Saving the White Lions

by Linda Tucker

  Declaring himself to me in this way seemed to corroborate Maria’s information that he was the bearer of the white gene, and held the genetic master code that would return the White Lion lineage to Timbavati. As the dominant male of the region, he had pride of place in mating with many females from different prides—this meant that if he was the last surviving gene bearer, he had a good chance of passing on his rare genes. Genetic laws of inheritence would suggest the materialization of White Lions not in the next generation, but the following one.

  From this moment on, I had to accept the amazing fact that this lion, Ingwavuma, was simultaneously alive as a physical lion in Timbavati, as well as a wise and elevated guide in my dreams. A luminous presence in both. I had no option but to take him with the seriousness he demanded of me. Whenever this magnificent beast appeared in my dreams, I felt the ancient connection all over again.

  Ingwavuma was the name given to him by the rangers in that region, but when I returned, Maria informed me of another name, one she called his secret spirit name. The meaning of this secret name was “wise one of great knowledge.” Maria took my encounter with the wise one as the sign she’d been waiting for. The dream messages I’d shared with her and the sudden manifestation of this dream lion in the flesh—both served to validate my authenticity for her.

  It was shortly after this real-life meeting with Ingwavuma that Maria revealed the ancient title the ancestors had bestowed on me: Mulangutezu wa Ngala yo Basa (Keeper of the White Lions), a mantle of great responsibility and gravity, the full seriousness of which I was yet to comprehend.

  CHAPTER 4

  Taking On the Mantle

  BY CONVEYING THE MESSAGE OF MY ANCIENT TITLE as Keeper of the White Lions, Maria implied I was in line to take over her own mantle one day. This was an impossible thought. My first reaction was to resist, but Maria conveyed an urgency to hand over her title. I couldn’t understand why she should be preparing to relinquish this responsibility when she herself held it with such force and magnitude. I was not of her tribe, her culture, her bloodline, yet it seemed there was a task to be undertaken, one of great seriousness and danger, which somehow only I was equipped to manage. She told me I was her “star-daughter,” beyond color or race.

  Overawed by Maria’s suggestions, I fell back on my academic training and retreated to the city in order to research this fascinating lion-human bond that, in the real world, Maria Khosa lived to the full. Strangely, I was able to locate information, however obscure, much more easily than in my university days. My Lion Guardian, Ingwavuma, was present in the libraries with me, guiding me effortlessly to this esoteric information, as if we had no time to waste.

  In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, European travelers to Africa had documented how certain indigenous high priests were capable of entering into a contract with the dominant lion of a pride, offering ceremonial beer at harvest time in exchange for meat from the lions’ kill. These explorers expressed disbelief, but recorded it nevertheless. In my time with Maria, I had discovered that she was still practicing this ancient tradition, which I now recognized as a soul-contract between the Lion Queen and the King of animals. She would leave an offering of beer or mieliepap at a ceremonial stone in thanksgiving to the lions of Timbavati, which she regarded as her kith and kin. Then she would return a day or so later when they made their next kill, and walk into their midst, where, unharmed, she was allowed to carve off chunks of their feast. Unfortunately, through ignorance and possibly fear, this time-honored priestly practice was prohibited by the Timbavati authorities, who dubbed it “carcass robbing.” Maria, the Lion Queen, must have been one of the last practitioners of this time-honored exchange, a last survivor of her lineage.

  In precolonial Africa, Maria Khosa’s wisdom would have guided the decisions of royalty. She would have been advisor to the most respected governing monarchs. In fact, kingship and lions have always been synonymous throughout old Africa, giving rise to the prevailing belief that the noblest of kings were able to reach the condition of what one can only call lionhood—then, being so enlightened, they were able to return to the stars when they died.

  Between periods of intensive research in libraries in Johannesburg, London, and Cambridge, I returned many times to Timbavati, the place of the starlions, in order to be with Maria, and with Ingwavuma, who roamed the bushveld. I could now connect with him in dream as well as in physical form. When I closed my eyes, he’d sometimes come to welcome me—and roar his hot greeting directly into my face. He was no longer threatening—Maria’s explanation had effectively changed that—and in these reveries, he often seemed to walk by my side, or sit sphinx-like at the entrance of my hut while I was taking an afternoon nap. In the city, there were moments when I felt him standing guard beside the chair in which I sat reading or typing up my research, so physically present I could almost see him. There were other moments when I became aware of his presence padding beside me on the pavement, like an invisible bodyguard. On one occasion when I gave a public talk, a member of the audience approached me afterward and described the presence of a huge lion standing beside me, as if on guard. But it was the real physical encounters with Ingwavuma in the bushveld wilderness that were the most spine-tingling of all.

  On one occasion, I returned to the Timbavati region after seeing on the news that devastating floods had occurred in the neighboring country of Mozambique, killing thousands of people. It was around the turn of the millennium, almost a year after my initial sighting of Ingwavuma, and I’d heard the Timbavati Private Nature Reserve itself was badly affected. I was desperately anxious for reassurance that my lion hadn’t been harmed. The rangers who traversed this vast wilderness area daily said they hadn’t seen the territorial male for months, which added to my concerns about his welfare. But when I joined Maria at her village in the bushveld and expressed my concern, she told me that my Lion Guardian would make his appearance within the next day or so of my arrival if I called him in my mind—that is, telepathically. Through Maria’s methods, I’d learned that the way to connect telepathically is by opening your heart and soul to another and allowing the flow of information to pass between you. The person or creature with whom you communicate doesn’t need to be nearby. Even if you are separated by distance, the connection is instantaneous once the channel opens between you.

  Eager to connect, I headed out that dark night in 1999 in search of Ingwavuma in an old 4×4 vehicle with a flashlight, armed only with this ancient shamanic technique. Significantly, I was also accompanied by two trackers and my young niece, Margo, a highly intuitive little girl who loved hearing my stories of the lions. Although it was getting dark, I asked the trackers to direct me to that same landing strip where Ingwavuma had made his debut appearance a couple of years before. Once there, on instinct, we got out of the vehicle and stood on the landing strip. While the trackers sat quietly talking to each other in the truck, Margo and I stood on the gravel, visualizing Ingwavuma’s magnificent face in our mind’s eyes, calling him to us telepathically.

  Moments later, we heard a roar. We stared in the direction from where it came—then a moment later, a massive lion came padding out of the darkness toward us. It was Ingwavuma. In a flash, he revealed himself—a golden gleam in our spotlight, huge and muscular, his golden mane more majestic than ever. Margo and I were thrilled beyond words, while the trackers were totally speechless. Still on the runway, we didn’t even try to move. We simply stood respectfully staring at him. Not too far away from us, a comfortable distance, he lay down, totally relaxed, on the landing strip. I was overjoyed he was alive, and he certainly looked very well indeed. Bearing in mind that Timbavati Private Nature Reserve is no less than 150,000 acres of wilderness, which borders the greater Kruger reserve of some 4,500,000 acres (without fences), my lion’s sudden appearance out of nowhere seemed nothing short of miraculous to everyone present, including myself. But I appreciated that he responded to our heartfelt prayers and visualizations.

  In th
at moment, I quietly committed my heart and soul more fully to my new path as Keeper of the White Lions, however strange and challenging it seemed to be. Of course, it no longer surprised me that telepathic communication should be employed by lions, since, fearsome as these great cats may be, I’d come to know them as heart-beings capable of great acts of love and tenderness. What took me by surprise was that I was able to apply these powerful shamanic techniques, which Maria assured me had been lying latent for much too long.

  After this thrilling reunion with Ingwavuma, I actively started refining the shamanic techniques shown to me by Maria in communicating with Ingwavuma and other wild animals I met in Timbavati. Being with Maria, and having access to her wisdom, reawoke an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. And the overwhelming need to know more took me down many avenues of academic pursuit, straight to the answers my heart was seeking for so long. These were no longer theoretical or rhetorical research projects; they were all too real. Rather than being stuck in stuffy libraries, I mostly brought my library books with me to Timbavati, where I would share my mornings with Maria, learning her ancient ways, and then spend the afternoons reading in my reed hut, trying to make sense of Maria’s compelling teachings.

  Maria seldom wore shoes, which made following in her footsteps all the more challenging. It was becoming clear to me that only by reviving my connection with Mother Earth, and becoming lionlike myself, could I hope to honor the legacy she was imparting to me. For the first time in my life, the path I was treading felt profoundly and urgently real. In order to find the answers that had been plaguing me for years, I had to reconnect with the Earth, the stars, and the causal connection behind all things.

  In my meditations, I started uncovering the most astounding connections between the present day White Lions and the Ancient Egyptian mysteries. Primary among these connections was the fact that the birthplace of the White Lions in the Timbavati region geographically aligns exactly with the Great Sphinx of Giza, humankind’s greatest lion riddle. Exploring this further led me to delve into Ancient Egyptian belief systems, where I discovered that the concept of starlions (neteru) was intrinsic to the understanding of the very origins of life on Earth. In my efforts to comprehend where this concept of stellar or angelic lions originated, I immersed myself in the study of ancient astrology. I uncovered an ever-deepening mystery, which went some way in explaining why so many lions are depicted with wings. And as I went deeper, I found similar references in the mythology of virtually every ancient culture on our planet. Not only did the White Lions have godlike attributes, but also, many of the luminous leaders of humankind—the so-called avatars, including Buddha, Vishnu, Muhammad, and indeed Christ, Lion of Judah—are associated with lions and are themselves lionlike. I came to the conclusion that the mystery behind the White Lions was a profound Book of Truth that links humankind not only with our origins, but also our destiny.

  The more I learned, the more I began to understand the urgency. As my spiritual consciousness began to reawaken through Maria’s teachings, and as my own self-awareness grew and expanded in relationship to Ingwavuma and the sacred lands I was now inhabiting, I simultaneously came to see the terrible risks these holy animals face in the world today.

  Tragically, due to poaching and other forced removals from their original homelands into captivity, White Lions were extinct in the wild. Yet commercial trophy hunting and blood sport continued to be common practice and were condoned by many echelons of modern society, including the upper-crust British society in which I myself had been schooled.

  Awakening to the ancient magic, while simultaneously discovering the shameful and shocking events in my present day, was agonizing for me. I finally accepted that I had an urgent mission to protect these critically endangered animals. And with this realization, at last, I began systematically formulating my action plan. But I also knew that the intellectual questionings and self-doubt of my past approach to life had no place any longer. Only through following my heart, not my head, would I succeed.

  By saving the King of kings, I would assist in the protection of all the other kingdoms, animals, plants, and ecosystems on Earth. And in making a commitment to pledge my life to redress the plight of the White Lions, something else dawned on me. I suddenly realized that, by committing my heart and soul to the urgent conservation of these legendary animals, I could be of service to a higher cause for the first time and make a meaningful difference to humanity’s future.

  CHAPTER 5

  Burden of the Lion Priest

  FOR YEARS, THESE RAREST OF ANIMALS, sacred messengers from God, had been mercilessly removed from their natural birthplace in the wilds of Timbavati, by the international trophy-hunting industry headquartered in South Africa. Because of this practice, White Lions were now technically extinct in the wild.

  Despite this catastrophe, Maria’s prophecy envisioned a future in which Ingwavuma brought the White Lions back to these lands through the secret code he carried in his genes. Over time, Maria introduced me to other shamans who carried the Great Knowledge of the White Lions, African astronomer-priest elders from different cultures who were custodians of hidden historical records, passed down from one initiate to the next in a time-honored oral tradition. Humbled by the closely guarded secrets that were handed over to me, I was beginning to comprehend the enormity of my appointed role as guardian of the holiest animals on Earth. From wiseman and cosmologist Dr. Mathole Matseho, I learned that the connections I’d been uncovering in my research between Ancient Egypt and the White Lions were corroborated within the teachings of Africa’s priestly initiates.

  From Dr. Koka, the wise elder and cofounder of the Kara Institute, I learned that the White Lions are bringers of light to the darkest corners of the Earth, the “capstone of the hierarchy of light” through which we can commune directly with the divine.

  From the San Bushman elder Jan Si Ku, I learned that there were still some surviving practitioners of the art of lion shamanism among his people, carriers of the oldest genetics on Earth. And he himself was one such lion shaman.

  Selby Gumbi, a medicine man serving the Zulu monarch King Goodwill Zwelithini, embraced me as a long-lost sister. Confirming the view that the White Lions were the “First Born of God’s creatures,” this commanding high shaman told me my name, Linda Tucker, means “Guardian of the Sacred Knowledge” (Lion-Da Tu-Ka). In the ancient Ngoni language, to linda means “to stand guard like a lion,” while tu-ka means “the spirit of wisdom.” My destiny was not only to protect the White Lions but also to guard over their sacred spiritual wisdom. My soul plan was written in my very name, at birth.

  Baba Mathaba, initiate of the Swazi tradition, had long foreseen my arrival in his life. Baba in African culture means “father” and when I first met this distinguished elder, seated in his apothecary of rare medicinal roots and herbs in his village close to the Swaziland border, he announced that I was late in coming forward to do my life’s task. With bright eyes shining and a gray beard framing his dark face, he told me that the White Lions were his brothers and sisters, his grandmothers and grandfathers. I thought about my own family; how I had been raised a white child entrenched in Apartheid times, with all public spaces divided by race. I had felt trapped within this unjust system. I knew it was cruel and unfair, but I was simply one cog in its grinding mechanism. I imagined I was helpless and inconsequential, and couldn’t make any difference even if I tried. Baba Mathaba changed that feeling of meaningless completely. The fact that I was a white woman did not hold Baba Mathaba back from embracing me as an equal and a trusted family member from the very moment I stepped across the threshold of his healing hut. He told me that a couple of years before, he had been very ill, in fact passing into spirit, when he saw a premonition of me, together with the great lion walking by my side. In this visionary state beyond the physical realms, he said, the lion and I supported him, each taking one of his arms around our shoulders, and bringing him back to life on Earth—with the firm instruction that he
had work to do.

  In following the mysterious trail left in the mists of time by the legendary White Lions, I was introduced to other esteemed elders from an ancient cast of African priesthood, now almost an extinct breed themselves. But, above all, it was Credo Vusamuzula Mutwa, the most eminent of Africa’s lion shamans, who shared his great knowledge with me and helped me appreciate the almost overwhelming responsibility bestowed on me by Maria.

  I traveled together with Maria in an old bus from Timbavati to the foothills of the Magaliesberg Mountains to visit this great man. He was a monumental presence, emanating a female and male consciousness simultaneously, as if his wisdom could not be contained in a single gender. I had learned from Maria that it was Credo Mutwa, the greatest living elder historian of Africa, who had broken the oath of silence held throughout the ages by the priestly initiates, in order to deliver critical information to humanity at a time of crisis on Earth. Unfortunately, in breaking this oath, Credo believed he had brought a curse upon himself, his children, and his children’s children. And sadly, his life’s story corroborated this tragic belief.