I spent the last week of February teaching Old Testament at the newly-formed Trinity Fellowship Pastors College in Addis Ababa. Ethiopia is by far the oldest nation I’ve visited, one of the few Old Testament nations still on the map. Its existence is a theological fact, testimony to the reliability of God’s promises.
According to the “primeval history” of Genesis, descendants of Cush settled the area that is now Ethiopia and Sudan soon after the flood. The Da’amat Empire was established in the tenth century B.C. by Menilek I, reputedly the son of Solomon and Makeda, queen of Sheba. According to the Kebre Negast (“The Glory of the Kings”), which was compiled in the fourteenth century A.D., Queen Makeda made a pilgrimage to Israel to learn statecraft from Solomon, who seduced her. Makeda conceived and went home to give birth to her son. As a boy, Menilek visited his father in Jerusalem, where Solomon anointed him as king of Ethiopia. As retribution for the humiliation of his mother, Menilek stole the Ark of the Covenant and levitated it across the Red Sea to Ethiopia, where it purportedly remains to this day. It’s a persistent national myth. Until Emperor Haile Selassie was overthrown in 1974, Ethiopian leaders claimed to be sons of Solomon, lions descended from the Lion of Judah.
There’s nothing of this legend in Scripture. To ancient Israelites, Ethiopia wasn’t an ally but an uncanny and terrifying threat. Cush’s son Nimrod founded Nineveh and Babylon (Gen. 10:8–12), cities that later conquered Israel. Aaron and Miriam objected when Moses took a Cushite wife (Num. 12:1). During the reign of King Asa, Zerah the Cushite came over the southern horizon to invade Judah with hundreds of chariots and a million-man army (2 Chron. 14).
Against this background, the heroism of Ebed-Melech is all the more notable (Jer. 38). Ebed-Melech was a Cushite eunuch who served in the court of King Zedekiah during the last days of Judah. The prophet Jeremiah counsels Zedekiah to surrender to Babylon. Enraged by this message, Jerusalem’s officials force Zedekiah to approve their plan to put the traitorous prophet to death. Like Joseph, Jeremiah is tossed into a muddy cistern without water, left to die of thirst.
Ebed-Melech bursts onto the scene as an unexpected deliverer. As the wonderfully-named Deusdedit Musinguzi points out in a monograph on the passage, Ebed-Melech is a model of compassion, justice, and courage. Though a foreigner, he charges Jerusalem’s leaders with “evil” in open court, and persuades the king to let him pull Jeremiah up from the pit. Ebed-Melech’s name, “Servant of the King,” indicates he’s Zedekiah’s servant, but he proves himself loyal to the King. As a Gentile deliverer, he foreshadows Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus. He literally rescues Jeremiah from death, raising him from beneath the earth, a figure of the Spirit who brings a greater Prophet from the grave. In every way, Ebed-Melech is the antithesis of the corrupt Jewish courtiers, a Gentile without Torah who keeps the Torah written on his heart (Rom. 2:14–15).
Ebed-Melech is firstfruits of a great harvest from the land of Cush. According to Orthodox tradition, Christianity came to the country in the late third century through two shipwrecked Syrian boys, the brothers Aedisius and Frumentius, who were brought to the court of the Axum emperor. Through their faithful service, the boys rose to high positions, and their witness convinced the emperor to become a Christian. In 305, the emperor’s successor sent Frumentius to Alexandria to ask the patriarch—none other than Athanasius—to send a bishop to Axum to promote evangelism and church construction. Athanasius ordained Frumentius, who returned to baptize Emperor Ezana, who made Christianity the official religion of his empire. Ethiopia is among the oldest of Christian nations.
In Acts, Luke tells us that Christianity arrived in Ethiopia already in the early first century. The first known Gentile to be baptized was another Ethiopian eunuch, a latter-day Ebed-Melech, who meets Philip in a Spirit-arranged encounter on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza (Acts 8). Though “cut off” like the Suffering Servant in the text he reads, the Ethiopian eunuch becomes fruitful, with a place in the house of his God (Isa. 56:1–8; Deut. 23:1–5).
Already in the old covenant, when the very name “Cush” could send chills down Israelite spines, the Lord promised he would one day adopt Ethiopia as a “home-born” son and a child of Zion (Ps. 87:4). One day, he promised, Cush would bring tribute to Jerusalem (Isa. 45:14). These promises form the story arc of Ethiopia’s long history. Every time you see Ethiopia is still on the map, you’re seeing real-world proof of the faithfulness of God.
👉 Peter J. Leithart is President of Theopolis Institute.
Turkey Is Reviving The Ottoman Empire And Biblical Cush Is Welcoming Turkey In Submission, As The Government Of Sudan Is Now Allowing Turkey To Expand Its Military Into Sudan
When we read Daniel’s “the Libyans and Ethiopians shall follow at his heels.” (Daniel 11:43) it means that Libya, Tunisia, Sudan, Somalia and Chad will simply follow and submit to Antichrist. We have argued that this Antichrist will some day come out of Turkey reviving the Ottoman Empire and yesterday, Erdogan’s visit marked the first time that a Turkishpresident has ever visited Sudan since the independence of the North African nation in 1956.
Even Reuters states that this expedition into North Africa is to revive Ottoman hegemony:
Turkey will rebuild a ruined Ottoman port city on Sudan’s Red Sea coast and construct a naval dock to maintain civilian and military vessels, Sudan’s foreign minister said on Tuesday, as Ankara expands military and economic ties in Africa.
He will now be given the Sudanese island of Suakin, by the Sudanese government. Turkey has agreed to “rebuild” the island, in a meeting in the capital city of Khartoum.
While there are regular normal industrial pursuits, such as that of cotton, the ultimate goal of Turkey’s presents in Sudan is a military one. Erdogan said in his speech, given at the University of Khartoum, that defense industry will be among the major investments that Turkey will make in Sudan.
There is a strategic reason for Turkey to be in the Sudanese island of Suakin, and it has an historical relation. The Ottoman Empire used Suakin, according to one Turkish report, “to secure the Hejaz province — present-day western Saudi Arabia — from attackers using the Red Sea front.”
Turkey is expanding its hegemony in Africa in the name of “rebuilding,” reinvigorating its authority in the Muslim world as a global power. On Tuesday, Erdogan will leave Sudan for a one-day visit to Chad and will then head to Tunisia, where these too will follow in his footsteps.
Ultimately, this is about reviving the Ottoman Empire, and the Sudanese, the Somalis, the Chadians and the Tunisians — that is, the people of Cush — are receiving Turkey in Submission. When Erdogan is seen (see video below) he waves with the sign of the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, the Rab’a sign tucking his thumb and waving with only his four fingers to remind the crowds that Egypt is next. Daniel then becomes clear:
He shall have power over the treasures of gold and silver, and over all the precious things of Egypt; also the Libyans and Ethiopians shall follow at his heels. (Daniel 11:43)
We are seeing the people in Sudan already expressing their submission to Turkey.
In his speech in Khartoum, Erdogan painted the “imperialist” West is like a dog hungry for Muslim resources. He vowed to change that status quo saying “every Pharaoh has a Moses to defeat him”. Erdogan painted himself as the Moses. Why? Because Moses defeated Egypt. And now he will be stationing his forces in Suakin, across from the Muslim promised land in Mecca.
Suakin is crucial for it now becomes a military base close to the ports of Qunfudah, the port of Jeddah, the port of Laith, the port of Yanbu in Saudi Arabia, and the ports of Quseir and Safaga in Egypt. This gets Turkey closer to Egypt’s Adam’s apple and tightens the noose around Saudi Arabia especially after the Gulf crisis. Sudan’s relations with Egypt and Saudi Arabia is tense. The four countries (the Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt and Saudi Arabia) tried to pressure Sudan to compel them to stand with them against Qatar. Erdogan made his stand against Saudi Arabia standing with Qatar where Turkish military bases are also established there.
Everything with this expedition has the marks of Ottoman revival. Suakin is the second port of Sudan after Port Sudan, 60 km to the north. The Ottoman Empire used the island of Suakin as a center for its navy in the Red Sea. The port included the seat of the Ottoman governor of the southern Red Sea between 1821 and 1885.
“We have asked for the allocation of Suakin Island for a certain time to re-establish it and restore it to its old [Ottoman] roots,” Erdogan said at the end of an economic meeting between Sudanese and Turkish businessmen on the second day of his visit to Sudan.
“There is an attachment I will not talk about now,” he said.
But it all becomes obvious. Erdogan visited with his Sudanese counterpart Omar al-Bashir Suakin, where the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA) carried out a project to restore the Ottoman ruins, during which the two presidents inspected the customs building and the historic Hanafi and Shafi’i mosques on the island.
And it also brings Erdogan closer to rule over Mecca. “The Turks who want to go to Umrah (in Mecca, Saudi Arabia) will come to Suakin and then go to Umrah in programmed tourism,” Erdogan said.
Erdogan made it clear that he aims at creating a $10 billion trade volume with Sudan. “Around a $500 million trade volume [in 2016] between the two countries is not enough. In the coming years, it will be $1 billion, but we are targeting $10 billion.”
Erdogan was accompanied by two hundred Turkish businessmen, as well as Turkish officials, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, Education Minister Ismet Yilmaz, Agriculture Minister Ahmet Esref Fakibaba, Energy Minister Berat Albayrak, Culture and Tourism Minister Numan Kurtulmus, Transport, Maritime Affairs and Communications Minister Ahmet Arslan, Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci, Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli, Turkish Chief of General Staff Hulusi Aka.
Erdogan said Turkey has invested around $650 million in Sudan, including $300 million worth of direct investments. But he wants to increase this tremendously.
So why the interest in Africa? You cannot have a world war without Africa, with all of its oil, diamonds and other rich resources. Erdogan wants not only the treasures of Egypt, but Africa. Hence why Turkey is expanding its military presence in Africa. The biggest military base in Somalia belongs to Turkey, spanning over four square kilometres and taking two years to construct. As we read in a report from October of 2017:
Turkey has set up its biggest overseas military base in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, increasing Ankara’s presence in the Horn of Africa country.
Officially opened on Saturday, the base, which reportedly cost $50m, will train 10,000 Somali troops and has the capacity to train at least 1,500 soldiers at a time, according to Turkish and Somali officials.
Hulusi Akar, Turkey’s chief of General Staff, said at the opening ceremony for the military base:
“This is the largest training base of its kind outside of Turkey … The government of Turkey and its army will provide all the needed support to our brothers in Somalia”
Sudan has been a place where a number of outside governments have entered to expand their own influences and military industrial hegemonies.
Sudan has been called the “arm’s dump” of Africa. It was a country that had a huge absorption and circulation of arms way before South Sudan succeeded in 2011. When South Sudan did split, there was an estimated 3.2 million small arms being used in that country. In 2010 and 2011, numerous rebel and militia groups began popping up in the Jonglei and Upper Nile states, and the ownership and possession of guns has been precipitously increasing partially due to this.
Former West Germany started a weapons flow into Muslim dominated North Sudan. Germany even built an ammunition factory in Khartoum, which is the capital of North Sudan today. In the 1980s, East Germany (under the Soviet Union) responded to the West German’s distribution of arms into the north, by sending weapons into the more Christian dominated South Sudan. As we read in one report:
“Meanwhile, research has shown the international role in weapon supply, with former West Germany introducing automatic small arms in vast numbers to Sudan, which, until then, mainly had old British carbines. West Germany also set up the ammunition factory in Sheggera, Khartoum, in effect, providing the bullets to keep the guns firing. In the 1980s, East Germany responded by supplying the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) with AK47s via Ethiopia. In this way, Cold War animosities were played out in the Greater Horn of Africa.”
In 2009, a major German mercenary group, Asgaard, which is ran by Thomas Kaltegartner, agreed to send one hundred mercenaries to Somalia to back a Somalian warlord named Abdinur Ahmed Darman, and even train his men. According to the German publication,Der Speigel:
“Thomas Kaltegärtner, CEO of Asgaard German Security Group, confirmed a report by the German public broadcaster ARD that his company plans to send former German soldiers to Somalia.
In a December 2009 press release, Asgaard announced it had signed an “exclusive agreement on security services” with Abdinur Ahmed Darman. Darman, a Somali warlord who styles himself as the country’s president, does not recognize the legitimacy of the United Nations-backed transitional government of Somali President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed. The agreement, the company said, would cover “all necessary measures to reintroduce security and peace to Somalia.” The country has not had a functioning central government since 1991.
According to Kaltegärtner, himself a former Bundeswehr soldier, Asgaard employees would provide security for Darman and train police and military forces. He stressed, however, that combat operations were not planned. He said that over 100 mercenaries could be involved in operations.”
In every world war, Africa is at the center of focus, getting invaded and controlled by foreign militaries.
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