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BRANCH DAVIDIANS |
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Roles of Women and Abraham in LDS and Islam |
Millennial groups in general seem to attract a following based on paranoia, greed, or simply as a source of personal salvation. In the case of the Branch Davidians, the group did not start out as a self destructive millennial cult. Instead, they started out as a small branch of the Seven Day Adventist Church. The chain of events that led to the eventual downfall of the group had little to do with the actual beliefs and practices of the group. Initially, the attractiveness of the Branch Davidians was based on the message of peace and salvation that it was portraying. Followers of the Seventh Day Adventist church where initially converted (really a loosely used term in the beginning, the only realistic difference being small theological differences and a chance of leadership) as followers of David Koresh’s predecessors. Internal strife within this pre-Davidian incarnation of the church eventually led to Koresh gaining control of the church. The attraction at this time became the differing interpretations of biblical material that Koresh offered. His social teachings, communal in origin, also attracted members. Individuals where attracted to the fact that the entire group worked in order to support the rest of the group. Later, as the millennium drew closer, members potential converts, seeking a place in gods kingdom, or simply attempting to attain salvation by what ever means possible, began to gravitate towards Koresh. Eventually, Koresh himself declared himself to be the messiah. When the government began to take an unwarranted interest in the activities of the Davidians and their methods of procuring finances, Koresh’s predictions of a coming apocalypse started to look more and more realistic. As far as members of Koresh’s parish could see, his predictions where coming true. The government was moving in, national opinion was skewed against them, and eventually, a full scale military assault was underway. To an individual with an apocalyptic bent to their world view, this situation paralleled the circumstances outlined in the biblical book of Revelations. Taking the analogy further, it also closely paralleled the eventual downfall of Israel to the Roman Empire, with the attack on the Waco compound strikingly similar to the roman assault on mount Zion. (Only a very few woman and children survived Zion, likewise only a few members of the Davidian movement survived Waco) The attractiveness of the entire movement was based on the fact that Koresh’s predictions seemed to be coming true. His theology made sense to those who followed him, and the followers who where most dedicated to him where bonded to him through marriage or through appropriation of the wives of male followers. Somehow, the ability of Koresh to convince even the wives of other followers to take him as their sexual partner, apparently without complaint from the husbands, helped greatly in Koresh’s ability to draw followers. In other words, if he could do that, he could do just about anything.
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