Origins of The Hidden Eye
The origins of the sect of the Hidden Eye began innocently enough: It was started by a group of devout Ethiopians who worshiped the Ark of the Covenant.
In the Old Testament, God commanded Moses to build an Ark to house the tablets inscribed with his commandments. Legends claim that after the Israelites left their desert wanderings and found a promised homeland, the Ark and its contents were kept in Solomon’s temple for centuries. Eventually, the Ark vanished. Jewish legend holds that the Ark disappeared around 560 BC, when Babylonians sacked the temple. Some believe it was likely captured earlier as a prize of war, removed to Babylon and eventually destroyed. Others argue it remained in the temple until just before its eventual destruction in 70 AD. It is common among modern scholars to believe the Ark was simply destroyed with the Temple.
But there are those who have believed for thousands of years that the Ark still exists.
Ethiopian Christians claim that the Ark of the Covenant was spirited out of Jerusalem around 900 BC, and taken to the town of Aksum in the Northern part of the country’s highlands.
For the next thousand years, a devout group of Ethiopian believers provided support and protection for the monks guarding the supposed resting place of the Holy Ark. Even the most powerful and influential members of the group, however, had never actually seen the Ark. It was forbidden. Each generation named a single monk, known as the Protector of the Ark, who was allowed into the inner shrine. The belief system of the Hidden Eye was built upon hundreds of years of generational ritual and rigid indoctrination.
In 1439, the shrine was ransacked and the most revered monk, the Protector of the Ark, was killed. In the aftermath, a number of the devout entered the inner shrine and found it empty. Their legends told them that the Ark had originally been stolen from Israel and spirited into Ethiopia by Menelik the bastard son of Queen Sheba and King Solomon. The protectors believed the Ark had been taken back by the Israelites.
This belief set the protectors on a course out of Africa, to Jerusalem and eventually to Florence, Italy. The result of their actions and journey would inspire the radicalization of the Hidden Eye.
