Chained Around the Neck

Illustration of Ethiopian Prisoners of Rameses II

Ethiopia in Fausset's Bible Dictionary

"Hebrew; Cush. (See CUSH; BABYLON.) Isaiah 11:11. S. of Egypt. Now Nubia, Sennaar, Kordofan, and N. Abyssinia. In a stricter sense the kingdom of Meroe from the junction of the Blue and the White Nile to the border of Egypt. Syene on the N. marked the boundary from Egypt (Ezekiel 29:10; Ezekiel 30:6). The Red Sea was on the Ethiopia, the Libyan desert on the W. The native name was Ethaush; the Greek "Ethiopia" means the land of the sunburnt. Compare Jeremiah 13:23, "can the Ethiopian change his skin?" "The rivers of Ethiopia" (Zephaniah 3:10) are the two branches of the Nile and the Astabbras (Tacazze). The Nile forms a series of cataracts here. The dispersed Israelites shall be brought as an offering by the nations to the Lord (Zephaniah 3:8-9; Isaiah 66:20; Isaiah 60:9), from both the African and the Babylonian Cush, where the ten tribes were scattered in Peter's time (1 Peter 1:1; 1 Peter 5:13; Isaiah 11:11, "from Cush and from Shinar".)

The Falashas of Abyssinia are probably of the ten tribes. In Isaiah 18:1, "the land shadowing with wings" is Ethiopia shadowing (protecting) with its two wings (Egyptian and Ethiopian forces) the Jews, "a nation scattered and peeled" (loaded with indignity, made bald) though once "terrible" when God put a terror of them into surrounding nations (Exodus 23:27; Joshua 2:9), "a nation meted out and trodden down whose land the (Assyrian) rivers (i.e. armies, Isaiah 8:7-8) have spoiled"; the Jews, not the Ethiopians. Ethiopia had sent her ambassadors to Jerusalem where they now were (Isaiah 18:2), Tirhakah their king shortly afterward being the ally whose diversion in that city's favor saved it from Sennacherib (Isaiah 36:37). Isaiah announces Sennacherib's coming overthrow to the Ethiopian ambassadors and desires them to carry the tidings to their own land (compare Isaiah 17:12-14; not "woe" but "ho," calling attention (Isaiah 18:1-2); go, take back the tidings of what God is about, to do against Assyria, the common foe of both Ethiopia and Judah." Read More

Ethiopian in Smiths Bible Dictionary

Biblical Definition of Ethiopia

Map of Ancient Nubia

The Bible mentions the "Ethiopians"

Jeremiah 38:12 - And Ebedmelech the Ethiopian said unto Jeremiah, Put now [these] old cast clouts and rotten rags under thine armholes under the cords. And Jeremiah did so.

2 Chronicles 14:9 - And there came out against them Zerah the Ethiopian with an host of a thousand thousand, and three hundred chariots; and came unto Mareshah.

Jeremiah 39:16 - Go and speak to Ebedmelech the Ethiopian, saying, Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will bring my words upon this city for evil, and not for good; and they shall be [accomplished] in that day before thee.

Jeremiah 38:7 - Now when Ebedmelech the Ethiopian, one of the eunuchs which was in the king's house, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the dungeon; the king then sitting in the gate of Benjamin;

Jeremiah 38:10 - Then the king commanded Ebedmelech the Ethiopian, saying, Take from hence thirty men with thee, and take up Jeremiah the prophet out of the dungeon, before he die.

Jeremiah 13:23 - Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? [then] may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil.

Numbers 12:1 - And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married: for he had married an Ethiopian woman.