Jesus of Siberia: The visitors cop who turned a cult chief — and can now spend 12 years in jail | EUROtoday
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Deep in a distant nook of Siberia, a bunch of masked males swarmed the City of the Sun, a deeply non secular settlement within the Krasnoyarsk area.
The Russian safety forces had arrived in September 2020 to arrest the so-called Jesus of Siberia, a former visitors policeman generally known as ‘Vissarion’ who some seen because the reincarnation of Christ. The non secular chief, whose actual identify is Sergei Torop, was accused of extorting cash and inflicting bodily and psychological hurt to his lots of followers, some 10,000 worldwide.
On Monday, practically 5 years later, Torop’s stint as a cult chief got here to an finish when he was convicted in a Siberian courtroom and sentenced to 12 years in a maximum-security jail camp, together with two different sect leaders, Vladimir Vedernikov and Vadim Redkin.
The 64-year-old bearded and long-haired mystic, who led the Church of the Last Testament, claimed that he had been “reborn” to convey god’s phrase to the world. Many of his devotees flocked to the settlement generally known as ‘Abode of Dawn’ or ‘Sun City’, soaking in Torop’s teachings of reincarnation, veganism, and harmonious human relations.
“It’s all very complicated,” he defined to a reporter for The Guardian in 2002. “But to keep things simple, yes, I am Jesus Christ. I am not god. And it is a mistake to see Jesus as god. But I am the living word of God the Father. Everything that god wants to say, he says through me.”
Torop informed his followers to not eat meat, smoke, drink alcohol or swear – and to cease utilizing cash. They would usually maintain prayers in his honour, trying as much as his massive hilltop residence within the City of the Sun.
But it was a darker, hidden aspect to life in Vissarion’s commune that led to his arrest.
His obvious re-birth was adopted by a long time of psychological manipulation of his followers, exploiting them for labour and cash from 1991 to 2020. Torop exerted management over his followers, prosecutors mentioned, inflicting “moral harm” on 16 folks, leaving six with “serious health problems”.
“There were these ridiculous situations when adults and children died because they didn’t receive medical assistance,” Elena Melnikova, one among a minimum of eight individuals who testified in opposition to Vissarion and his lieutenants within the yr after his arrest, informed the BBC.
An anti-medical commandment was one among a variety of rules imposed by Vissarion which proved to be dangerous to his followers. “Know thyself. From now on, the flesh must heal itself. In most cases, illness is a punishment for the inability to keep one’s flesh in harmony with nature,” Ms Melnikova mentioned, recalling his teachings.
Community leaders would beg for cash for the neighborhood, she mentioned. In some circumstances, folks donated all of their funds, admitted Alexander Staroveroc, who acts as a press secretary for the City of the Sun.
Along with Vedernikov and Redkin – jailed for 11 and 12 years respectively – Torop denied all wrongdoing, and it’s unclear whether or not they are going to attraction their sentences. After their conviction, the courtroom additionally awarded 45 million rubles (£417,000) in damages to the victims.
Torop’s journey as a non secular chief started when he was 29 in 1990, the yr he claimed he was reborn as Vissarion, claiming to be a returned Jesus Christ.
Born in 1961 within the metropolis of Krasnodar, which was then the Soviet Union, Torop’s life till his flip to faith was a story of toil. Stints within the Red Army, on constructing websites, in factories, and as a visitors policeman, finally led to bitter disappointment when he was made redundant from his newest function after 5 years of service.
As he launched into a non secular path following his redundancy, Torop started drawing from parts of varied religions: Russian Orthodox Church, Buddhism, and apocalypticism. He embraced veganism and commenced to undertake collectivist views and ecological values.
It could be simply two years earlier than he based the Church of the Last Testament in Krasnoyarsk, Siberia, in simply months earlier than the autumn of the Soviet Union in 1991. The finish of the world, Torop informed his early followers, was imminent. Only those that noticed his strict teachings could be saved.
“He radiates incredible love,” 57-year-old Hermann informed The Guardian. “I met Vissarion final August. He informed me we needed to comply with two legal guidelines. It was like an electrical shock, like bells ringing.”
Denis, a 21-year-old Australian, mentioned: “No doubt about it, mate. Definitely the Son of God.”
An whole new calendar was adopted based mostly round moments in Vissarion’s life: Christmas was changed by a feast day on Vissarion’s birthday, 14 January, whereas one other feast day on August 18 was the most important, and originated from his first sermon in 1991.
But following a long time of worship of a self-professed messiah, his 1000’s of followers remaining within the distant nook of Siberia now reside with out their non secular trainer. He shouldn’t be attributable to be launched till he’s 76 years previous.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/jesus-of-siberia-russia-cult-leader-jailed-12-years-b2782624.html