Transcription
The story of Jesus as a young man ends in Luke 2:41-52, where Jesus, at age 12, visits the temple in Jerusalem, engaging teachers with his wisdom. After this event, the narrative pauses, and Jesus's life from age 12 to about age 30 remains unrecorded in scripture. The story picks up again with the start of Jesus's public ministry around age 30. This begins with his baptism by John the Baptist, detailed in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
This gap in Jesus's life from age 12 to 30 is often referred to as the silent years or hidden years, a period about which the Bible provides no explicit details. But today, we can say it's not hidden anymore. Why? Because the Ethiopian Bible, which is known as the oldest Bible in the world, is challenging this narrative.
The Ethiopian Bible is not a discovery; it has been there for a long time. Because, from records, the country wasn't even colonized; therefore, most of their way of life and artifacts have been preserved properly without tampering. Some suggest that the country holds the Ark of the Covenant, but that's another topic for another day. So, back to Jesus's Lost Years. In the Ethiopian Bible, there is a connection between Jesus's early life and ascension. It tells his story from the time he was born till the time he ascended to heaven, and with detailed pictures. In this video, I will take my time to explain and tell exactly how the Ethiopian Bible talks about these Lost Years of Jesus, thus from age 12 to 30, which wasn't written in our canonical Bible. Share your thoughts in the comments and do not forget to subscribe to be notified of all our upcoming videos, which are very inspiring and informative. Let's delve in.
Have you ever seen this before in your life? Chances are your answer is no. It looks really weird, like something you see in a treasure hunt movie, only that this is real. The Ethiopian Bible is one of the most mysterious and controversial books that ever existed. Even the country itself is shrouded in mysteries that can't be explained. Ethiopia is home to one of the oldest civilizations in the world and is the only country in Africa that was not colonized. And because of that, they can trace their lineage all the way back to Ham, one of the sons of Noah. This has even been collaborated with the Jews. But this video is not about the country itself but about what the country possesses.
Ethiopia has some of the oldest Bible scrolls that ever existed, even older than the famous KJV Bible. Other than the 66 books that make up the King James Bible, the Ethiopic Bible has 88 books and includes some works that other churches just don't have. The book has scrolls from the Old Testament, the New Testament, and scrolls that had never been seen before. And what makes this so interesting is that they had these scrolls long before Christianity first came to their society in the 4th century. In other words, Christianity wasn't a religion given to them like most nations; Christianity was already in Ethiopia since the 4th century.
Ethiopia has been a nation of Christianity. Egyptian traveler, monk, and historian Cosmos Indicopleustes wrote that Ethiopia was a Christian country when he visited there in the middle of the 6th century. He saw how the rulers opened their borders to a lot of Christian refugees who fled to Ethiopia as they ran away from persecution from kingdoms and empires that were against Christianity. Certain Ethiopian tribes have been worshiping the Christian God for over 3,500 years. As such, the oldest organized Christian body in the world is not the Catholic ministry, as many would have thought, but the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, which is locally known as Tewahedo in Ethiopia. The country also has one of the earliest illustrated Christian books ever found, which is a part of the gospels written in Ge'ez, an old Ethiopian language, and was found in 2010 in a monastery on top of a mountain in Ethiopia.
According to the Kebra Nagast, which is Ethiopia's holy book, in the 10th century BC, an Ethiopian ruler and the famous biblical Queen of Sheba went to Jerusalem to ask the famous King Solomon for advice. It's even recorded in the acceptable Bible canon. But what the Bible didn't tell us is that the two rulers had a son together, named Menelik. Queen Sheba took the boy back to Ethiopia and made him the first emperor. In 2012, experts looked at the genetic makeup of many Ethiopians and found some evidence to support Sheba's journey to Jerusalem and birth there. As such, it is believed that Egyptian, Israeli, or Syrian people may have mixed with the Ethiopian natives around 3,000 years ago, during the time when the queen is said to have ruled the kingdom of Sheba, collaborating the story even further.
Despite having all these credentials and authenticity, the Ethiopian Bible is still discarded and not taken as part of the canon of the Holy books. In fact, most people, including believers of the same faith, have never heard of the Ethiopian Bible. That's to show you the extent of what was done to discredit and hide the Ethiopian Bible. This begs the question: why? Well, to understand that, let's take a little history lesson.
The Bible as we know it today wasn't actually how the Bible was in the past. There were many versions of different parts of the Bible, as well as many different interpretations and ideas of what the Bible was thought to be saying. As we all know, the biblical texts were originally written in Hebrew before being translated into other languages. The first translation was carried out by a man known as St. Jerome, who translated from Hebrew to Latin. He compiled what is referred to as the Vulgate around April of that year. The Vulgate remains the principal Latin version or translation of the Bible, containing 27 books referred to as the New Testament and 39 books known as the Old Testament. At that time, it was called the Hebrew Bible.
In the first century, many books were written about Jesus's life and teachings, but a lot of these books were not true; they were like fanfiction stories about Jesus. The problem was that when these books came out, people thought these made-up stories were real. Back then, there was no internet to quickly check if these books were telling the truth, and as we know, fake news often spreads faster than real news. So you can imagine how many false books were around and the trouble they caused. This worried leaders in the early Christian Church. They met at the Council of Nicaea and again at the First Council of Constantinople to pick which books would be in the New Testament. They decided that a book could only be scripture if it was written by one of Jesus's followers or by someone who actually saw Jesus' teaching. The book also had to have been written in the first century and make sense with the rest of the Bible.
There have been many changes to what we now call The Holy Bible, but the most important change may have happened during the reign of King James I. Despite the Vulgate existing for about 500 years, there were still numerous versions and accounts of the Bible, so much that it bothered the reigning monarch at that time. He was worried about the different Bible versions that were popular in the 1600s. The king wanted a version of the Bible that settled religious differences, as well as one that reinforced his power. Several priests also asked the king to make changes, saying that some of the translations that were going around were wrong. To solve this pressing issue, the king got 47 experts to look over all the different translations of the Bible that were already out there. They were split into six groups and worked on different parts of the project on their own for seven years. These men had to follow strict rules so that they wouldn't show any bias. They also used a number of different tools to help them make a scientific Bible that stayed true to the original languages. When the priest and the King looked at the works of these experts and saw that they had similarities in their work, despite being far from each other, they approved it, giving glory to God for guiding them to arrive at the same conclusion. In 1611, the King James Bible was published, and because of advancements made in printing, it became one of the most accessible Bible versions to date.
So these edits made in the King James Bible and the original Vulgate translation made by St. Jerome saw to it that some books were not included in the Bible most Christians have today, while the Ethiopian Bible still retains all scripture. Interestingly, Ethiopian tradition preserved the stories about Jesus's hidden years, offering intriguing accounts of amazing miracles attributed to him as a young man. These stories come from ancient writings known as apocryphal texts, which, though respected culturally and spiritually, are not officially part of the canonical Ethiopian Bible.
One captivating story describes young Jesus shaping birds from clay as his friends watched. He breathed life into the clay birds, which immediately sprang to life and flew away. Those witnessing the miracle were amazed, recognizing even then that Jesus possessed the divine power to create life. In another compelling tale, Jesus's earthly father, Joseph the carpenter, severely injured his hand while working. Calmly, Jesus approached Joseph, touched the injury, and immediately healed him. Joseph's hand was instantly restored, highlighting Jesus's deep compassion and extraordinary healing abilities.
According to the Ethiopian Bible, particularly texts like the Infancy Gospel within Ethiopian tradition, many more details are provided about the early life of Jesus Christ. The Ethiopian tradition narrates more miraculous and significant events. Other stories from this Bible describe Jesus performing miracles which were kind of extreme. The Ethiopian Bible also recounts events emphasizing the divine protection and purpose surrounding Jesus. It narrates an incident during the holy family's flight to Egypt, describing miraculous protection from danger, including confrontations with wild animals that became tame and docile in Jesus's presence. Another story from these texts involves young Jesus healing children and raising individuals from the dead, showcasing his divine compassion and miraculous abilities from infancy onward. Furthermore, it highlights Jesus's profound wisdom and knowledge of scripture from an exceptionally young age, astonishing learned elders and teachers in various communities. The Ethiopian biblical tradition emphasizes not just miraculous actions but also the early manifestation of Jesus's role as a teacher and spiritual guide, indicating the ministry that would later transform the spiritual landscape.
However, some of his extreme actions, according to the gospel, are that young Jesus, in some accounts, is described as causing harm or even death to other children who angered or mistreated him, though later he often reversed these actions, restoring them to life. There are accounts of Jesus using his powers in anger, such as causing individuals who opposed him or his family to become blind or paralyzed, only to later heal them after they acknowledged his divine nature. These dramatic and controversial stories are a key reason why mainstream Christian traditions generally did not include these narratives in the canonical Bible, viewing them as inconsistent with the established image of Jesus's compassion, humility, and self-control.
The Ethiopian canon is a great way to see how the Bible has changed over time. Contrary to popular belief, the Bible isn't just one book; it's more of a collection of texts and experiences written over many years, and that's where the problem kind of lies. Different religious groups, including the very identified or accepted ones, have a long history of excluding or including different texts or copies based on different theological or personal grounds. For example, the Bible we know today was mostly written in the fourth and fifth centuries AD. By that time, Christianity in Ethiopia had already begun to differ from Christianity in Europe and the surrounding area of the Mediterranean, and until date, the difference keeps getting wider.
The Ethiopian Bible has a lot of similarities with the Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, although it does have a few extra Old Testament books. These were probably written in the last few hundred years BC, which is late in the time of the Old Testament books but before the New Testament began. But in recent years, people have become more interested in the Ethiopian Bible, trying to find out what makes it special and the truth it holds. The Ethiopian churches have also worked to make it easier for more people to read by translating it into more languages and doing academic studies on it. Personally, I think it is amazing that this Bible survived this long, especially after the country was attacked by Muslims in Italy and after a fire burned the church of the monastery where the Bible was in the 1930s, and it survived it all, adding to the mystery of this book. What do you think?