Word: messiahs
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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DAVID KORESH WASN'T A REAL MESSIAH: HE COULDN'T TURN water into wine, and perhaps that's why he so valued his private stash of Scotch whisky. TIME has learned that three Branch Davidian cultists who left Ranch Apocalypse before the conflagration and surrendered were forced to leave by Koresh for getting into the would-be prophet's Scotch cache. At first Koresh punished the three -- Kevin Whitecliff, Brad Branch and Oliver Gyarfas -- by ordering them to bury a rotting corpse. Finally the Scotch-drinking cult leader had them thrown out. The trio are being held in jail...
...flock. And for anyone who thought it odd that a holy man lived out a teenage boy's sexual fantasy, Koresh had a mangled theological rationale. He was Jesus Christ in sinful form, who because he indulged the flesh could judge mankind with insights that the first, more virtuous Messiah had lacked. Or as he put it in one of his harangues to the faithful: "Now what better sinner can know a sinner than a godly sinner...
Having convinced his followers that he was the messiah, Koresh went on to persuade them that because his seed was divine, only he had the right to procreate. Even as Koresh bedded their wives and daughters -- some as young as 11 -- in his comfortable private bedroom on the second floor, the men were confined to their dormitory downstairs. Behind the mind games and psychological sadism lay the threat of physical force. In addition to the paddlings, administered in a utility area called the spanking room, offenders could be forced down into a pit of raw sewage, then not allowed...
...been elevated way above his capability or accepted role in that compound," says Byron Sage, the main FBI negotiator. Before Feb. 28, the second in command was Perry Jones, the father and the grandfather of several other Koreshians. "Perry was killed, and all of a sudden you had the messiah and a quantum leap down to the next viable person, who was Schneider. He was not highly respected. Plus, after giving up his worldly possessions and his wife to David, it's a difficult thing convincing yourself that, hey, you've made a mistake...
After 51 days, self-styled messiah David Koresh finally realized his biblical vision; for him and 85 of his followers, the world did end in blood and fire...