Shoolaan

Shoolaan was part of a group of people who cooperated with Aläqa Zännäb in translating Bible texts into Oromo.

Origin

“[…] Scholan e stirpe Ada […] enixe auxiliantibus”
[St. Matthew and St. Mark, title page] /
“[Zännäb] with the strong help from […] and Sholan from the offspring of Ada [Qubee: probably Aadaa; alternatively: Adʾa or Ada’a]”

  • Aadaa is one of the three agnate descendant groups of the Därra Oromos [cf. Sesasew.com]
  • Ad’a or Ada’a is a district southeast of Addis Ababa. There (in a place called Balli), Johannes Mayer and his colleagues worked from 1880 until early 1886.

Contribution to Bible translation

Shoolaan is mentioned on the title page of the following translations:

Probably the same person as Gäbrä Mika’el

Shoolaan is an Oromo name, whereas Gäbrä Mika’el is an Amharic name that might have been given to him at his baptism.

Gäbrä Mika’el is the name of an Oromo who led Bible studies in Adwa alongside aläqa Zännäb and Waaree, in addition to his teaching children.

  • Gäbrä Mika’el is not mentioned in Greiner’s letters published by St. Chrischona. He seems to have been absent from Greiner’s school for Oromos in Ankober.
  • The reason might be that Gäbrä Mika’el / Shoolan, who had studied at St. Chrischona in 1872, experienced difficulties returning to Abyssinia from Alexandria on his own. The mission board in St. Chrischona considered him less qualified than Jaagan. This belittling may have prompted Gäbrä Mika’el to avoid Ankober and withdraw to his home region, Ada.

Johannes Mayer employed Gäbrä Mika’el as a teacher in his Amharic school in Ankober and his Oromo-speaking school in Balli.

  • Gäbrä Mika’el [aka Shoolan] is not mentioned in the letters written by Greiner, with whom he appears to have travelled from St. Chrischona to Alexandria in 1872. Gäbrä Mika’el might have wanted to avoid Greiner since the St. Chrishona mission board considered him less qualified than Jaagan.

Further reading

Flad, Friedrich. Michael Argawi: Ein mutiger Kenner und Zeuge unter den Falaschas in Abessinien. Edited by W. Sidler. Basel: Brunnen, 1952. [Esp. p. 15; view online]

Mayer, Johannes. Diary, written in Adwa, Ankobar, Entotto, and Balli, April 1869 to October 1883. [To be published by Makeda Ketcham and Wolbert Smidt]

Cross-references

» Balli mission station

» Mayer & Bender, Letters and journals published by St. Chrischona

» Jaagan