Background
Marley, along with fellow Rastafarians, worship Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia as the incarnation of God, and refer to him as "Ras Tafari," "Jah" or “The Lion of Judah” which Marley does in many of his songs. To him, Selassie was not only one of the most prominent African leaders of his time, he was also identified as God returning to earth as "King of Kings, Lord of Lords" (Revelation 19, 16), imperial titles born both by Selassie I and Ethiopian Emperor Menelik II before him. It was Menelik II, however, who created this self-styled imperial title in the late 19th Century after he succeeded in uniting his country, later known as Ethiopia. Marley did however accept Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity 8 months before his passing. Haile Selassie I gave the "War" speech on October 4, 1963, calling for world peace at the 1963 U.N. Conference in New York City. This historical speech was spoken a few weeks after the Organization of African Unity (OAU) was founded in Ethiopian capital city Addis Ababa where Selassie chaired a summit meeting gathering almost every African head of state (The King of Morocco had declined the invitation). For the first time in history, a head of state could therefore speak in the name of Africa with full legitimacy before the U.N. General Assembly.
This U.N. speech resounded even louder as Haile Selassie I had made a name for himself on the international scene in 1936, when he spoke at The League of Nations (L.O.N.) in Geneva. It was there that Selassie warned the world that if member state Ethiopia was not militarily supported by other member states to fight the fascist Italian invasion of his country then taking place, as the L.O.N. status guaranteed, the League of Nations would then cease to exist as a matter of fact. And according to him, without much needed L.O.N. tutelage (as dictators Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin were about to join forces), the rest of the member states were to suffer the same fate as his country. Which they did, as Mussolini soon allied with Hitler, actually making Ethiopia the first country to be occupied in World War II, nearly two years before the Sino-Japanese war. This visionary speech granted Selassie much respect around the world, eventually leading to British military support, which helped freeing his country in 1941. Addressing the world again in 1963, Selassie's words bore full weight. In picking this utterance for lyrics, Bob Marley thus projected two dimensions of the Ethiopian Emperor: the head of state as well as the Living God Rastafarians see with him.
Read more about this topic: War (Bob Marley Song)
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