After a few more hours of play, Mufasa and the other lions decided it was time to start the journey back to the pride land. They rounded up all the cubs and set off on their journey home. Everything was going smoothly with the journey until about the second day when Mufasa and Nala realized they had not seen their son Simba in quite some time. They looked to see if he was talking to the elders of the pride but he was not with them. They sought out the cubs to see if he was playing with them but he was not with them. They checked with the mothers to see if he had offered to help them with their young but he was not with them. Slowly his parents realized they had not seen Simba since they set off for home. Riddled with grief and anxiety about the whereabouts of their son, Mufasa and Simba told the others to set up camp where they were while they both went back to find Simba.
Mufasa and Nala began the long trek back to the hunting grounds they had been at. The entire way there, they were concerned about their son, looking for him as they traveled back to where they had come from. Eventually, they reached the hunting grounds but did not see Simba anywhere. As they continued to search, they found him in a nearby cave surrounded by the elders of the baboon tribe. He was talking to them about the order of the pride land and how the entire ecosystem was balanced and how to maintain harmony with in the tribe. His parents were astonished at his wisdom and silently stayed at the opening of the cave until he had finished his stories. Once the elder baboons began to disperse, his mother confronted him, concerned that he had wandered but curious about the extent of his wisdom.
"Simba, why did you not stay with the pride? Why did you stay behind with these strangers?" Nala asked.
"Mother, no creature that walks the same earth and breaths the same air is a stranger. Should you not be overjoyed that I am sharing the knowledge you have instilled in me? Or at least be proud of the image I represent on behalf of our pride," Simba replied.
With that Nala was stunned and had no response. But she took his words and considered them deeply, vowing to never forget them. Simba apologized for worrying both her and his father and together the family set off to go meet the rest of the tribe and finish their long journey back to the pride land.
Bibliography:
Infancy Gospel as told by the apostles Luke and Mathew
Author's note:
I chose to write this story based on the story of when Jesus, Mary and Joseph were traveling from Jerusalem. His parents realized he was not with them and turned around to search for him in Jerusalem. H had stayed behind to speak to some of the high priest there and shared his wisdom and insight. When his parents finally found him in the temple, they were confused as to why he stayed behind and the great knowledge he was sharing with he elders. This made me think a little of the Disney movie the Lion King because of how independent Simba was in the movie. I could imagine him running off to go on some big adventure alone and worrying his mother and father to death. I wanted to try storytelling with animals but retain some of the tone that was used in the original story in the Infancy Gospel . I also wanted to use parallelism by repeating the phrase "but he was not with them." I felt like the phrase added a tone similar to the Bible to my story. I was nervous about writing this story at first but once I got this thought in my mind it was fairly easy to write.
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| Simba, Nala and Mufasa |
