Ethiopian movement

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The Ethiopian movement is a religious movement that began in southern Africa towards the end of the 19th and early 20th century, when two groups broke away from the Anglican and Methodist churches. One of the main reasons for breaking away was the growing idea that Africa had little to no history before the European colonisation of the continent, leaving many Africans upset at the prospect of their heritage and culture being erased through colonialism.^[1]

Later in the 19th century, many people of African descent who found themselves in America due to slavery found solace in a passage of the bible speaking of Ethiopia which connected them to their lands and gave them hope of blacks being able to one day self govern. Their interpretations of the Biblical passage (Psalm 68:31): "Ethiopia shall soon stretch forth its hands unto God" (in the original Hebrew, actually כּוש Cush) united them to one another and also to their homes and cultures.^[1]

The term was later given a much wider interpretation by Bengt Sundkler, whose book Bantu Prophets in South Africa was the first comprehensive study of African Independent Churches (AICs).