A Religious History of Beghi, West Wallagga Zone, Ca. 1880s -1991

Abstract

To reconstruct the religious history of the district during the period under study, both primary and secondary sources were utilized. Attempts have been made to unearth a history of the three major religions of Bèghi namely the Oromo traditional religion (waaqqëffañña), Islam, and Christianity during the period under study. Apparently the native religion practiced in the Bèghi district as in other Oromo regions was Waqqëffañña, which is based on belief of one Wääqä tokkicha or Waaqaa guraacha, the Béghi Oromo perceive that the color of waaqa is black. The second major religion and of course the dominant religion in the Bèghi nowaday is Islam. Muslim merchants and shèikhs had played a pivotal role in the introduction of Islam to the region. Christianity is the third major religion prevailed in the Beghi. Most probably its introduction to the region dates back to the time of Menilik II incorporation of Lëqa Qëllam. It seems that the king of Qëllam was converted to Christianity during the time of Menilik II incorporated the region. Evangelical Christianity has been introduced to the region recently.The research is reconstructed from different sources of both Published and unpublished materials. The data was collected through referring to the literature and theses, collecting maps, figures and photographys and interview from Beghi district West Wallagga zone and Mao and Komo special warada of BNRS. The need to look back at the historical background of the Beghi religious history is very crucial. It has dual purpose. On the one hand, the area has long history of Religion and religious processing, still the attention or concern given by scholars and researchers to the issues are very little or low. Indeed, there are few works produced on some aspects of this area merged with other Wällagga state and former Ghimbi and Asossa awurajjas. Nevertheless, these works have no specificity and depth/comprehensiveness on the study. That is why this research work was conducted to address/fill the gap left by different written documents. The carefully gathered data are organized, analyzed, interpreted and reconstructed by using the qualitative methods of research writing. The shortage of archieval sources and scantiness of written materials directly related to Béghi has been a challenge in the writing of this thesis. Many findings belonging to various periods ranging from the scope of the study time were recorded. The research has also underscored the importance of the area for the future relative and archeological research which was considered as the former center of the Islamic state that witness a rich history of harmony, tolerance and co-existance among the many communities