Sanbanpuren—Three Grades of Servant

Part 1: The Murders

Edited by Tony Lambert, OMF China Researcher

In late November 2006 Xu Shuangfu, the leader of Sanbanpuren—the Three Grades of Servant cult (TGS) in China—along with two other leaders was secretly executed. They had been accused of murdering 20 members of another cult, Eastern Lightning (EL), and defrauding members of their own group of 32 million RMB (U.S. $4 million). The reaction in some quarters was swift—here was a clear case of persecution of faithful house-church Christians. Others were not so sure and equivocated—TGS was a marginal or extreme group.

It is unfortunate that those who support the view that TGS is clearly a cult have been labeled in some quarters as dupes of the Three Self Patriotic Movement (China’s official Protestant church) or the Chinese government. In fact, as I shall show, the overwhelming opinion of mainstream house-church leaders within China and of knowledgeable Chinese Christian ministries based in Hong Kong and elsewhere is that TGS fulfills virtually all the definitions of a pseudo-Christian cult.

It is not my intention to comment in depth on whether the leader of TGS, Xu Shuangfu, was guilty of the crimes of being responsible for the murders of 20 members of another cult, Eastern Lightning. We may never know. Certain aspects of the case, such as allegations of torture and the swift execution of Xu and other TGS leaders in secret, are deeply disturbing. The case raises several serious issues:

1) Was Xu guilty of the crimes with which he was charged?
2) Were his human rights upheld by a fair trial?
3) Even if he was guilty as charged, should the death penalty have been carried out?
4) Was Xu a cult leader and his organization a cult?

These are important questions—separate, but inter-related. I intend to focus mainly on the last—is TGS a cult or not?
However, before doing so, it may be helpful in this issue of China Insight to give some details of the 20 killings for which Xu was held accountable. There seems little doubt that they actually took place. It seems strange that in some of the accounts overseas seeking to exonerate Xu, these crimes are largely omitted in the reporting. My main sources of information are a long report in the New York Times and three long articles published in the magazine Phoenix in Hong Kong. Both the U.S. and Hong Kong reporters went to the area where the murders took place and conducted interviews with several people, including Xu’s daughter. They appear to have been unbiased and wanting to get to the bottom of the affair.

The indictment against Xu and the other TGS co-defendants makes grim reading. There were 16 counts of murder in all:

1. In 2002 several TGS believers in Heze, Shandong kidnapped two EL male believers and took them to a basement in Cao County. Three days later the two were buried alive in the lotus field of the Jiap family near the Shandong-Henan border.
2. In February 2002 an unidentified EL believer was kidnapped by TGS members in Wengou town, Dazu City in Chongqing. He was strangled and his body dumped.
3. In June 2002 TGS believers attacked EL believer Jia Jiulin in Zhengyuan town, Gaotai County, Gansu. He was stabbed and dragged into a car where he died.
4. In July 2002 a Gansu female EL believer, Liu Yanping, was kidnapped by TGS believers and brought to a basement where she was beaten and interrogated for information on the addresses and activities of EL believers. She could not endure the torture and hanged herself.
5. On July 11, 2002 TGS believer Lian Zifu organized other TGS believers to kidnap EL believers Tang and Qian in Huaguoshan village, Da’an Town, Yongcun City, Chongqing. Later Qian died of suffocation and Tang was strangled; their bodies were stuffed into sacks and thrown into a reservoir.
6. In November 2002 TGS believers in Baishan City, Jilin, kidnapped a female hotel guest whom they thought was EL. Two days later she was strangled and buried.
7. On January 23, 2003 TGS believers found an EL follower named Liu in Yichun City, Heilongjiang. He was held in a basement where the temperature was colder than -10 degrees Celsius and repeatedly beaten. The next morning, he was dead. His body was burned and the remains buried.
8. In January 2003 a new TGS believer who was a female ticket seller in Dalian was suspected of being a spy for EL. After several days of torture, she admitted she was a spy trying to collect information on Xu [the TGS leader] to kidnap him. She was taken to a hill in Anzu Town, Zhuanghe City, strangled and buried.
9. On February 17, 2003 EL believers Zhang Chengli and Liu Dedong were found out by TGS followers. Zhang was strangled; he and Liu were thrown into a car trunk where Liu died of suffocation.
10. On March 27, 2003 an EL believer, Gu Junzhong in Donggong City, Liaoning, was suspected of using women to seduce TGS believers. He was assaulted and strangled in a barber’s shop and his corpse buried.
11. On March 29, 2003 TGS believers in Tengzhou City, Shandong, kidnapped EL believer, Qiu Qiyu. He was imprisoned in a basement. Later he was transported to Qufu City but died of suffocation en route.
12. On March 30, 2003 EL believers Wang Xiufen and Zheng Xuejun were proselytizing in Yucheng County, Shandong, when they were attacked by TGS believers. Their hands and feet were bound and they were thrown into sacks and tossed into a river near Binzhou city. Both drowned.
13. In early 2003 EL believer Li Yaxian of Chengling County, Jilin, was attacked in his own home by TGS believers and strangled. His body was buried.
14. In April 2003 a blind man named Ying Yongjiang was discovered to be an EL believer who was trying to convert TGS believers. Several TGS people brought machetes and sticks and drove to Ying’s home at night. He died from the beating.
15. In December 2003 TGS believers took revenge against a Mr. He who had left their church. A Shandong believer named Wang Chang and another TGS believer went to He’s home in Jiangxi. They climbed over a wall into the courtyard and entered his bedroom. They used long cloth sacks filled with rocks to batter him and his wife in bed. Wang then jumped on the bed and stabbed He several times. He died from loss of blood.
16. On January 28, 2004 TGS believers Wang Jun, Ben Zhonghai and Liu Zhixue posed as police officers and entered the home of EL believer Zhang Cuiping who had left their church. Zhang was kidnapped, killed and buried under the snow.

(English translation, taken from Phoenix Weekly website, of original Chinese articles dated April 15, 2006, Issue No. 216, No. 11, 2006)

In all, 20 members of the cult Eastern Lightning were murdered in the space of two years or more in 16 separate incidents. It is a gruesome catalog.
It was the last case which apparently first tipped off the authorities that they were dealing with a whole series of murders. Two elementary school students in Chaoyang Village, Baoqing County in Heilongjiang discovered a female corpse. It was that of Zhang Cuiping who had been a member of TGS but had defected to EL. This reportedly infuriated Xu Shuangfu who arranged for his followers Zhang Min and Zhu Lixin to collect photos of Zhang and other information. They tried to “educate” Zhang as to the error of her ways. Xu reportedly said: “You should educate her. If she does not come back [to TGS] then you can dispose of her.”

A police officer with the Shuangya City Public Security Bureau stated: “Following this line of enquiry, we discovered this case was connected to a series of major murder cases across the country. It was shocking.” (Phoenix Magazine, April 15, 2006)

It seems that after 1999 Three Grades of Servants began to lose ground to the other growing cult, Eastern Lightning. TGS began a series of revenge actions against EL for more than two years (2002-2004). This is certainly the view of the New York Times reporter in his article of November 25, 2004. The question is: was Xu Shuangfu himself responsible for these crimes or were they totally unconnected with him? The prosecution case seems to have depended on extracting confessions from his co-workers quite possibly under torture. If so, such evidence would be highly unreliable and inadmissible in a true court of law. Indeed, the defense claimed that the evidence linking Xu directly to the murders hinged on the confession of one associate under torture.

On the other hand, in a sect as tightly controlled by Xu (as we shall see later) is it likely that he would have allowed his followers to run amok and commit murder on such a huge scale without his express command or at least tacit permission? Because overseas Xu has been portrayed as some kind of house-church saint, it is necessary to draw on key evidence provided in a book on Chinese cults published in Taiwan in 2000 before the murders even happened. It was published by Chinese Ministries International headed by the late Rev. Jonathan Chao who can hardly be called a friend of either the TSPM or the Chinese government. He was an outspoken champion for the house churches. Yet in this book it is clearly stated that Sanbanpuren is a cult. Further: “Their errors are woven into ‘normal’ messages which makes it very hard for people to distinguish. For instance, they quote the cases of Elijah killing the prophets of Baal and Samuel killing King Agag as proving that God is pleased with murder committed for righteous causes. They use this to uphold the death penalty (sixing) within their own church as a disciplinary measure, and the assassination (ansha) of opponents outside it.” (Zhenli Yiduan Zhenwei Bian [Discerning Truth from Heresies] China Ministries International, Taipei, 2000; page 116, my translation)

This is proof positive that the justification of murder on pseudo-biblical grounds was current within TGS at least two years before the wave of killings took place.

As we shall see later, severe beating is also used as a disciplinary measure within the cult against its own refractory members. The evidence points, sadly, to the likelihood that beatings and even murder were conducted against those who actively opposed the cult or apostatized. Xu Shuangfu as chief “Servant” and head of the cult must surely take prime responsibility for the creation of a culture of violence within TGS.

Eastern Lightning is known to have kidnapped leaders of evangelical house churches and to have indulged in beating, blackmail, extortion and even murder. Its activities reek of the hei shehui (Chinese mafia) and criminal secret societies. It seems that TGS gave as good as it got (and more) and developed the same kind of sectarian violence.

In the next issue I plan to look in more detail at the beliefs and practices of TGS which will demonstrate clearly that it is a dangerous cult, shunned by mainstream house churches.

Copyright OMF International 2007