage of Archbishop Luwum and his companions in the face of death. by James Kiefer

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1966-1971, President, Milton Obote
East Africa, Ugandan President, 1966-1971, Milton Obote; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1971-1979, President, Idi Amin
East Africa, Ugandan President, 1971-1979, Idi Amin; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Africa, East Africa, Sudan Folder, 1983 - 2005

Sudanese Diaspora - Martyrs of South Sudan 1983 - 2005
Sudanese Diaspora - Martyrs of South Sudan 1983 ; MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983) ; Christian bishops, chiefs, commanders, clergy and people of Sudan declared, on May 16, 1983, that they would not abandon God as God had revealed himself to them under threat of Shariah Law imposed by the fundamentalist Islamic government in Khartoum. a peace treaty was signed on January 9, 2005, the Episcopal Church of the Province of the Sudan suffered from persecution and devastation through twenty-two years of civil war. and a half million people were killed, half of whom were members of this church. Many clergy and lay leaders were singled out because of their religious leadership in their communities. buildings, including churches and schools, are left standing in an area the size of Alaska. Four million people are internally displaced, and a million are scattered around Africa and beyond in the Sudanese Diaspora. of the twenty-four dioceses exist in exile in Uganda or Kenya, and the majority of the clergy are unpaid. 5% of the population of Southern Sudan was Christian in 1983. Today over 85% of that region of six million is now mostly Episcopalian or Roman Catholic. faith rooted deeply in the mercy of God has renewed their spirits through out the years of strife and sorrow.

Africa, East Africa, Blue Nile River Folder

Blue Nile River

Blue Nile Source (Lake Tana, Ethiopia)
Blue Nile;

Blue Nile Spring Mt Gish (sacred source of the Nile)
Mt Gish Blue Nile Spring (sacred source of the Nile, at 9,000 ft elevation, in Ethiopia); Gish Abay Spring;

Blue Nile 1 (Blue Nile Falls)
Blue Nile Falls;

Blue Nile 2

Blue Nile 3

Blue Nile 4

Blue Nile 18 (Ethopia)

Blue Nile 19 (Sudan)

Blue Nile 27 (Khartoum, Nile River Source)

Africa, East Africa, White Nile Folder

White Nile River

White Nile Source (Lake Victoria)
White Nile; Lake Victoria;

White Nile 1 (Buganda and Namugongo, Uganda)

White Nile 2 (Victoria Nile section)

White Nile 3 (Albert Lake, Albert Nile section)

White Nile 4 (Sudan-Uganda Border)

White Nile 5 (Juba, Sudan)

White Nile 6

White Nile 7

White Nile 8 (Lake No, South Sudan)

White Nile 9

White Nile 10 (Sudan-Egypt border)

White Nile Mouth (Kartoum, Blue Nile, Nile River Source)

Africa, East Africa, Albert Nile Folder

Albert Nile (Semliki) River

Albert Nile Source (Lake Albert, Uganda)

Semliki River Mouth (Lake Albert)

Rwenzori Mountains

Semliki River Source (Lake Edward)

Mitumba Mountains (North Kivu)
Mitumba Mountainsl

Rutshura River

Rutshuru River Source (Lake Mutanda)

Rutshuru River Mouth (Lake Edward)

Virunga Mountains
Virunga Mountains;

Africa, East Africa, Sudan Folder

Sudan, East Africa
Sudan; FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE, NURSE, RENEWER OF SOCIETY (12 AUGUST 1910); PHILIP, DEACON AND EVANGELIST (11 OCT NT); CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983);

British Empire - Sudan, East Africa
Sudan; FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE, NURSE, RENEWER OF SOCIETY (12 AUGUST 1910); PHILIP, DEACON AND EVANGELIST (11 OCT NT); CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983);

Sudan History Folder

Nubia (Sudan)
Nubia; PHILIP, DEACON AND EVANGELIST (11 OCT NT);

Khartoum, Sudan, East Africa (Nile River Source, Blue Nile, White Nile)
Khartoum; FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE, NURSE, RENEWER OF SOCIETY (12 AUGUST 1910); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983);

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia Folder

Ethiopia, East Africa
Ethiopia; PHILIP, DEACON AND EVANGELIST (11 OCT NT); Apostle Philip of the Seventy, One of the Seven Deacons, Commemorated on October 11 ; Icon of the Mother of God Arapet (Arabian), Commemorated September 6 ; Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated October 6 ; Blessed Elesbaan the King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24 ; Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, Commemorated November 16 ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; St Niphon the Bishop of Cyprus, Commemorated December 23 ; Venerable Mark the Anchorite of Athens, Commemorated on April 5;

British Empire - British Somaliland - East Africa, Gulf of Aden
British Empire - British Somaliland - East Africa; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836);

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia History Folder

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 33-34, Apostle Philip, Deacon Evangelist, Converted Ethiopian Queen's Minister on road to Gaza
East Africa, Ethiopia, 33-34, Apostle Philip, Deacon Evangelist, Converted Ethiopian Queen's Minister on road to Gaza; the command of an angel of the Lord, Saint Philip set out (from Samaria) upon the road connecting Jerusalem with Gaza. There he met an official of the empress of Ethiopia, whom also he converted to Christianity (Acts 8:26-39). Ethiopia; PHILIP, DEACON AND EVANGELIST (11 OCT NT); Apostle Philip of the Seventy, One of the Seven Deacons, Commemorated on October 11; Apostle Philip of the Seventy, one of the 7 Deacons is not to be confused with Saint Philip one of the Twelve Apostles (November 14). This Philip was born in Palestine, was married and had children. the Descent of the Holy Spirit, the Twelve Apostles made Philip a deacon in the Church of Jerusalem. Along with the other six deacons, they appointed him to deal with the offerings of the faithful and attend to the concerns of the widowed, the orphaned and the needy. The eldest among the seven deacons was the holy Archdeacon Stephen. the persecution of Christians began, the Jews stoned the Protomartyr Stephen. Apostle Philip left Jerusalem and settled in Samaria. There he successfully preached Christianity. Among the disciple’s converts was the noted magician Simon, who “after being baptized, continued with Philip.” (Acts 8:9-13) the command of an angel of the Lord, Saint Philip set out upon the road connecting Jerusalem with Gaza. There he met an official of the empress of Ethiopia, whom also he converted to Christianity (Acts 8:26-39). holy disciple Philip tirelessly preached the Word of God in many of the lands of the Near East adjoining Palestine. Jerusalem the Apostles made him a bishop and sent him to Tralles in Asia Minor, where he also baptized many. Saint Philip died in old age.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 33-38, Apostle Thomas, established Ehtiopian church or churches, Arab Icon
Ethiopia, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; East Africa, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Thomas is commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" because he doubted Jesus' resurrection when first told of it (as related in the Gospel of John alone); later, he confessed his faith ("My Lord and my God") on seeing Jesus' crucifixion wounds. to traditional accounts of the Saint Thomas Christians of modern-day Kerala in India, Thomas is believed to have travelled outside the Roman Empire to preach the Gospel, travelling as far as the Tamilakam which is in South India.[1][5][6][7] According to their tradition, Thomas reached Muziris of Tamilakam (modern-day North Paravur and Kodungalloor in Kerala State, India) in AD 52.[8][9][1] In 1258, some of the relics were brought to Ortona, in Abruzzo, Italy, where they have been held in the Church of Saint Thomas the Apostle.[10] He is often regarded as the patron saint of India among its Christian adherents,[11][12] and the Feast of Saint Thomas on July 3 is celebrated as Indian Christian Day by believers belonging to many Christian denominations.[13][14] The name Thomas remains quite popular among the Saint Thomas Christians of the Indian subcontinent. Arapet Icon of the Mother of God, Commemorated on September 6; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6; Holy and Glorious Apostle Thomas was born in the Galilean city of Pansada and was a fisherman. Hearing the good tidings of Jesus Christ, he left all and followed after Him. The Apostle Thomas is included in the number of the holy Twelve Apostles of the Savior. to Holy Scripture, the holy Apostle Thomas did not believe the reports of the other disciples about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ: “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). the eighth day after the Resurrection, the Lord appeared to the Apostle Thomas and showed him His wounds. “My Lord and my God,” the Apostle cried out (John 20:28). “Thomas, being once weaker in faith than the other apostles,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “toiled through the grace of God more bravely, more zealously and tirelessly than them all, so that he went preaching over nearly all the earth, not fearing to proclaim the Word of God to savage nations.” icons depicting this event are inscribed “The Doubting Thomas.” This is incorrect. In Greek, the inscription reads, “The Touching of Thomas.” In Slavonic, it says, “The Belief of Thomas.” When Saint Thomas touched the Life-giving side of the Lord, he no longer had any doubts. to Church Tradition, the holy Apostle Thomas founded Christian churches in Palestine, Mesopotamia, Parthia, Ethiopia and India. Preaching the Gospel earned him a martyr’s death. For having converted the wife and son of the prefect of the Indian city of Meliapur [Melipur], the holy apostle was locked up in prison, suffered torture, and finally, pierced with five spears, he departed to the Lord. Part of the relics of the holy Apostle Thomas are in India, in Hungary and on Mt. Athos. The name of the Apostle Thomas is associated with the Arabian (or Arapet) Icon of the Mother of God (September 6).

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 33-38, Arab Icon, Appeared to Apostle Thomas
Arabs, 38-43, Arab Icon, Appeared to Apostle Thomas; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). East Africa, 1st Century, Apostle Thomas; the Apostle was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Thomas is commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" because he doubted Jesus' resurrection when first told of it (as related in the Gospel of John alone); later, he confessed his faith ("My Lord and my God") on seeing Jesus' crucifixion wounds. to traditional accounts of the Saint Thomas Christians of modern-day Kerala in India, Thomas is believed to have travelled outside the Roman Empire to preach the Gospel, travelling as far as the Tamilakam which is in South India.[1][5][6][7] According to their tradition, Thomas reached Muziris of Tamilakam (modern-day North Paravur and Kodungalloor in Kerala State, India) in AD 52.[8][9][1] In 1258, some of the relics were brought to Ortona, in Abruzzo, Italy, where they have been held in the Church of Saint Thomas the Apostle.[10] He is often regarded as the patron saint of India among its Christian adherents,[11][12] and the Feast of Saint Thomas on July 3 is celebrated as Indian Christian Day by believers belonging to many Christian denominations.[13][14] The name Thomas remains quite popular among the Saint Thomas Christians of the Indian subcontinent. Arapet Icon of the Mother of God, Commemorated on September 6; Arapet, or “Arabian” Icon of the Most Holy Theotokos appeared while the holy Apostle Thomas (October 6) was evangelizing Ethiopia, Arabia, and India. of the usual three stars (signifying the perpetual virginity of the Mother of God), the outer garment of the Theotokos has three circles with the head of an angel inside each one. In this feature, it resembles the icons “In Giving Birth you Preserved your Virginity” (“A Virgin Before and After Giving Birth”) (October 17) and “O All-Hymned Mother” (October 6). Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6; Holy and Glorious Apostle Thomas was born in the Galilean city of Pansada and was a fisherman. Hearing the good tidings of Jesus Christ, he left all and followed after Him. The Apostle Thomas is included in the number of the holy Twelve Apostles of the Savior. to Holy Scripture, the holy Apostle Thomas did not believe the reports of the other disciples about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ: “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into His side, I will not believe” (John 20:25). the eighth day after the Resurrection, the Lord appeared to the Apostle Thomas and showed him His wounds. “My Lord and my God,” the Apostle cried out (John 20:28). “Thomas, being once weaker in faith than the other apostles,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “toiled through the grace of God more bravely, more zealously and tirelessly than them all, so that he went preaching over nearly all the earth, not fearing to proclaim the Word of God to savage nations.” icons depicting this event are inscribed “The Doubting Thomas.” This is incorrect. In Greek, the inscription reads, “The Touching of Thomas.” In Slavonic, it says, “The Belief of Thomas.” When Saint Thomas touched the Life-giving side of the Lord, he no longer had any doubts. to Church Tradition, the holy Apostle Thomas founded Christian churches in Palestine, Mesopotamia, Parthia, Ethiopia and India. Preaching the Gospel earned him a martyr’s death. For having converted the wife and son of the prefect of the Indian city of Meliapur [Melipur], the holy apostle was locked up in prison, suffered torture, and finally, pierced with five spears, he departed to the Lord. Part of the relics of the holy Apostle Thomas are in India, in Hungary and on Mt. Athos. The name of the Apostle Thomas is associated with the Arabian (or Arapet) Icon of the Mother of God (September 6).

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 80-90, Apostle Matthew, city of Mirmena, staff tree fruit, Fulvian story
Ethiopia, 1st Century, Apostle Matthew; Holy, Glorious Apostle Thomas, Commemorated on October 6 ; Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, Commemorated on November 16; holy Apostle brought the Gospel of Christ to Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia, and finishing his preaching in Ethiopia with a martyr’s death. This land was inhabited by tribes of cannibals with primitive customs and beliefs. The holy Apostle Matthew converted some of the idol-worshippers to faith in Christ. He founded the Church and built a temple in the city of Mirmena, establishing there his companion Platon as bishop. the holy apostle was fervently entreating God for the conversion of the Ethiopians the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of a youth. He gave him a staff, and commanded him to plant it at the doors of the church. The Lord said that a tree would grow from this staff and it would bear fruit, and from its roots would flow a stream of water. When the Ethiopians washed themselves in the water and ate the fruit, they lost their wild ways and became gentle and good. the holy apostle carried the staff towards the church, he was met by the wife and son of the ruler of the land, Fulvian, who were afflicted by unclean spirits. In the Name of Christ the holy apostle healed them. This miracle converted a number of the pagans to the Lord. But the ruler did not want his subjects to become Christians and cease worshiping the pagan gods. He accused the apostle of sorcery and gave orders to execute him. put Saint Matthew head downwards, piled up brushwood and ignited it. When the fire flared up, everyone then saw that the fire did not harm Saint Matthew. Then Fulvian gave orders to add more wood to the fire, and frenzied with boldness, he commanded to set up twelve idols around the fire. But the flames melted the idols and flared up toward Fulvian. The frightened Ethiopian turned to the saint with an entreaty for mercy, and by the prayer of the martyr the flame went out. The body of the holy apostle remained unharmed, and he departed to the Lord. ruler Fulvian deeply repented of his deed, but still he had doubts. By his command, they put the body of Saint Matthew into an iron coffin and threw it into the sea. In doing this Fulvian said that if the God of Matthew would preserve the body of the apostle in the water as He preserved him in the fire, then this would be proper reason to worship this One True God. night the Apostle Matthew appeared to Bishop Platon in a dream, and commanded him to go with clergy to the shore of the sea and to find his body there. The righteous Fulvian and his retinue went with the bishop to the shore of the sea. The coffin carried by the waves was taken to the church built by the apostle. Then Fulvian begged forgiveness of the holy Apostle Matthew, after which Bishop Platon baptized him, giving him the name Matthew in obedience to a command of God. Saint Fulvian-Matthew abdicated his rule and became a presbyter. Upon the death of Bishop Platon, the Apostle Matthew appeared to him and exhorted him to head the Ethiopian Church. Having become a bishop, Saint Fulvian-Matthew toiled at preaching the Word of God, continuing the work of his heavenly patron. Holy Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, was also named Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27); he was one of the Twelve Apostles (Mark 3:18; Luke 6:45; Acts 1:13), and was brother of the Apostle James Alphaeus (Mark 2:14). was a publican, or tax-collector for Rome, in a time when the Jews were under the rule of the Roman Empire. lived in the Galilean city of Capernaum. When Matthew heard the voice of Jesus Christ: “Come, follow Me” (Mt. 9:9), left everything and followed the Savior. Christ and His disciples did not refuse Matthew’s invitation and they visited his house, where they shared table with the publican’s friends and acquaintances. Like the host, they were also publicans and known sinners. This event disturbed the pharisees and scribes a great deal. who collected taxes from their countrymen did this with great profit for themselves. Usually greedy and cruel people, the Jews considered them pernicious betrayers of their country and religion. The word “publican” for the Jews had the connotation of “public sinner” and “idol-worshipper.” To even speak with a tax-collector was considered a sin, and to associate with one was defilement. But the Jewish teachers were not able to comprehend that the Lord had “come to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mt. 9:13). acknowledging his sinfulness, repaid fourfold anyone he had cheated, and he distributed his remaining possessions to the poor, and he followed after Christ with the other apostles. Matthew was attentive to the instructions of the Divine Teacher, he beheld His innumerable miracles, he went together with the Twelve Apostles preaching to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt. 10:6). He was a witness to the suffering, death, and Resurrection of the Savior, and of His glorious Ascension into Heaven. received the grace of the Holy Spirit, which descended upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, Saint Matthew preached in Palestine for several years. At the request of the Jewish converts at Jerusalem, the holy Apostle Matthew wrote his Gospel describing the earthly life of the Savior, before leaving to preach the Gospel in faraway lands. the order of the books of the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew comes first. Palestine is said to be the place where the Gospel was written. Saint Matthew wrote in Aramaic, and then it was translated into Greek. The Aramaic text has not survived, but many of the linguistic and cultural-historical peculiarities of the Greek translation give indications of it. Apostle Matthew preached among people who were awaiting the Messiah. His Gospel manifests itself as a vivid proof that Jesus Christ is the Messiah foretold by the prophets, and that there would not be another (Mt. 11:3). preaching and deeds of the Savior are presented by the evangelist in three divisions, constituting three aspects of the service of the Messiah: as Prophet and Law-Giver (Ch. 5-7), Lord over the world both visible and invisible (Ch. 8-25), and finally as High Priest offered as Sacrifice for the sins of all mankind (Ch. 26-27). theological content of the Gospel, besides the Christological themes, includes also the teaching about the Kingdom of God and about the Church, which the Lord sets forth in parables about the inner preparation for entering into the Kingdom (Ch. 5-7), about the worthiness of servers of the Church in the world (Ch. 10-11), about the signs of the Kingdom and its growth in the souls of mankind (Ch. 13), about the humility and simplicity of the inheritors of the Kingdom (Mt. 18:1-35; 19 13-30; 20:1-16; 25-27; 23:1-28), and about the eschatological revelations of the Kingdom in the Second Coming of Christ within the daily spiritual life of the Church (Ch. 24-25). Kingdom of Heaven and the Church are closely interconnected in the spiritual experience of Christianity: the Church is the historical embodiment of the Kingdom of Heaven in the world, and the Kingdom of Heaven is the Church of Christ in its eschatological perfection (Mt. 16:18-19; 28:18-20). holy Apostle brought the Gospel of Christ to Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia, and finishing his preaching in Ethiopia with a martyr’s death. This land was inhabited by tribes of cannibals with primitive customs and beliefs. The holy Apostle Matthew converted some of the idol-worshippers to faith in Christ. He founded the Church and built a temple in the city of Mirmena, establishing there his companion Platon as bishop. the holy apostle was fervently entreating God for the conversion of the Ethiopians the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of a youth. He gave him a staff, and commanded him to plant it at the doors of the church. The Lord said that a tree would grow from this staff and it would bear fruit, and from its roots would flow a stream of water. When the Ethiopians washed themselves in the water and ate the fruit, they lost their wild ways and became gentle and good. the holy apostle carried the staff towards the church, he was met by the wife and son of the ruler of the land, Fulvian, who were afflicted by unclean spirits. In the Name of Christ the holy apostle healed them. This miracle converted a number of the pagans to the Lord. But the ruler did not want his subjects to become Christians and cease worshiping the pagan gods. He accused the apostle of sorcery and gave orders to execute him. put Saint Matthew head downwards, piled up brushwood and ignited it. When the fire flared up, everyone then saw that the fire did not harm Saint Matthew. Then Fulvian gave orders to add more wood to the fire, and frenzied with boldness, he commanded to set up twelve idols around the fire. But the flames melted the idols and flared up toward Fulvian. The frightened Ethiopian turned to the saint with an entreaty for mercy, and by the prayer of the martyr the flame went out. The body of the holy apostle remained unharmed, and he departed to the Lord. ruler Fulvian deeply repented of his deed, but still he had doubts. By his command, they put the body of Saint Matthew into an iron coffin and threw it into the sea. In doing this Fulvian said that if the God of Matthew would preserve the body of the apostle in the water as He preserved him in the fire, then this would be proper reason to worship this One True God. night the Apostle Matthew appeared to Bishop Platon in a dream, and commanded him to go with clergy to the shore of the sea and to find his body there. The righteous Fulvian and his retinue went with the bishop to the shore of the sea. The coffin carried by the waves was taken to the church built by the apostle. Then Fulvian begged forgiveness of the holy Apostle Matthew, after which Bishop Platon baptized him, giving him the name Matthew in obedience to a command of God. Saint Fulvian-Matthew abdicated his rule and became a presbyter. Upon the death of Bishop Platon, the Apostle Matthew appeared to him and exhorted him to head the Ethiopian Church. Having become a bishop, Saint Fulvian-Matthew toiled at preaching the Word of God, continuing the work of his heavenly patron.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 80-90, Apostle Matthew, many lands, Ethiopia, Fulvian-Matthew story
Galilee, 30-90, Apostle Matthew, Capernaum, Sea of Galilee; the Apostle,[a] also known as Saint Matthew and possibly as Levi, was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve apostles of Jesus. to Christian traditions, he was also one of the four Evangelists as author of the Gospel of Matthew, and thus is also known as Matthew the Evangelist, a claim rejected by the majority of modern biblical scholars, though the "traditional authorship still has its defenders."[3] New Testament records that as a disciple, he followed Jesus, and was one of the witnesses of the Ascension of Jesus. Later Church fathers such as Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria claim that Matthew preached the Gospel to the Jewish community in Judea, before going to other countries. Capernaum; MATTHEW, APOSTLE AND EVANGELIST (21 SEP NT); day Jesus was walking and saw a tax collector named Matthew sitting at a tax collection post, and said to him, "Follow me." And Matthew stood up and followed Him, and became one of His twelve apostles. (See M 9:9-13 = P 2:13-17 = L 5:27-32) Tax collectors in those days were social outcasts. Devout Jews avoided them because they were usually dishonest (the job carried no salary, and they were expected to make their profits by cheating the people from whom they collected taxes). Patriotic and nationalistic Jews hated them because they were agents of the Roman government, the conquerors, and hated them with a double hatred if (like Matthew) they were Jews, because they had gone over to the enemy, had betrayed their own people for money. Thus, throughout the Gospels, we find tax collectors (publicans) mentioned as a standard type of sinful and despised outcast. Matthew brought many of his former associates to meet Jesus, and social outcasts in general were shown that the love of Jesus extended even to them. (Jesus numbered among his disciples persons of widely different backgrounds. They included not only Matthew, a former agent of the Roman government, but Simon the Zealot (not to be confused with Simon Peter). Josephus tells us that the Zealots were fanatical nationalists, determined to drive out the Romans by guerrilla tactics, ambushes, assassinations, terrorist methods, or whatever worked. Their motto was, "No king but Messiah, no tax but the Temple, no friend but the Zealot." It is not clear that Simon was, or had been, a member of the group that Josephus describes, but it seems clear that he would have regarded himself as at the opposite end of the political spectrum from Matthew.) The name "Matthew" means "gift of the LORD." Mark and Luke, in the story of his calling, name him "Levi." Perhaps this was his original name, and he received a new name from Jesus when he became a disciple. (It has also been suggested that he was simply a member of the tribe of Levi.) Of Matthew's life after Pentecost the Scriptures tell us nothing. Later accounts of his life vary, some reporting that he was martyred, others that he died a natural death. The Christian community since early times has commemorated him as a martyr. the Apostle Matthew is also the Evangelist Matthew -- that is, whether the Apostle Matthew wrote the Gospel that bears his name -- is disputed. The Gospel itself does not say who wrote it, but the designation "according to Matthew" is very old. In favor of his authorship it may be noted that (1) while Mark and Luke give the fourth pair of Apostles as "Matthew and Thomas," the Gospel of Matthew gives them as "Thomas and Matthew"; and (2) while Luke 5:29 explicitly states, and Mark 2:15 suggests, that Matthew gave a banquet for Jesus, Matthew 9:10 in describing the same banquet does not indicate who the host was. Both of these variations would be routine touches of modesty if Matthew was the author. On the other hand, the gospel (1) does not have the manner of an eyewitness, and (2) is thought by many scholars to contain material borrowed from Mark, whereas one would not expect someone who had been an eyewitness to borrow from someone who had not. (NOTE: The view that Mark is an older Gospel than Matthew is widespread and not long ago many scholars regarded the matter as settled. However, there is respectable opinion holding that Matthew is the earliest Gospel after all. See, for example, the comments in the Matthew volume of The Anchor Bible.) the Gospel was written by some early Christian, not an apostle, whose name was Matthew, and about whom nothing else is known. Early Christian readers, hearing the Gospel ascribed to "Matthew," would naturally associate it with the Apostle of that name, and so the ascribing of the work to the Apostle Matthew becomes common at an early date, by a perfectly natural misunderstanding. of Hierapolis, writing in the late first or early second century, says that Matthew compiled the sayings (Logia) of Jesus in Hebrew. Now the material common to Matthew and Luke, but not to Mark, includes sayings of Jesus but almost no narrative. It has therefore been conjectured that there was once a document (usually called Q), now lost, that is basically a collection of speeches by Jesus, and that Matthew (the evangelist) and Luke, had access to it while Mark did not. It has been suggested that Matthew (the apostle) is the author of this document Q, which may well have been first written in Hebrew (or Aramaic). Scripture readings associated with the day bear the themes of Matthew as a Gospel-writer (hence readings that speak of the Scriptures), Matthew as an Apostle, and Matthew as a sinner called by God's grace. by James Kiefer Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, Commemorated on November 16; Holy Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, was also named Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27); he was one of the Twelve Apostles (Mark 3:18; Luke 6:45; Acts 1:13), and was brother of the Apostle James Alphaeus (Mark 2:14). was a publican, or tax-collector for Rome, in a time when the Jews were under the rule of the Roman Empire. lived in the Galilean city of Capernaum. Matthew heard the voice of Jesus Christ: “Come, follow Me” (Mt. 9:9), left everything and followed the Savior. and His disciples did not refuse Matthew’s invitation and they visited his house, where they shared table with the publican’s friends and acquaintances. Like the host, they were also publicans and known sinners. event disturbed the pharisees and scribes a great deal. who collected taxes from their countrymen did this with great profit for themselves. Usually greedy and cruel people, the Jews considered them pernicious betrayers of their country and religion. The word “publican” for the Jews had the connotation of “public sinner” and “idol-worshipper.” To even speak with a tax-collector was considered a sin, and to associate with one was defilement. the Jewish teachers were not able to comprehend that the Lord had “come to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mt. 9:13). acknowledging his sinfulness, repaid fourfold anyone he had cheated, and he distributed his remaining possessions to the poor, and he followed after Christ with the other apostles. Matthew was attentive to the instructions of the Divine Teacher, he beheld His innumerable miracles, he went together with the Twelve Apostles preaching to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt. 10:6). was a witness to the suffering, death, and Resurrection of the Savior, and of His glorious Ascension into Heaven. received the grace of the Holy Spirit, which descended upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, Saint Matthew preached in Palestine for several years. the request of the Jewish converts at Jerusalem, the holy Apostle Matthew wrote his Gospel describing the earthly life of the Savior, before leaving to preach the Gospel in faraway lands. the order of the books of the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew comes first. Palestine is said to be the place where the Gospel was written. Saint Matthew wrote in Aramaic, and then it was translated into Greek. The Aramaic text has not survived, but many of the linguistic and cultural-historical peculiarities of the Greek translation give indications of it. Apostle Matthew preached among people who were awaiting the Messiah. His Gospel manifests itself as a vivid proof that Jesus Christ is the Messiah foretold by the prophets, and that there would not be another (Mt. 11:3). preaching and deeds of the Savior are presented by the evangelist in three divisions, constituting three aspects of the service of the as Prophet and Law-Giver (Ch. 5-7), over the world both visible and invisible (Ch. 8-25), finally as High Priest offered as Sacrifice for the sins of all mankind (Ch. 26-27). theological content of the Gospel, besides the Christological themes, includes also the teaching about the Kingdom of God and about the Church, which the Lord sets forth in parables about the inner preparation for entering into the Kingdom (Ch. 5-7), about the worthiness of servers of the Church in the world (Ch. 10-11), about the signs of the Kingdom and its growth in the souls of mankind (Ch. 13), about the humility and simplicity of the inheritors of the Kingdom (Mt. 18:1-35; 19 13-30; 20:1-16; 25-27; 23:1-28), and about the eschatological revelations of the Kingdom in the Second Coming of Christ within the daily spiritual life of the Church (Ch. 24-25). Kingdom of Heaven and the Church are closely interconnected in the spiritual experience of Christianity: the Church is the historical embodiment of the Kingdom of Heaven in the world, and the Kingdom of Heaven is the Church of Christ in its eschatological perfection (Mt. 16:18-19; 28:18-20). holy Apostle brought the Gospel of Christ to Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia, finishing his preaching in Ethiopia with a martyr’s death. land was inhabited by tribes of cannibals with primitive customs and beliefs. The holy Apostle Matthew converted some of the idol-worshippers to faith in Christ. He founded the Church and built a temple in the city of Mirmena, establishing there his companion Platon as bishop. the holy apostle was fervently entreating God for the conversion of the Ethiopians the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of a youth. He gave him a staff, and commanded him to plant it at the doors of the church. The Lord said that a tree would grow from this staff and it would bear fruit, and from its roots would flow a stream of water. the Ethiopians washed themselves in the water and ate the fruit, they lost their wild ways and became gentle and good. the holy apostle carried the staff towards the church, he was met by the wife and son of the ruler of the land, Fulvian, who were afflicted by unclean spirits. In the Name of Christ the holy apostle healed them. This miracle converted a number of the pagans to the Lord. But the ruler did not want his subjects to become Christians and cease worshiping the pagan gods. He accused the apostle of sorcery and gave orders to execute him. put Saint Matthew head downwards, piled up brushwood and ignited it. When the fire flared up, everyone then saw that the fire did not harm Saint Matthew. Then Fulvian gave orders to add more wood to the fire, and frenzied with boldness, he commanded to set up twelve idols around the fire. But the flames melted the idols and flared up toward Fulvian. The frightened Ethiopian turned to the saint with an entreaty for mercy, and by the prayer of the martyr the flame went out. The body of the holy apostle remained unharmed, and he departed to the Lord. ruler Fulvian deeply repented of his deed, but still he had doubts. his command, they put the body of Saint Matthew into an iron coffin and threw it into the sea. In doing this Fulvian said that if the God of Matthew would preserve the body of the apostle in the water as He preserved him in the fire, then this would be proper reason to worship this One True God. night the Apostle Matthew appeared to Bishop Platon in a dream, and commanded him to go with clergy to the shore of the sea and to find his body there. righteous Fulvian and his retinue went with the bishop to the shore of the sea. The coffin carried by the waves was taken to the church built by the apostle. Then Fulvian begged forgiveness of the holy Apostle Matthew, after which Bishop Platon baptized him, giving him the name Matthew in obedience to a command of God. Saint Fulvian-Matthew abdicated his rule and became a presbyter. Upon the death of Bishop Platon, the Apostle Matthew appeared to him and exhorted him to head the Ethiopian Church. Having become a bishop, Saint Fulvian-Matthew toiled at preaching the Word of God, continuing the work of his heavenly patron.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 80-90, Saint Fulvianus, Mirmena, Jesus, wooden rod, spring, Matthew burned, Fulvianus-Matthew
Africa, East Africa, 80-90, Saint Fulvianus, Mirmena (Asmara or Massawa), Jesus, wooden rod, plant it in Mirmena, sprouted immediately, delicious fruit, spring welled up, healing waters, Matthew burned at stake, Fulvianus-Matthew ; Saint Fulvianus (in Baptism Matthew), Prince of Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 16; is believed that after the day of Pentecost, the Apostle and Evangelist Matthew preached the Gospel first in Palestine, and then in Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia and finally, Ethiopia. holds that the Lord appeared to Saint Matthew, giving him a wooden rod and instructing him to plant it in a particular place in Ethiopia. his arrival at the place in Ethiopia described by the Lord, he met a Bishop named Platon. rod was planted, as the Lord had instructed, and almost immediately it sprouted leaves and grew into a beautiful tree, the fruit of which was delicious. spring also welled up nearby, the water of which could heal the sick. Ethiopians were won over to Christ, although the local sovereign Prince, Fulvianus, a dedicated pagan, was violently opposed to this and, by his order, Saint Matthew was arrested and burned at the stake. time, however, Fulvianus came to doubt his action and agonized over his horrific act. His conscience beckoned him towards Christ. Ultimately, he embraced the Christian faith and was baptized, taking the name "Matthew." the elderly Bishop Platon reposed, Saint Fulvianus-Matthew was consecrated to the episcopacy and succeeded him. He spent his remaining years preaching the Gospel and winning his people to the Church.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 100-940, Ethiopian Kingdom of Axum, Christian
Ethiopian Kingdom of Axum, 100-940, Christian; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ;

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 323-383, Bishop Frumentius, grace of the priesthood
Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 323-383, Bishop Frumentius, grace of the priesthood; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30; he returned from his consecration, Saint Frumentius began to perform miracles, bringing many people to the Church. The emperor said to him, “You have lived among us for many years, yet we never saw you perform such wonders. Why is it that you do so now?” The saint replied, “This has nothing to do with me, but is due to the grace of the priesthood.” Then the emperor and many of his subjects received holy Baptism. Frumentius, Archbishop of Inda (Ethiopia, formerly Abyssinia), was a native of the city of Tyre. still a child, he came to Abyssinia by divine Providence. up near the imperial court, he became a friend and chief counselor of the Abyssinian emperor, and afterwards tutor to his son, who ascended the throne while still a minor after the death of his father. the consent of the new emperor, Saint Frumentius journeyed to his native land and afterwards visited Alexandria and its patriarch, Saint Athanasius the Great (May 2). the blessing of Saint Athanasius, Frumentius was elevated to become Bishop of Abyssinia and he returned to that country, which had sheltered him from his childhood. he returned from his consecration, Saint Frumentius began to perform miracles, bringing many people to the Church. The emperor said to him, “You have lived among us for many years, yet we never saw you perform such wonders. Why is it that you do so now?” The saint replied, “This has nothing to do with me, but is due to the grace of the priesthood.” Then the emperor and many of his subjects received holy Baptism. accomplished the apostolic task of converting the Abyssinian nation to Christ, Saint Frumentius zealously and fruitfully guided the Church entrusted him by God for many years, then peacefully departed to the Lord in great old age.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 323-383, Frumentius, Abyssinia Saint, emperor's boyhood friend, bishop, from Tyre
East Africa, Abyssinia, 323-383, Ethiopian Saint, Frumentius; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30; Frumentius, Archbishop of Inda (Ethiopia, formerly Abyssinia), was a native of the city of Tyre. still a child, he came to Abyssinia by divine Providence. up near the imperial court, he became a friend and chief counselor of the Abyssinian emperor, and afterwards tutor to his son, who ascended the throne while still a minor after the death of his father. the consent of the new emperor, Saint Frumentius journeyed to his native land and afterwards visited Alexandria and its patriarch, Saint Athanasius the Great (May 2). the blessing of Saint Athanasius, Frumentius was elevated to become Bishop of Abyssinia and he returned to that country, which had sheltered him from his childhood. he returned from his consecration, Saint Frumentius began to perform miracles, bringing many people to the Church. The emperor said to him, “You have lived among us for many years, yet we never saw you perform such wonders. Why is it that you do so now?” The saint replied, “This has nothing to do with me, but is due to the grace of the priesthood.” Then the emperor and many of his subjects received holy Baptism. accomplished the apostolic task of converting the Abyssinian nation to Christ, Saint Frumentius zealously and fruitfully guided the Church entrusted him by God for many years, then peacefully departed to the Lord in great old age.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 333-356, Ezana of Axum, King
East Africa, 333-356, King, Ezana of Axum; was ruler of the Kingdom of Axum, an ancient kingdom located in what is now Eritrea and Ethiopia. (320s -c. 360 AD). himself employed the style (official title) "king of Saba and Salhen, Himyar and Dhu-Raydan".[1] states that ‘Ezana succeeded his father Ella Amida (Ousanas) as king while still a child but his mother, Sofya then served as regent until he came of age. He conquered the Kingdom of Kush around the year 350 AD. St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated on November 30;

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 350-405, Moses the Black, Ethiopian Saint
Egyptian Saint, 350-405, Moses the Black; MOSES THE BLACK, DESERT FATHER & MARTYR, 28 August 405; Venerable Moses the Ethiopian of Scete, Commemorated on August 28;

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 501-555, Saint Gregory of Homer or Omrits, many detailed accurate prophecies & visions, many travels, converts fourfold people
Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 501-555, Saint Gregory of Homer or Omrits was the purported archbishop of Ẓafar, the capital of the kingdom of Ḥimyar, in the mid-6th century, according to a hagiographical dossier compiled in the 10th century. This compilation is essentially legendary and fictitious, although a few parts of it are of historical value. Written in Greek, it survives also in a Slavonic translation.[2] The three works in the dossier are conventionally known as the Bios (Life), Nomoi (Laws) and Dialexis (Debate).[3] The whole dossier is sometimes known as the Acts of Gregentios.[4] name Gregentios is unknown apart from the Bios and related texts. According to the Bios, he received his name from a local holy man. Several later scribes, encountering an unheard of name, changed it to Gregorios (Gregory).[5] This is the name that appears in all the Slavonic versions, as well as an Arabic translation of the Dialexis.[2][5] It also appears in the fresco depicting Gregentios in the monastery of Koutsovendis on Cyprus, painted between 1110 and 1118.[6] Other scribal emendations are Gregentinos and Rhegentios.[5] name has a Latin ending, which may indicate a western origin for the name, but such suffixes had entered vernacular Greek by the time the Bios was written. The name may be derived from Agrigentius, "man from Agrigento", or from a combination of the name Gregory with either Agrigentius or the name of Saint Vincentius. The biography of Gregory of Agrigento was a major source used by the author of the Bios, and an itinerary of Vincentius may also have been used.[5] only known persons named after Gregentios are two 19th-century monks of Mount Athos. The first was the archimandrite of Vatopedi in April 1842 and the second a monk of the Skete of Saint Anne who died in 1879 aged 69. Both monastic communities had copies of the Bios and Dialexis of Gregentios.[5] Bios, which Jean-Marie Sansterre called a "hagiographical romance", is divided into nine chapters. While the first eight are vague in their chronology and geography, the ninth draws on superior historical sources and contains more precise details.[7] The early part, which includes an Avar raid on his hometown, may also reflect authentic conditions in the northern Balkans during the later 6th century.[8] The Bios was completed either at Constantinople in the 10th century or in Rome in the 9th century.[7] The Nomoi and Dialexis are later additions. The whole collection, which presents as a unity, was not brought together before the 10th century. The Nomoi may contain some authentic information, since it shares characteristics with legal inscriptions from pre-Islamic South Arabia.[2] The Dialexis, which is a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban, was the most popular part of the work and circulated independently into modern times.[4] life in Avaria start of the Bios of Gregentios, from a copy made in 1180 and now in Saint Catherine's Monastery, Sinai[9] to his Bios, Gregentios was born on 6 December in the late 5th century in the town of Lyplianes (Ljubljana) in the land of the Avars.[2][7][10] father was named Agapios and his mother Eusebia. At his baptism, he was named after a sage who lived on a nearby mountain. His schooling begins at the age of seven. At the age of ten, he is pushed into a river by a deer. Miraculously saved from drowning, he retires to the desert, where he receives instruction and prophecies about his future from a holy man.[11] his mother dies, Gregentios is placed in the custody of the married but childless priest who baptised him. During a barbarian invasion, the townspeople flee to the fortress of Korada. Gregentios, who was in the vineyards at the time, manages to sneak in through the Rhomanesios gate while the fortress is besieged. After the barbarians retreat, both Gregentios and his foster mother have prophetic dreams about him. At the urging of a certain Sergios, his foster mother tells her dream to an elder named Niketas, who interprets it as saying that Gregentios will one day convert a fourfold people.[11] next traveled extensively in northern and central Italy and Sicily before sailing to Alexandria in Egypt.[2][7] The Bios presents him as travelling from Lyplianes to Moryne (Murano), Antenora (Padua) and Agrigento, then by boat to Pavia, then to Milan and Carthage, then by foot to Rome, then to Augustopolis (either Augusta or Koper) and finally Alexandria. In its order, timing and means of travel, this itinerary is absurd.[12] and Sicily first departs with the holy man from the desert. They reach Moryne in a single day. There they stay with a man named Sabbatios, where a holy fool named Peter informs Gregentios that his foster parents are searching for him. The holy man and Gregentios leave Moryne after the local bishop learns of the latter's spiritual gifts. In Antenora, they stay in the house of Theodoretos, while the bishop of Moryne searches for him. Bishop Eulogios of Antenora makes Gregentios a deacon and lector. A holy woman named Theodora informs him again of his foster parents' search.[10] the holy man, Gregentios moves on to Agrigento, leaving the bishop of Antenora also to send searchers after him. He is hosted by the priest Stephanos in the church of the Mother of God outside the walls. He visits the grave of the hermit Eirene, who appears to him and talks to him. He visits two churches in the city, and a woman preaching to a crowd from a balcony predicts that he will go to Egypt and Ḥimyar. The holy man then appears and whisks Gregentios away to Milan. Going by boat, they pass Rome on the way.[10] Milan, Gregentios stays with one Niketas, while the holy man moves on to Largention (Piacenza). He visits the grave of Saint Ambrose and begins reading his works. He takes on as a disciple a boy of fourteen named Leon, who later becomes governor of Melike (either Ravenna or the land of the Melingoi) and is assassinated. Gregentios has a vision of the underworld in which he sees Leon among those who died before their time awaiting the Last Judgement. The holy man then returns and the two travel to Carthage, where they stay with one Constantine.[10] and Rome Carthage, Gregentios meets a woman named Philothea who is regarded as a mute who only barks and sighs. The holy man reveals that this is merely a gift God gave her to ward off a man who tried to seduce her. She speaks to Gregentios clearly and lucidly. his time in Carthage, he befriends a young man named George and they visit a church dedicated to Saint Anastasia. There, a holy woman identifies Gregentios by name and birthplace. When George asks for the same treatment, she reproaches and names the women he has been sinning with. young man, a Thracian named Pothetos, asks Gregentios for spiritual advice. Gregentios writes sixteen homilies that make Pothetos regret his marriage, but Gregentios convinces him to go home to his wife.[10] Carthage, the holy man takes Gregentios to Rome. On the way, he has a vision of the devil in the valley of Patherolymna. Rome, they stay with a man named Benedict near the Great Portico. He owns a slave named Elizabeth, who is sexually abused by a demon every night. After Gregentios writes a formula on a piece of papyrus and gives it to her, she is freed from the demon.[10] day, Gregentios is visited by Saint Peter, who had been absent from his grave when Gregentios visited it, for he had gone to give comfort to the persecuted Christians of Negra (Najrān). tells Gregentios that the time has not yet come for the holy man's identity to be revealed. a woman identifies Gregentios by name as the prophet of the Ḥimyarites. He is also identified by name by the monk Abramios. At the request of a beggar named Zacharias, he heals the eye of a youth named Basil. In ecstasy at the tomb of Saint Paul, he sees a vision of the saint bringing him a pallium.[10] visits a church dedicated to Saint Boniface, whose feast day he will come to share. He meets a fool for Christ named John who throws stones at passersby. visits a hermit named Michael, who sends him on to a hermit named Artados, who lives atop a mountain beyond the Dry Lakes. Artados prophesies in detail about Gregentios' future in Egypt and Ḥimyar, where he will convert four peoples: pagans, Jews, Ḥimyarites and Maurousians. a stay of two days, Gregentios returns to Rome, where he meets Pope Felix IV (526–530). The holy man rejoins him and they go to Augustopolis.[10] Augustopolis, Gregentios stays with a widow named Euphemia. In the market, he meets an Armenian from Artazat (Artaxata), who prophesies his future. a few days, the holy man and Gregentios board a ship from Leukas for Alexandria. There, Gregentios is greeted by name by a female slave, whose prophesies how the patriarch will call him to be an archbishop. He stays in the house of one Leontios. In Alexandria, he visits a monastery led by a eunuch-abbot named Epiphanios. His prayers chase away a devil who throws stones at a monk named Kosmas. A woman named Archontia greets him by name.[10] in South Arabia last part of the Bios "contains the only clear historical information scattered through the whole" of the Gregentios materials.[13] 523, the Ḥimyarite king Dhū Nuwās massacres the Christians of Najrān and its leader, Arethas. Emperor Justin I asks the Ethiopian (Aksumite) king Elesboam (Caleb) to lead an expedition against Dhū Nuwās. writes to the patriarch of Alexandria, Proterios, for a bishop to evangelize the Ḥimyarites.[14] (The actual patriarch at this time was Timothy IV.[2]) Mark informs Proterios of Gregentios in a dream. The patriarch consecrates Gregentios as bishop and send him back with the Ethiopian envoys.[14] This takes place after the successful Ethiopian conquest of Ḥimyar (525).[2] Ethiopia, Gregentios stays for a time in the capital, Amlem (Aksum), before crossing the sea to Medekion (Maddaban) and then heading to Taphar (Ẓafār) and finally Najrān, where he meets the king. consecrates the churches that the kings has built and installs priests in them at Najrān, Ẓafār, Akana, Atarph, Legmia , Azaki and Iouze.[14][15] Bios describes Elesboam's retirement to a monastery and the miraculous invocation of his name. Gregentios threatens the Ḥimyarites with the death penalty for all those who do not convert, whereupon the hole country becomes Christian. The Dialexis is interposed here, and the end of the Bios follows.[14] remains in Ḥimyar for thirty years, assisting Elesboam's appointed viceroy, Abraha, in building churches. Shortly after Abraha dies and is succeeded by his son Seridos (Masrūq), Gregentios dies on 19 December. He is buried in the cathedral.[16] He is commemorated in the Synaxarion of Constantinople on 19 December.[2] Start of the Nomoi in a manuscript copied in Gaza in 1487[17] Nomoi ton Homeriton, also known in Latin as Leges Homeritarum,[18] is usually regarded as a fictional law code containing some amount of authentic pre-Islamic South Arabian material. The laws are not arranged thematically, but may be subsumed under eight headings: (1) morals, marriage and family; (2) slavery; (3) right of employment; (4) culture and social life; (5) cruelty against animals; (6) rental laws; (7) officeholders; and (8) miscellaneous. Within the last class are laws concerning sorcery, poisoning, perjury, theft, extrajudicial punishments, infringing ecclesiastical asylum, workhouses for criminals and prohibitions on begging. The Nomoi do not come near to being a comprehensive law code. There is, for example, no law of inheritance.[19] Nomoi prescribes harsh punishments for transgressions, often mutilation, and mitigating factors are nowhere admitted. Its strong prohibitions of wife-beating and cruelty to animals stand out, however, since Byzantine law knew no restriction on the treatment of animals. The laws seem concerned strictly with an urban community like Najrān. Administration and taxation are governed in a clearly Byzantine manner. The prohibitions on dancing, singing, gambling and gaming may be taken from the canons of the Quinisext Council (691/692). On the whole, the influence of canon law is limited, but Christian theological justifications are provided for the laws. Although the Nomoi is a civil law code, it presents itself as having been promulgated by a supernatural force to the geitoniarchai (administrators of Najrān's 36 districts). It bears the unmistakable stamp of a Christian monk of a strong ascetic spirit. In the words of J. B. Bury, the laws "illustrate the kind of legislation at which the ecclesiastical spirit, unchecked, would have aimed."[20] and authorship authenticity of the Nomoi was first put in doubt by Cardinal Jean-Baptiste-François Pitra in 1864. He was followed by many, including Louis Duchesne, but in 1969 Nina Pigulevskaya defended a 6th-century origin. She thought the code was written in the Byzantine Empire and never actually came into force in Ḥimyar. Irfan Shahîd and A. K. Irvine have also defended the authenticity of the code.[21] Garth Fowden considers that it contains some authentic material.[18] It mentions a slave market at a place called Trikanos or Trikanon, a place not attested anywhere else.[21] features of the Nomoi that would be unusual in 6th-century Byzantium have been ascribed to South Arabian influence. They may, however, reflect a later date of composition. Mutilation was an uncommon punishment in Byzantine law prior to Leo III's Ecloga (741). One of the most unusual and cruel punishments in the Nomoi—suspending a convict upside down and smoking him to death with burning hay—is actually attested in an 8th-century Byzantine source (Nikephoros's Breviarium). Some prescriptions regarding marriage in the Nomoi became a part of Byzantine law during the reign Leo VI (886–912).[22] Similarities between the Najrān of the Nomoi and Constantinople under the Macedonian dynasty suggest that the Nomoi was probably written at Constantinople in the 10th century.[23] The Nomoi may be compared with other pseudepigraphal texts of supposed supernatural origin from Byzantium, such as the Didascalia Apostolorum and Letter of Christ Fallen from Heaven.[24] earliest manuscript witness to the Nomoi, a copy made in 1180 on Cyprus, shows some Western influence in its terminology. It is probable that it was copied from a manuscript made shortly before in Crusader Syria. Some of its terminology does not appear in Greek again until the Assizes of Cyprus in the 14th century.[24] Dialexis purports to be a record written around 550 or 560 of a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban that took place before the royal court of Ḥimyar around 520 or 530. The author does not claim to have been present or to have known Gregentios, but does claim to have had access to a record of the proceedings written at the time by the notary Palladios. [25] The text, however, shows clear evidence of having been composed after the start of the controversies over monothelitism (7th century), iconoclasm (8th century) and the filioque clause, which only became a live controversy in the Byzantine Empire after 860.[26] is a treatise against the Azymites in the form of a letter that is ascribed to Gregentios in one manuscript. Given the issue it discusses, it can have no connection to the time in which Gregentios supposedly lived. In 1660, some "letters of Gregentios"—possibly the same treatise—were catalogued as part of the library of Denis Pétau that had been purchased after his death by Queen Christina of Sweden. There is no further record of these letters and they appear to be lost.[27] Afar, Ethiopia (Semara) ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 520-540, Elesbaan, King, pious christian, took revenge, defeated, vow, victory, monastery
Ethiopian King, 520-540, Elesbaan (Caleb or Kaleb), Christian Kingdom of Axum (100-940); Blessed Elesbaan, King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24; Elesbaan, King of what is now Ethiopia lived when Arabia was ruled by Dunaan, the oppressor of Christians. pious Elesbaan was unable to look on indifferently as believers in Christ were being massacred. He declared war on Dunaan, but his military campaign was unsuccessful. to learn the reason for his defeat, Elesbaan, with prompting from above, turned to a certain hermit. He revealed to the emperor that he had proceeded unrighteously in deciding to take revenge against Dunaan, since the Lord had said, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay!” (Heb 10:30). hermit counseled Saint Elesbaan make a vow to devote his final days of life to God, to escape the wrath of God for his self-willed revenge, and then to defeat Dunaan. Elesbaan made a vow to the Lord, and marching off with his army against the enemy, he defeated, captured and executed him. After the victory the saint resigned as emperor, secluded himself within a monastery and for fifteen years he dwelt in strict fasting and asceticism. Elesbaan reposed around 553-555. St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ;

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 523-540, Saint Gregory of Homer, during this time Gregory with Elesbaan, Jesus revealed to Jews
Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 523-540, Saint Gregory of Homer, during time Gregory with Elesbaan ; -------------------During this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar. Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar. Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, 523-540, Saint Gregory of Homer or Omrits was the purported archbishop of Ẓafar, the capital of the kingdom of Ḥimyar, in the mid-6th century, according to a hagiographical dossier compiled in the 10th century. This compilation is essentially legendary and fictitious, although a few parts of it are of historical value. Written in Greek, it survives also in a Slavonic translation.[2] The three works in the dossier are conventionally known as the Bios (Life), Nomoi (Laws) and Dialexis (Debate).[3] The whole dossier is sometimes known as the Acts of Gregentios.[4] name Gregentios is unknown apart from the Bios and related texts. According to the Bios, he received his name from a local holy man. Several later scribes, encountering an unheard of name, changed it to Gregorios (Gregory).[5] This is the name that appears in all the Slavonic versions, as well as an Arabic translation of the Dialexis.[2][5] It also appears in the fresco depicting Gregentios in the monastery of Koutsovendis on Cyprus, painted between 1110 and 1118.[6] Other scribal emendations are Gregentinos and Rhegentios.[5] name has a Latin ending, which may indicate a western origin for the name, but such suffixes had entered vernacular Greek by the time the Bios was written. The name may be derived from Agrigentius, "man from Agrigento", or from a combination of the name Gregory with either Agrigentius or the name of Saint Vincentius. The biography of Gregory of Agrigento was a major source used by the author of the Bios, and an itinerary of Vincentius may also have been used.[5] only known persons named after Gregentios are two 19th-century monks of Mount Athos. The first was the archimandrite of Vatopedi in April 1842 and the second a monk of the Skete of Saint Anne who died in 1879 aged 69. Both monastic communities had copies of the Bios and Dialexis of Gregentios.[5] Bios, which Jean-Marie Sansterre called a "hagiographical romance", is divided into nine chapters. While the first eight are vague in their chronology and geography, the ninth draws on superior historical sources and contains more precise details.[7] The early part, which includes an Avar raid on his hometown, may also reflect authentic conditions in the northern Balkans during the later 6th century.[8] The Bios was completed either at Constantinople in the 10th century or in Rome in the 9th century.[7] The Nomoi and Dialexis are later additions. The whole collection, which presents as a unity, was not brought together before the 10th century. The Nomoi may contain some authentic information, since it shares characteristics with legal inscriptions from pre-Islamic South Arabia.[2] The Dialexis, which is a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban, was the most popular part of the work and circulated independently into modern times.[4] life in Avaria start of the Bios of Gregentios, from a copy made in 1180 and now in Saint Catherine's Monastery, Sinai[9] to his Bios, Gregentios was born on 6 December in the late 5th century in the town of Lyplianes (Ljubljana) in the land of the Avars.[2][7][10] father was named Agapios and his mother Eusebia. At his baptism, he was named after a sage who lived on a nearby mountain. His schooling begins at the age of seven. At the age of ten, he is pushed into a river by a deer. Miraculously saved from drowning, he retires to the desert, where he receives instruction and prophecies about his future from a holy man.[11] his mother dies, Gregentios is placed in the custody of the married but childless priest who baptised him. During a barbarian invasion, the townspeople flee to the fortress of Korada. Gregentios, who was in the vineyards at the time, manages to sneak in through the Rhomanesios gate while the fortress is besieged. After the barbarians retreat, both Gregentios and his foster mother have prophetic dreams about him. At the urging of a certain Sergios, his foster mother tells her dream to an elder named Niketas, who interprets it as saying that Gregentios will one day convert a fourfold people.[11] next traveled extensively in northern and central Italy and Sicily before sailing to Alexandria in Egypt.[2][7] The Bios presents him as travelling from Lyplianes to Moryne (Murano), Antenora (Padua) and Agrigento, then by boat to Pavia, then to Milan and Carthage, then by foot to Rome, then to Augustopolis (either Augusta or Koper) and finally Alexandria. In its order, timing and means of travel, this itinerary is absurd.[12] and Sicily first departs with the holy man from the desert. They reach Moryne in a single day. There they stay with a man named Sabbatios, where a holy fool named Peter informs Gregentios that his foster parents are searching for him. The holy man and Gregentios leave Moryne after the local bishop learns of the latter's spiritual gifts. In Antenora, they stay in the house of Theodoretos, while the bishop of Moryne searches for him. Bishop Eulogios of Antenora makes Gregentios a deacon and lector. A holy woman named Theodora informs him again of his foster parents' search.[10] the holy man, Gregentios moves on to Agrigento, leaving the bishop of Antenora also to send searchers after him. He is hosted by the priest Stephanos in the church of the Mother of God outside the walls. He visits the grave of the hermit Eirene, who appears to him and talks to him. He visits two churches in the city, and a woman preaching to a crowd from a balcony predicts that he will go to Egypt and Ḥimyar. The holy man then appears and whisks Gregentios away to Milan. Going by boat, they pass Rome on the way.[10] Milan, Gregentios stays with one Niketas, while the holy man moves on to Largention (Piacenza). He visits the grave of Saint Ambrose and begins reading his works. He takes on as a disciple a boy of fourteen named Leon, who later becomes governor of Melike (either Ravenna or the land of the Melingoi) and is assassinated. Gregentios has a vision of the underworld in which he sees Leon among those who died before their time awaiting the Last Judgement. The holy man then returns and the two travel to Carthage, where they stay with one Constantine.[10] and Rome Carthage, Gregentios meets a woman named Philothea who is regarded as a mute who only barks and sighs. The holy man reveals that this is merely a gift God gave her to ward off a man who tried to seduce her. She speaks to Gregentios clearly and lucidly. his time in Carthage, he befriends a young man named George and they visit a church dedicated to Saint Anastasia. There, a holy woman identifies Gregentios by name and birthplace. When George asks for the same treatment, she reproaches and names the women he has been sinning with. young man, a Thracian named Pothetos, asks Gregentios for spiritual advice. Gregentios writes sixteen homilies that make Pothetos regret his marriage, but Gregentios convinces him to go home to his wife.[10] Carthage, the holy man takes Gregentios to Rome. On the way, he has a vision of the devil in the valley of Patherolymna. Rome, they stay with a man named Benedict near the Great Portico. He owns a slave named Elizabeth, who is sexually abused by a demon every night. After Gregentios writes a formula on a piece of papyrus and gives it to her, she is freed from the demon.[10] day, Gregentios is visited by Saint Peter, who had been absent from his grave when Gregentios visited it, for he had gone to give comfort to the persecuted Christians of Negra (Najrān). tells Gregentios that the time has not yet come for the holy man's identity to be revealed. a woman identifies Gregentios by name as the prophet of the Ḥimyarites. He is also identified by name by the monk Abramios. At the request of a beggar named Zacharias, he heals the eye of a youth named Basil. In ecstasy at the tomb of Saint Paul, he sees a vision of the saint bringing him a pallium.[10] visits a church dedicated to Saint Boniface, whose feast day he will come to share. He meets a fool for Christ named John who throws stones at passersby. visits a hermit named Michael, who sends him on to a hermit named Artados, who lives atop a mountain beyond the Dry Lakes. Artados prophesies in detail about Gregentios' future in Egypt and Ḥimyar, where he will convert four peoples: pagans, Jews, Ḥimyarites and Maurousians. a stay of two days, Gregentios returns to Rome, where he meets Pope Felix IV (526–530). The holy man rejoins him and they go to Augustopolis.[10] Augustopolis, Gregentios stays with a widow named Euphemia. In the market, he meets an Armenian from Artazat (Artaxata), who prophesies his future. a few days, the holy man and Gregentios board a ship from Leukas for Alexandria. There, Gregentios is greeted by name by a female slave, whose prophesies how the patriarch will call him to be an archbishop. He stays in the house of one Leontios. In Alexandria, he visits a monastery led by a eunuch-abbot named Epiphanios. His prayers chase away a devil who throws stones at a monk named Kosmas. A woman named Archontia greets him by name.[10] in South Arabia last part of the Bios "contains the only clear historical information scattered through the whole" of the Gregentios materials.[13] 523, the Ḥimyarite king Dhū Nuwās massacres the Christians of Najrān and its leader, Arethas. Emperor Justin I asks the Ethiopian (Aksumite) king Elesboam (Caleb) to lead an expedition against Dhū Nuwās. writes to the patriarch of Alexandria, Proterios, for a bishop to evangelize the Ḥimyarites.[14] (The actual patriarch at this time was Timothy IV.[2]) Mark informs Proterios of Gregentios in a dream. The patriarch consecrates Gregentios as bishop and send him back with the Ethiopian envoys.[14] This takes place after the successful Ethiopian conquest of Ḥimyar (525).[2] Ethiopia, Gregentios stays for a time in the capital, Amlem (Aksum), before crossing the sea to Medekion (Maddaban) and then heading to Taphar (Ẓafār) and finally Najrān, where he meets the king. consecrates the churches that the kings has built and installs priests in them at Najrān, Ẓafār, Akana, Atarph, Legmia , Azaki and Iouze.[14][15] Bios describes Elesboam's retirement to a monastery and the miraculous invocation of his name. Gregentios threatens the Ḥimyarites with the death penalty for all those who do not convert, whereupon the hole country becomes Christian. The Dialexis is interposed here, and the end of the Bios follows.[14] remains in Ḥimyar for thirty years, assisting Elesboam's appointed viceroy, Abraha, in building churches. Shortly after Abraha dies and is succeeded by his son Seridos (Masrūq), Gregentios dies on 19 December. He is buried in the cathedral.[16] He is commemorated in the Synaxarion of Constantinople on 19 December.[2] Start of the Nomoi in a manuscript copied in Gaza in 1487[17] Nomoi ton Homeriton, also known in Latin as Leges Homeritarum,[18] is usually regarded as a fictional law code containing some amount of authentic pre-Islamic South Arabian material. The laws are not arranged thematically, but may be subsumed under eight headings: (1) morals, marriage and family; (2) slavery; (3) right of employment; (4) culture and social life; (5) cruelty against animals; (6) rental laws; (7) officeholders; and (8) miscellaneous. Within the last class are laws concerning sorcery, poisoning, perjury, theft, extrajudicial punishments, infringing ecclesiastical asylum, workhouses for criminals and prohibitions on begging. The Nomoi do not come near to being a comprehensive law code. There is, for example, no law of inheritance.[19] Nomoi prescribes harsh punishments for transgressions, often mutilation, and mitigating factors are nowhere admitted. Its strong prohibitions of wife-beating and cruelty to animals stand out, however, since Byzantine law knew no restriction on the treatment of animals. The laws seem concerned strictly with an urban community like Najrān. Administration and taxation are governed in a clearly Byzantine manner. The prohibitions on dancing, singing, gambling and gaming may be taken from the canons of the Quinisext Council (691/692). On the whole, the influence of canon law is limited, but Christian theological justifications are provided for the laws. Although the Nomoi is a civil law code, it presents itself as having been promulgated by a supernatural force to the geitoniarchai (administrators of Najrān's 36 districts). It bears the unmistakable stamp of a Christian monk of a strong ascetic spirit. In the words of J. B. Bury, the laws "illustrate the kind of legislation at which the ecclesiastical spirit, unchecked, would have aimed."[20] and authorship authenticity of the Nomoi was first put in doubt by Cardinal Jean-Baptiste-François Pitra in 1864. He was followed by many, including Louis Duchesne, but in 1969 Nina Pigulevskaya defended a 6th-century origin. She thought the code was written in the Byzantine Empire and never actually came into force in Ḥimyar. Irfan Shahîd and A. K. Irvine have also defended the authenticity of the code.[21] Garth Fowden considers that it contains some authentic material.[18] It mentions a slave market at a place called Trikanos or Trikanon, a place not attested anywhere else.[21] features of the Nomoi that would be unusual in 6th-century Byzantium have been ascribed to South Arabian influence. They may, however, reflect a later date of composition. Mutilation was an uncommon punishment in Byzantine law prior to Leo III's Ecloga (741). One of the most unusual and cruel punishments in the Nomoi—suspending a convict upside down and smoking him to death with burning hay—is actually attested in an 8th-century Byzantine source (Nikephoros's Breviarium). Some prescriptions regarding marriage in the Nomoi became a part of Byzantine law during the reign Leo VI (886–912).[22] Similarities between the Najrān of the Nomoi and Constantinople under the Macedonian dynasty suggest that the Nomoi was probably written at Constantinople in the 10th century.[23] The Nomoi may be compared with other pseudepigraphal texts of supposed supernatural origin from Byzantium, such as the Didascalia Apostolorum and Letter of Christ Fallen from Heaven.[24] earliest manuscript witness to the Nomoi, a copy made in 1180 on Cyprus, shows some Western influence in its terminology. It is probable that it was copied from a manuscript made shortly before in Crusader Syria. Some of its terminology does not appear in Greek again until the Assizes of Cyprus in the 14th century.[24] Dialexis purports to be a record written around 550 or 560 of a debate between Gregentios and a Jew named Herban that took place before the royal court of Ḥimyar around 520 or 530. The author does not claim to have been present or to have known Gregentios, but does claim to have had access to a record of the proceedings written at the time by the notary Palladios. [25] The text, however, shows clear evidence of having been composed after the start of the controversies over monothelitism (7th century), iconoclasm (8th century) and the filioque clause, which only became a live controversy in the Byzantine Empire after 860.[26] is a treatise against the Azymites in the form of a letter that is ascribed to Gregentios in one manuscript. Given the issue it discusses, it can have no connection to the time in which Gregentios supposedly lived. In 1660, some "letters of Gregentios"—possibly the same treatise—were catalogued as part of the library of Denis Pétau that had been purchased after his death by Queen Christina of Sweden. There is no further record of these letters and they appear to be lost.[27] Afar, Ethiopia (Semara) ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar.

Aksum (Axum or Abyssinia)
Aksum (Axum or Abyssinia); Elesbaan, or Kaleb of Axum (Axum is in Eritrea. Capital of Eritrea is Aksum; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ;

Mirmena (Asmara or Massawa), Ethiopia, important port, very hot, Apostle Matthew story
Mirmena (Asmara or Massawa); is a port city in the Northern Red Sea region of Eritrea, located on the Red Sea at the northern end of the Gulf of Zula beside the Dahlak Archipelago.[2] It has represented a historically important port for many centuries. was the capital of the Italian Colony of Eritrea until the seat of the colonial government was moved to Asmara in 1897.[3] has an average temperature of 30 °C/86 °F, which is one of the highest found in the world, and is "one of the hottest marine coastal areas in the world."[4] Historical map of Massawa was originally a small seaside village, lying in lands coextensive with the Kingdom of Axum—also known as Kingdom of Zula in antiquity—and overshadowed by the nearby port of Adulis about 50 kilometres (31 mi) to the south.[5] Massawa has been ruled or occupied by a succession of polities during its history, including the Aksumite Empire, Abyssinia and Italian Eritrea. Following the fall of Axum in the 8th century, the area around Massawa and the town itself fell under the occupation of the Umayyad Caliphate from 702 to 750 CE. The Beja people would also come to rule within Massawa during the Bajag Kingdom of Eritrea from the year 740 to the 14th century. Massawa was situated between the sultanates of Qata, Baqulin, and Dahlak. Midri-Bahri, an Eritrean kingdom (14th–19th centuries), gained leverage at various times and ruled over Massawa. The port city would also come under control of the Balaw people during the Balaw Kingdom of Eritrea (12th–15th centuries). At this time, the Sheikh Hanafi Mosque, one of the country's oldest mosques, was built on Massawa Island. The city reportedly has the oldest mosque in Africa, that is the Mosque of the Companions. It was reportedly built by companions of Muhammad who escaped persecution by Meccans.[6] Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, Commemorated on November 16; Holy Apostle and Evangelist Matthew, was also named Levi (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27); he was one of the Twelve Apostles (Mark 3:18; Luke 6:45; Acts 1:13), and was brother of the Apostle James Alphaeus (Mark 2:14). was a publican, or tax-collector for Rome, in a time when the Jews were under the rule of the Roman Empire. lived in the Galilean city of Capernaum. Matthew heard the voice of Jesus Christ: “Come, follow Me” (Mt. 9:9), left everything and followed the Savior. and His disciples did not refuse Matthew’s invitation and they visited his house, where they shared table with the publican’s friends and acquaintances. Like the host, they were also publicans and known sinners. event disturbed the pharisees and scribes a great deal. who collected taxes from their countrymen did this with great profit for themselves. Usually greedy and cruel people, the Jews considered them pernicious betrayers of their country and religion. The word “publican” for the Jews had the connotation of “public sinner” and “idol-worshipper.” To even speak with a tax-collector was considered a sin, and to associate with one was defilement. the Jewish teachers were not able to comprehend that the Lord had “come to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mt. 9:13). acknowledging his sinfulness, repaid fourfold anyone he had cheated, and he distributed his remaining possessions to the poor, and he followed after Christ with the other apostles. Matthew was attentive to the instructions of the Divine Teacher, he beheld His innumerable miracles, he went together with the Twelve Apostles preaching to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Mt. 10:6). was a witness to the suffering, death, and Resurrection of the Savior, and of His glorious Ascension into Heaven. received the grace of the Holy Spirit, which descended upon the Apostles on the day of Pentecost, Saint Matthew preached in Palestine for several years. the request of the Jewish converts at Jerusalem, the holy Apostle Matthew wrote his Gospel describing the earthly life of the Savior, before leaving to preach the Gospel in faraway lands. the order of the books of the New Testament, the Gospel of Matthew comes first. Palestine is said to be the place where the Gospel was written. Saint Matthew wrote in Aramaic, and then it was translated into Greek. The Aramaic text has not survived, but many of the linguistic and cultural-historical peculiarities of the Greek translation give indications of it. Apostle Matthew preached among people who were awaiting the Messiah. His Gospel manifests itself as a vivid proof that Jesus Christ is the Messiah foretold by the prophets, and that there would not be another (Mt. 11:3). preaching and deeds of the Savior are presented by the evangelist in three divisions, constituting three aspects of the service of the as Prophet and Law-Giver (Ch. 5-7), over the world both visible and invisible (Ch. 8-25), finally as High Priest offered as Sacrifice for the sins of all mankind (Ch. 26-27). theological content of the Gospel, besides the Christological themes, includes also the teaching about the Kingdom of God and about the Church, which the Lord sets forth in parables about the inner preparation for entering into the Kingdom (Ch. 5-7), about the worthiness of servers of the Church in the world (Ch. 10-11), about the signs of the Kingdom and its growth in the souls of mankind (Ch. 13), about the humility and simplicity of the inheritors of the Kingdom (Mt. 18:1-35; 19 13-30; 20:1-16; 25-27; 23:1-28), and about the eschatological revelations of the Kingdom in the Second Coming of Christ within the daily spiritual life of the Church (Ch. 24-25). Kingdom of Heaven and the Church are closely interconnected in the spiritual experience of Christianity: the Church is the historical embodiment of the Kingdom of Heaven in the world, and the Kingdom of Heaven is the Church of Christ in its eschatological perfection (Mt. 16:18-19; 28:18-20). holy Apostle brought the Gospel of Christ to Syria, Media, Persia, Parthia, finishing his preaching in Ethiopia with a martyr’s death. land was inhabited by tribes of cannibals with primitive customs and beliefs. The holy Apostle Matthew converted some of the idol-worshippers to faith in Christ. He founded the Church and built a temple in the city of Mirmena, establishing there his companion Platon as bishop. the holy apostle was fervently entreating God for the conversion of the Ethiopians the Lord Himself appeared to him in the form of a youth. He gave him a staff, and commanded him to plant it at the doors of the church. The Lord said that a tree would grow from this staff and it would bear fruit, and from its roots would flow a stream of water. the Ethiopians washed themselves in the water and ate the fruit, they lost their wild ways and became gentle and good. the holy apostle carried the staff towards the church, he was met by the wife and son of the ruler of the land, Fulvian, who were afflicted by unclean spirits. In the Name of Christ the holy apostle healed them. This miracle converted a number of the pagans to the Lord. But the ruler did not want his subjects to become Christians and cease worshiping the pagan gods. He accused the apostle of sorcery and gave orders to execute him. put Saint Matthew head downwards, piled up brushwood and ignited it. When the fire flared up, everyone then saw that the fire did not harm Saint Matthew. Then Fulvian gave orders to add more wood to the fire, and frenzied with boldness, he commanded to set up twelve idols around the fire. But the flames melted the idols and flared up toward Fulvian. The frightened Ethiopian turned to the saint with an entreaty for mercy, and by the prayer of the martyr the flame went out. The body of the holy apostle remained unharmed, and he departed to the Lord. ruler Fulvian deeply repented of his deed, but still he had doubts. his command, they put the body of Saint Matthew into an iron coffin and threw it into the sea. In doing this Fulvian said that if the God of Matthew would preserve the body of the apostle in the water as He preserved him in the fire, then this would be proper reason to worship this One True God. night the Apostle Matthew appeared to Bishop Platon in a dream, and commanded him to go with clergy to the shore of the sea and to find his body there. righteous Fulvian and his retinue went with the bishop to the shore of the sea. The coffin carried by the waves was taken to the church built by the apostle. Then Fulvian begged forgiveness of the holy Apostle Matthew, after which Bishop Platon baptized him, giving him the name Matthew in obedience to a command of God. Saint Fulvian-Matthew abdicated his rule and became a presbyter. Upon the death of Bishop Platon, the Apostle Matthew appeared to him and exhorted him to head the Ethiopian Church. Having become a bishop, Saint Fulvian-Matthew toiled at preaching the Word of God, continuing the work of his heavenly patron.

Upper Blue Nile region (Ethiopia)
Previously, Ethiopia referred to Upper Nile region, Blue Nile and White Nile; Icon of the Mother of God Arapet (Arabian), Commemorated September 6 ; PHILIP, DEACON AND EVANGELIST (11 OCT NT); Apostle Philip of the Seventy, One of the Seven Deacons, Commemorated on October 11; Blessed Elesbaan the King of Ethiopia, Commemorated on October 24; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ;

Abyssinia (Ethiopian Empire, Northwest Ethiopia, north of the rift, Ethiopian Highlands)
Abyssinia: the Ethiopian Empire. Ethiopian Highlands ; MOSES THE BLACK, DESERT FATHER & MARTYR, 28 August 405; St Frumentius the Archbishop of Abyssinia, Ethiopia, Commemorated November 30 ;

Afar, Ethiopia (Semera), saint Gregory's extraordinary miracle which showed them the Lord Jesus
Afar, Ethiopia (Semara) ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar.

Africa, East Africa, Ethiopia, Saint Gregory
Afar, Ethiopia (Semara) ; St Gregory the Archbishop of Omirits, Commemorated on December 19 ; Gregory, Bishop of Homer (Omirits), the son of Agapius and Theodota, was filled with the grace of God and possessed gifts of healing and wonderworking even in his youth. Providence of God led him to hierarchical service. While still a deacon at Mediolanum (Milan) he heard the foretelling of his destiny from a hermit, and then he received confirmation of these words from another spirit-bearing Elder who lived an ascetic life in the mountains. Gregory went to this holy schemamonk for guidance, a miracle occurred. As he approached the mountain, he saw a fiery column in the air. He soon realized that the fiery column was actually the man of God coming toward him. That night he saw the Elder standing in the air above the ground. Elder revealed to Saint Gregory that he must go to Rome to pray in the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida. he would go to Alexandria and to become a bishop. he would arrive in the city of Negran in the land of Homer (in southern Arabia) to proclaim the Gospel. Gregory felt himself unworthy of this, and wished to remain with the ascetic as his disciple. that Gregory should have no doubts of the veracity of his words, the Elder revealed that he knew a secret about him. In a vision, Gregory had seen the First-Ranked Apostles Peter and Paul, and they had placed a bishop’s omophorion upon him. Gregory stayed a short time in Carthage (North Africa) serving as a deacon, then arrived in Rome. He went to the church of Saints Boniface and Aglaida, then to the tomb of Saint Peter. There he was granted a vision of the holy Apostle, who told him to walk the path of virtue and to live according to God’s will. That night he saw the Apostle Paul in a dream bringing to him a cup filled with oil, foretelling that he should receive the grace of the priesthood and the episcopacy. this time the armies of the Ethiopian emperor Elesbaan (October 24) vanquished the Himyarite king Dunaan, who was of Jewish background. city of Negran was liberated, and Christianity restored in the land of Homer. But all the clergy had been cruelly exterminated by Dunaan, and therefore Elesbaan sent emissaries to the Patriarch of Alexandria asking him to send a bishop to Negran, and clergy for the churches. he was praying, the holy Apostle Mark appeared to the patriarch, bidding him to find a deacon named Gregory, who was to be ordained to the priesthood, consecrated as a bishop, and then to be sent to Elesbaan. patriarch did this. During the service a miracle took place. Saint Gregory’s face shone with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and from his vestments came a sweet fragrance like myrrh or incense, filling the whole church with the scent. in Homer, Saint Gregory began to set the Church in order, preaching to both pagans and Jews. After three years Elesbaan returned to Ethiopia, leaving the noble Abramius behind as King of Homer. Gregory crowned and anointed Abramius as king. he issued a decree that all his subjects be baptized. certain prominent Jews turned to the emperor saying that it was better for people to believe willingly rather than under compulsion. requested that he should permit a debate on faith to be held between them and the Christians, vowing that if the Christians proved victorious in this debate, the Jews would then accept Baptism. Jews were given forty days to prepare for the debate, which lasted for several days. Gregory refuted all the arguments of the head of the Hebrew elder, Rabbi Ervan, using only texts from the Old Testament. a vision Ervan beheld the holy Prophet Moses, who worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ. The prophet told Ervan that Ervan was in opposition to the truth and would be defeated. the grace of God Christian truth prevailed in the debate, but Ervan would not acknowledge his defeat. made a last desperate attempt. He said, “If you want me to believe in your Christ, and to acknowledge that yours is the true God, then show Him to me, bishop!” saint replied: “Your request is impertinent. It is not with man that you contend now, but with God. However, the Lord can do what you have asked in order to convince you. waited to see what would happen. Saint Gregory, having steadfast faith in God and trusting in Him, began to pray aloud. He recalled the mystery of the Incarnation of God the Word, the miracles of His earthly life, the Three-day Resurrection and the Ascension into Heaven, and he invoked the power of the Life-Creating Cross. “Show Thyself to these people, O Lord,” he prayed, “and glorify Thy holy Name!” he finished the prayer, the earth quaked, and in the east the heavens were opened, and in a radiant cloud of light the Lord Jesus Christ came down on earth, and the Voice of the Lord was heard: “Through the prayers of Bishop Gregory, He Whom your fathers put to death will heal you.” Saul, who was struck blind by the Heavenly light on the road to Damascus, the Jews were struck blind. Then they believed in Christ and they implored the holy bishop to heal them. Upon receiving holy Baptism, all of them were healed. Rabbi Ervan received the Christian name Leo (meaning “lion”). this most extraordinary miracle, Saint Gregory guided the flock of Homer for another thirty years. He reposed in the year 552 and was buried in a crypt in the cathedral of Afar.

Africa, East Africa, Kenya Folder

Kenya, East Africa
Kenya; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836); JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983); ROLAND ALLEN, MISSION STRATEGIST, Commemorated June 8 ;

British Empire - Kenya, East Africa
Kenya; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836); JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983); ROLAND ALLEN, MISSION STRATEGIST, Commemorated June 8 ;

Nairobi, Kenya, East Africa
Nairobi; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); ROLAND ALLEN, MISSION STRATEGIST, Commemorated June 8 ;

Amimos, Kenya, East Africa
Amimos, Kenya ; Martyr Eudoxius, Commemorated September 6 ;

Africa, East Africa, Uganda Folder

Uganda, East Africa
Uganda; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885) ; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836); JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983); THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886) ;

British Empire - Uganda, East Africa
Uganda; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885) ; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836); JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983); THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886) ;

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1856-1884, Ugandan King, Muteesa I of Buganda, Christian
Ugandan King, 1856-1884, Muteesa I of Buganda; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885); THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886); 3 June 1886, thirty-two young men, pages of the court of King Mwanga of Buganda, were burned to death at Namugongo for their refusal to renounce Christianity. In the following months many other Christians throughout the country died by spear or fire for their faith. martyrdoms totally changed the dynamic of Christian growth in Uganda. Introduced by a handful of Anglican and Roman missionaries after 1877, the Christian faith had been preached only to the immediate members of the court, by order of King Mutesa. His successor, Mwanga, became increasingly angry as he realized that the first converts put loyalty to Christ above the traditional loyalty to the king. Martyrdoms began in 1885. Mwanga first forbade anyone to go near a Christian mission on pain of death, but finding himself unable to cool the ardor of the converts, resolved to wipe out Christianity. of UgandaThe Namugongo martyrdoms produced a result entirely opposite to Mwanga's intentions. The example of these martyrs, who walked to their deaths singing hymns and praying for their enemies, so inspired many of the bystanders that they began to seek instruction from the remaining Christians. Within a few years the original handful of converts had multiplied many times and spread far beyond the court. The martyrs had left the indelible impression that Christianity was truly African, not simply a white man's religion. Most of the missionary work was carried out by Africans rather than by white missionaries, and Christianity spread steadily. Uganda now has the largest percentage of professed Christians of any nation in Africa.

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1884-1897, Ugandan King, Mwanga II of Buganda, Pagan
Ugandan King, 1884-1897, Mwanga II of Buganda; THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886); 3 June 1886, thirty-two young men, pages of the court of King Mwanga of Buganda, were burned to death at Namugongo for their refusal to renounce Christianity. In the following months many other Christians throughout the country died by spear or fire for their faith. martyrdoms totally changed the dynamic of Christian growth in Uganda. Introduced by a handful of Anglican and Roman missionaries after 1877, the Christian faith had been preached only to the immediate members of the court, by order of King Mutesa. His successor, Mwanga, became increasingly angry as he realized that the first converts put loyalty to Christ above the traditional loyalty to the king. Martyrdoms began in 1885. Mwanga first forbade anyone to go near a Christian mission on pain of death, but finding himself unable to cool the ardor of the converts, resolved to wipe out Christianity. of UgandaThe Namugongo martyrdoms produced a result entirely opposite to Mwanga's intentions. The example of these martyrs, who walked to their deaths singing hymns and praying for their enemies, so inspired many of the bystanders that they began to seek instruction from the remaining Christians. Within a few years the original handful of converts had multiplied many times and spread far beyond the court. The martyrs had left the indelible impression that Christianity was truly African, not simply a white man's religion. Most of the missionary work was carried out by Africans rather than by white missionaries, and Christianity spread steadily. Uganda now has the largest percentage of professed Christians of any nation in Africa.

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1884-1886, JAMES HANNINGTON & MARTYRS OF UGANDA, East Africa, Anglican & Catholic, k by Mwanga
Africa, East Africa, 1884-1886, JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, East Africa, Anglican and Catholic martyrs killed by Mwanga, after Christian father Mutesa; Uganda; JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885) ; the new nations of Africa, Uganda is the most predominantly Christian. work began there in the 1870's with the favor of King Mutesa, who died in 1884. his son and successor, King Mwanga, opposed all foreign presence, including the missions. Hannington, born 1847, was sent out from England in 1884 by the Anglican Church as missionary Bishop of Eastern Equatorial Africa. he was travelling toward Uganda, he was apprehended by emissaries of King Mwanga. and his companions were brutally treated and, a week later, 29 October 1885, most of them were put to death. last words were: "Go tell your master that I have purchased the road to Uganda with my blood." first native martyr was the Roman Catholic Joseph Mkasa Balikuddembe, who was beheaded after having rebuked the king for his debauchery and for the murder of Bishop Hannington. 3 June 1886, a group of 32 men and boys, 22 Roman Catholic and 10 Anglican, were burned at the stake. of them were young pages in Mwanga's household, from their head-man, Charles Lwanga, to the thirteen-year-old Kizito, who went to his death "laughing and chattering." and many other Ugandan Christians suffered for their faith then and in the next few years. 1977, the Anglican Archbishop Janani Luwum and many other Christians suffered death for their faith under the tyrant Idi Amin. largely to their common heritage of suffering for their Master, Christians of various communions in Uganda have always been on excellent terms. by James Kiefer THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886) ; 3 June 1886, thirty-two young men, pages of the court of King Mwanga of Buganda, were burned to death at Namugongo for their refusal to renounce Christianity. the following months many other Christians throughout the country died by spear or fire for their faith. martyrdoms totally changed the dynamic of Christian growth in Uganda. by a handful of Anglican and Roman missionaries after 1877, the Christian faith had been preached only to the immediate members of the court, by order of King Mutesa. successor, Mwanga, became increasingly angry as he realized that the first converts put loyalty to Christ above the traditional loyalty to the king. began in 1885. first forbade anyone to go near a Christian mission on pain of death, finding himself unable to cool the ardor of the converts, resolved to wipe out Christianity. Matryrs of Uganda Namugongo martyrdoms produced a result entirely opposite to Mwanga's intentions. example of these martyrs, who walked to their deaths singing hymns and praying for their enemies, so inspired many of the bystanders that they began to seek instruction from the remaining Christians. a few years the original handful of converts had multiplied many times and spread far beyond the court. martyrs had left the indelible impression that Christianity was truly African, not simply a white man's religion. of the missionary work was carried out by Africans rather than by white missionaries, and Christianity spread steadily. now has the largest percentage of professed Christians of any nation in Africa. years ago I heard an African clergyman, born of pagan parents, tell of his conversion. He said: afternoon I was bicycling along a road and met a young man about my own age bicycling in the opposite direction. He promptly turned about and began to ride beside me and to talk. spoke with great enthusiasm about Jesus, whom I had never heard of before, and how He had destroyed the power of death and evil by dying and rising again, and how He was God become man to reconcile man with God. heard what my companion had to say, and before we parted I had accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. Now, the young man who preached the Good News of Jesus Christ to me that afternoon had himself heard of Jesus for the first time that morning. persecution of Christians in the 1970's by the military dictatorship of Idi Amin proved the vitality of the example of the Namugongo martyrs. the thousands of new martyrs, both Anglican and Roman, was Janani Luwum, Archbishop of the (Anglican) Church of Uganda. by James Kiefer

Africa, East Africa, Uganda, 1885-1897, Homosexual War of King Mwanga
Uganda, 1885-1897, Homosexual War of King Mwanga ; Basammula-Ekkere Mwanga II Mukasa (1868 - 8 May 1903)[1] was Kabaka of Buganda from 1884 until 1888 and from 1889 until 1897. He was the 31st Kabaka of Buganda. 1 Claim to the throne 2 Reign 3 Final years 4 Married life 5 Issue 6 Quotes 6.1 Quotes about Mwanga II 7 Succession table: First time 8 Succession table: Second time 9 See also 10 References 11 Further reading 12 External links to the throne[edit] was born at Nakawa in 1868. His father was Muteesa I of Buganda, who reigned between 1856 and 1884. His mother was Abakyala Abisagi Bagalayaze, the 10th of his father's 85 wives. ascended to the throne on 18 October 1884, after the death of his father. He established his capital on Mengo Hill. Mwanga on stained glass at Munyonyo Martyrs Shrine. came to the throne at the age of 16. He increasingly regarded the greatest threat to his rule coming from the Christian missionaries who had gradually penetrated Buganda . His father had played-off the three religions, Catholics, Protestants and Muslims, against each other and thus balanced the influence of the European colonial powers that were backing each group in order to extend their reach into Africa. Mwanga II took a much more aggressive approach, expelling missionaries and insisting that Christian converts abandon their faith or face death. A year after becoming king he executed Yusufu Rugarama, Makko Kakumba, and Nuuwa Sserwanga, who had converted to Christianity. On 29 October 1885, he had the incoming archbishop James Hannington assassinated on the eastern border of his kingdom. Mwanga, the ultimate humiliation was the insolence he received from the (male) pages of his harem when they resisted his sexual advances. According to old tradition the king was the centre of power and authority, and he could dispense with any life as he felt. It was unheard of for mere pages to reject the wishes of a king. Given those conflicting values Mwanga was determined to rid his kingdom of the new teaching and its followers. Mwanga therefore precipitated a showdown in May 1886 by ordering converts in his court to choose between their new faith and complete obedience to his orders and kingdom.[2] is believed that at least 30 Catholic and Protestant neophytes went to their deaths.[citation needed] Twenty-two of the men, who had converted to Catholicism, were burned alive at Namugongo in 1886 and later became known as the Uganda Martyrs. Among those executed were two Christians who held the court position of Master of the Pages, Joseph Mukasa Balikuddembe and Charles Lwanga. They had repeatedly defied the king by rescuing royal pages in their care from sexual exploitation by Mwanga which they believed contrary to Christian teaching.[3] murders and Mwanga's continued resistance alarmed the British, who backed a rebellion by Christian and Muslim groups who supported Mwanga's half brother and defeated Mwanga at Mengo in 1888. Mwanga's brother, Kiweewa Nnyonyintono, was elevated to the throne. He lasted exactly one month and was replaced on the throne by another brother, Kabaka Kalema Muguluma. However, Mwanga escaped and negotiated with the British. In exchange for handing over some of his sovereignty to the British East Africa Company, the British changed their backing to Mwanga, who swiftly removed Kalema from the throne in 1889. He later converted to Christianity and was baptised. years[edit] 26 December 1890, Mwanga signed a treaty with Lord Lugard, granting certain powers over revenue, trade and the administration of justice to the Imperial British East Africa Company. These powers were transferred to the crown on 1 April 1893. 27 August 1894, Mwanga accepted for Buganda to become a Protectorate. However, on 6 July 1897 he declared war on the British and launched an attack but was defeated on 20 July 1897, in Buddu (in today's Masaka District). He fled into German East Africa (modern-day Tanzania), where he was arrested and interned at Bukoba. was deposed in absentia on 9 August 1897. Tenacious as he was, he escaped and returned to Buganda with a rebel army, but was again defeated on 15 January 1898. He was captured and in April 1899 was exiled to the Seychelles. While in exile, he was received into the Anglican Church and was baptized with the name of Danieri (Daniel). He spent the rest of his life in exile. He died in the Seychelles on 8 May 1903, aged 34 or 35. On 2 August 1910, his remains were repatriated and buried at Kasubi.[1] JAMES HANNINGTON AND THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (29 OCT 1885) ; THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886); 3 June 1886, thirty-two young men, pages of the court of King Mwanga of Buganda, were burned to death at Namugongo for their refusal to renounce Christianity. In the following months many other Christians throughout the country died by spear or fire for their faith. martyrdoms totally changed the dynamic of Christian growth in Uganda. Introduced by a handful of Anglican and Roman missionaries after 1877, the Christian faith had been preached only to the immediate members of the court, by order of King Mutesa. His successor, Mwanga, became increasingly angry as he realized that the first converts put loyalty to Christ above the traditional loyalty to the king. Martyrdoms began in 1885. Mwanga first forbade anyone to go near a Christian mission on pain of death, but finding himself unable to cool the ardor of the converts, resolved to wipe out Christianity. of UgandaThe Namugongo martyrdoms produced a result entirely opposite to Mwanga's intentions. The example of these martyrs, who walked to their deaths singing hymns and praying for their enemies, so inspired many of the bystanders that they began to seek instruction from the remaining Christians. Within a few years the original handful of converts had multiplied many times and spread far beyond the court. The martyrs had left the indelible impression that Christianity was truly African, not simply a white man's religion. Most of the missionary work was carried out by Africans rather than by white missionaries, and Christianity spread steadily. Uganda now has the largest percentage of professed Christians of any nation in Africa.

Kampala, Uganda, East Africa
Kampala, Uganda; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Namugongo, Uganda
Namugongo; THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886);

Buganda, Central Uganda, East Africa
Buganda; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977); THE MARTYRS OF UGANDA, (3 JUNE 1886);

Northern Uganda, East Africa
Northern Uganda; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Acholi tribe, Northern Uganda, South Sudan, East Africa
Acholi tribe, Northern Uganda, South Sudan, East Africa; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977) ; Lord's Resistance Army; MARTYRS OF SUDAN, (16 May 1983)

Lango Tribe, Northern Uganda, East Africa
Lango; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977) ;

Buwalasi Theological College, Sironko District, Uganda, East Africa
Buwalasi Theological College, Sironko District, Uganda, East Africa; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Africa, East Africa, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania Folder

Rwanda, East Africa
Rwanda, East Africa; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Burundi, East Africa
Burundi, East Africa; JANANI LUWUM, ARCHBISHOP OF UGANDA, MARTYR (16 FEB 1977);

Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania (19,341 ft or 5,895 meters)
Mount Kilimanjaro;

East African Community (EAC), Tanzania
East Africa; ROLAND ALLEN, MISSION STRATEGIST, Commemorated June 8 ;

British Empire - Tanganyika, Tanzania, East Africa, Zanzibar, Indian Ocean
British Empire - Tanganyika, Tanzania, East Africa; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836);

British Empire - British Indian Ocean Territory - halfway between Tanzania and Indonesia
British Empire - British Indian Ocean Territory - ; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836);

British Empire - Zanzibar, Indian Ocean Islands right next to Tanganyika, East Africa
British Empire - Zanzibar, Indian Ocean Island right next to Tanganyika, East Africa; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836);

British Empire - Seychelles - Islands in the Indian Ocean, off East Africa
British Empire - Seychelles - Islands in the Indian Ocean, off East Africa; CHARLES SIMEON, TEACHER, PROMOTOR OF MISSIONARY WORK (12 NOV 1836)

Mitumba Mountains Mt Kahuzi 10,850 ft
Mitumba Mountains Mt Kahuzi

Ruzizi River

Ruzizi River Source (Lake Kivu)

Ruzizi River Mouth (Lake Tanganyika)