Kristos Samra or Christos Samra was an Ethiopian female saint who founded a monastery of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. She is one of Ethiopia's over two-hundred indigenous saints and one of the earliest of about fourteen Ethiopian female saints. She lived in the 15th century, according to the Gädlä Krəstos Śämra, a hagiography written about her around 1508. Her monastery's festival in her honor on her saint's day, 24 Nahase, draws thousands every year.
Life
Kristos Samra lived in the 15th century. According to her hagiography, the only contemporaneous source on her life, she was born into a wealthy and pious family from a frontier province in the Christian Ethiopian empire and married to the son of the emperor's own priest. She gave birth to eight sons and two daughters. When she was around forty years old, one day she became enraged with a maidservant who wound't want to behave decently and cursed her and the maidservant died. Then Kristos Samra felt terrible and guilty and prayed for God to restore the life of the maidservant fortunately her prayer was answered and the maid was alive again. So Kristos Samra was amazed and she felt "if God hears my prayer while I'm in this worldly life how much will he answer my prayer in monastery?"and decided to be a nun and started her journey to a spiritual life. But when she arrived at the monastery, they told her that no males were allowed into the nunnery because she was traveling with the maidservant who was carrying her baby son and insisted on being with Kristos Samra when she headed to the monastery. So the child was taken by Saint Michael the Archangel to Heaven as her hagiography tells. or another nun saved the boy and raised him. Kristos Samra spent two years as a novice before becoming a nun. She then left for Lake Tana, a place known for its many monasteries and ascetic monks and nuns, to live the life of a hermit. As her first remarkable act, she spent twelve years praying while standing several hours a day in the shallow waters of the lake near the shore, an act common among devout Ethiopians. Living in solitude, she moved around the lake, staying at monasteries, including Narga Sellase and Tana Qirqos. During this period, she had visions, speaking with angels and saints as well as Christ and his mother the Virgin Mary. In her most well-known vision, she travelled to heaven and hell to plead with Christ and Satan to reconcile themselves to each other so that human beings would no longer suffer due to their enmity. Some scholars, such as Ephraim Isaac, consider her to be one of the first female philosophers in Ethiopia, and many other countries. Her contemporary, Zara Yacob of 17th century Ethiopia is also seen as the first philosopher of Ethiopia, and Africa. Then the biblical Patriarchs came to her in a dream and told her to settle at Gʷangut, located on the southwestern end of Lake Tana. They told her that the entire world would come there to prostrate themselves at her feet. In response, she gave up the life of a hermit and founded a monastery. A monk named Yəsḥaq helped her by building a church, training female novices, and celebrating the liturgy. Eventually, she withdrew once again into solitude, standing in a pit for three years and in the lake for another three years. Before she died, she told a scribe named Filəṗṗos her life story and thirty of her visions. He wrote both down in her hagiography at the monastery of Debre Libanos. She was buried at Gʷangʷət, where her monastery is today.
