Last month, if you were visiting Adis Ababa in Ethiopia, you would have witnessed an astonishing sight.
Every January, the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church celebrates a festival called Timkat, during which their senior priests parade through the streets of Ethiopia's capital. They carry a replica of the Ark of the Covenant, as onlookers drop to their knees in reverence.
This obscure branch of Christianity has approximately 50 million adherents, most of whom live in Ethiopia. Aside for this sect's curious affinity to the Hebrew Scriptures and Jewish practices — evident in their observance of kosher laws, separation of the sexes in their churches, and the treatment of Saturday as Sabbath rather than Sunday — they also make the extraordinary claim that the Ark of the Covenant, Judaism's most revered object, is in their possession — and has been for almost 3,000 years.
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