Ephraim, Isaac

Isaac was born in Ethiopia in 1936. Mother is Yemen, father is Ethiopian Jew . The exact date of birth is unknown. In high school, he chose May 29th as his nominal birthday. ^[4] Got his primary education in Ethiopia.

Efraim Isaac was a professor at various universities and published scientific articles and books. In 1969, he became the first teacher at Harvard University in the Department of African and African American Studies, and played an important role in the early history of the department. Isaac continued teaching until 1977, and taught almost half of the students who completed this program during this period ^[5] .

Dr. Isaac also lectured at other higher education institutions:

• Princeton University - Middle East Studies, 1983-85
• Hebrew University (Ancient Semitic Languages)
• University of Pennsylvania (religion, Semitic languages)
• Howard University (School of Theology)
• Lichai University (Religion)
• Bard College (Religion, History)

Apart from those mentioned above, his themes range from biblical Hebrew , Jewish literature, the history of Ethiopia , the concept and history of slavery and ancient African civilizations. He was a fellow at the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Institute for Advanced Study and a fellow at Harvard University, Dubois Institute (1985-86).

Dr. Isaac had a lengthy argument with Harvard regarding the refusal of his job request. ^{[6] [7]} In the end, he lost the case in court.

Contribution

Isaac made an important contribution to peace and reconciliation . He founded the ad hoc Peace Committee for Peace and Reconciliation between all Ethiopian conflicting parties at a critical juncture in Ethiopian history in 1989. The Committee - twelve elders - assisted in conducting bilateral negotiations between the government and all conflicting parties in the country and abroad. This forum was created for dialogue on the peaceful resolution of violence and bloody conflicts. The committee helped accelerate the end of the 30-year civil war in eastern Africa and resolve the conflict in July 1991. In July 1991, the Committee also helped mobilize funds to cover the costs of the Addis Ababa Conference on Peaceful and Democratic Transition, when the 30-year-old civil war formally ended. The Provisional Government and the Provisional Council of Ethiopia were formed, which later became the Ethiopian Parliament . He participated in the conference as an observer, along with representatives of international diplomatic, social and religious leaders. In 1992, he organized, with the help of his two elder colleagues, Dr. Haile Belai Selasia and Dr. Tilahun Beyene, an international night teleconference of religious reconciliation elders, with the participation of eight conflicting Ethiopian bishops and several religious leaders, which led to the resolution of serious religious disputes and conflict situations among the archbishop regarding church governance and the appointment of the Patriarch.

From 1998 to 2000, he led the Ethiopian-Eritrean Peace Delegation in Ethiopia and Eritrea during the war between the two countries. In 2007, he was negotiating the release of 30 Ethiopian political leaders and members of parliament. Subsequently, since 2007, Isaac, in collaboration with other organizations, has also been negotiating the release of some 35,000 prisoners. In 2009, he actively lobbied an agreement with the main branch of the Ogaden National Liberation Front in the Ethiopian government. He participated in the release of two kidnapped Germans (2012) and the release of two Swedish journalists from prison (2013). He continues to work actively in the field of peace, but avoids publicity.

Activities

He currently holds the chair of the International Department of Africa, the Horn of Africa and the Organization for Development (Addis Ababa, Asmara) and former president of the Yemeni Jewish Federation of America. He founded (1960) the Ethiopian Literacy Committee, whose executive director was from 1967 to 1974; in the late sixties, the committee taught literacy to millions of people ^{[8] [9] [10]} . In 1959, he organized the Constituent Assembly of the Ethiopian Students Association in North America (ESANA) in Chicago, becoming the organization’s first president.

Listed in the editorial board of two international scientific journals: Afrasian Languages ^[11] and Second Temple Jewish Literature. Dr. Isaac is a member of the Board of Directors or a consultant to several interfaith and intercultural groups and organizations, nationally and internationally. These include the Temple of Understanding, the Institute of Religion and Public Policy, Tanenbaum's Center for Interfaith Mutual Understanding, Princeton Fellowship in Prayer, the Jewish Community Studies Institute, and the Oxford Forum (England).

In the 80s, he was an active member of the apartheid anti- apartheid Harvard Radcliffe Alumni Association. He was nominated twice at Harvard, along with fifteen other prominent Harvard graduates. In 1993 (Chicago, Illinois) he was a member of the revolutionary document of global ethics along with the Dalai Lama , the late Cardinal of Chicago Joseph Bernardin, and others, as a Jewish delegate to the parliament of world religions.

In 1994-2005 (New York, New York) he was an active member of the National Committee on American Foreign Policy at the height of their involvement in the peace process in Northern Ireland.

In 2004 and 2005, participated in peace symposia in Amman, Jordan.

In 2005 (Brussels, Belgium) and 2006 (Seville, Spain), he twice served as a delegate to two major peacebuilding symposia of imams and rabbis sponsored by the kings of Morocco, Belgium and Spain, and the French organization Planet of the People (Hommes de Parole).

In June 2006 (Oslo, Norway), Isaac made a presentation to the international congress of conflict resolution experts under the auspices of the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Geneva Center for the Humanitarian Dialogue.

In 2007 (Sarajevo, Bosnia) took part and contributed to the peace building symposium between the followers of the three Abrahamic religions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, a member of the peace delegation of the Tanenbaum Inter-Religious Understanding Center.

In 2009, in Israel and the Palestinian Authority, he was a member of a peaceful delegation of prominent lawyers, diplomats, scholars and religious leaders, led by Cardinal McCaric and Ambassador Tony Hall.

In 2010 (Basel, Switzerland), Isaac made a presentation on the traditional struggle for peace as a member of a peaceful delegation at a meeting of Jews, Christians and Iranian Ayatollahs, sponsored by the Norwegian Peace Institute PRIA and the Catholic University of America.

• From Abraham to Obama, A History of Jews, Africans, and Africanamericans (co-author with Harold Brackman of the Simon Wiesentahl Center), Africa World Press, 2015
• The Ethiopian Orthodox Tawahido Church. Trenton The Red Sea Press. (2012)
• Editor (with Yosef Tobi). Judaeo-Arabic Studies: Proceedings of the Second International Congress of Yemenite Jewish Studies. University of Haifa & Institute of Semitic Studies. (1999)
• The History of Joseph, a Heretofore Unknown Apocryphal Work Translated from a Fourteenth Century Ethiopic (Ge'ez) Manuscript, with Introduction and Notes. Princeton Seminary Pseudepigrapha. Sheffield Academic Press. (1990)
• 1 Enoch: A New Translation and Introduction. In JH Charlesworth (ed.) The Old Testament Pseudoepigrapha , vol. 1, New York, Doubleday (1983), ISBN 0-385-09630-5 , 5-89.
• A New-Text Critical Introduction to Mashafa Berhan. EJ Brill (1973)
• The History of Joseph, (Princeton Seminary Pseudepigrapha, Sheffield Academic Press, 1990.)
• The Ethiopian Church. Boston Henry Sawyer (1967, 1968)
• Co-Editor, Journal of Afroasiatic Studies (1985-)
• Over one hundred articles in academic journals on language, religion, and Ethiopian and general Semitic studies.

His work has been featured on the front pages of well-known magazines and newspapers, including three in the New York Times and the Washington Post . Other works appeared in the Boston Globe , in the Chicago Tribune , the Christian Science Monitor , The Jerusalem Post , The Jewish Week (New York), the Baltimore Jewish Times. He repeatedly appeared on various Ethiopian radio stations and television, newspapers, many other local and national publications in the United States of America and the BBC. ^{[12] [13] [14] [15]}

• Knight of the Order of the North Star of the first degree; presented by the King of Sweden (December 5, 2013) ^[16]
• Morton Deutsch Award for Conflict Resolution (American Psychological Association, 2013) ^[17]
• Honorary Doctor of Philology, Addis Ababa University, 2004
• Ethiopian “Interfaith Peace-Home Decree Initiative of Merit”, 2004
• Peacekeeper Prize Rabbi Tanenbaum Center for Inter-Community for Ethiopians Established in Diaspora Education Award, 2002
• UN Association of Ethiopia Certificate of Appreciation, 2000
• The institution of the "Ephraim Isaac Prize for Excellence in African Studies" by the Harvard University in 1999/2000
• Honorary DHL, John Jay College, CUNY, 1993
• National Honor Society of Secondary Schools Award, 1992
• American Philosophical Society Fellow, 1980-1981
• National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow, 1979-80
• Education Honor Society: Harvard Graduate School of Education, 1976
• Outstanding Educators of America Award, 1972
• Emperor Haile Selassie National High School Matriculation Prize, 1954

• Ephraim Isaac. Institute for Advanced Semitic and Afroasiatic Studies (inaccessible link) . Institute of Semitic Studies . Date of treatment July 17, 2018. Archived July 13, 2013.