[No author found yet for the profile.
Please use the contact form below to get in touch with us.]
Life and ministry
Haile Mariam Engeda was born in Illubabor.
After a time with the Italians, he worked as a teacher in the Kambaata [and Hadiyya?] area and then as a school registrar in Addis Ababa. There he got to know David Stokes from the Bible-Churchmen’s Missionaries Society.
Pedersen, Early Evangelical Christians, p. 30, reports:
“Ato Negash [Degafu] remembers that Mr. Stokes taught Ato Haile Mariam a little Ge’ez, and how to express himself in songs of Orthodox character, i.e. with the Yared melody, which later brought him in contact with the Orthodox believers and priests in and around Dodola. […; p. 31] Because of his background in the Orthodox Church, and his training by Mr. Stokes, Ato Haile Mariam remained in contact with the Orthodox believers in Dodola and Lensho. Actually,
the Orthodox believers admired his singing, but since the content mainly stressed Christ as a savior, and did not stress on the “Virgin Mariam”, they were, according to Ato Negash, not really comfortable with it.”
Further reading
Pedersen, Henrik Sonne. “Early Evangelical Christians in the Dodola area, Bale: Life and setting according to contemporary witnesses and written sources”. [Paper written during his time as lecturer at MYS / EGST?] 2005. [View online (academia.edu)]