David Koresh and the religious group the Branch Davidians, which are at the centre of Paramount Networks' Waco, now streaming on Netflix, famously met a tragic end in a standoff with the FBI [1] in 1993. Though the group's compound — called Mount Carmel — was initially raided for firearms, the religious beliefs of the Branch Davidians became the hot-button story in the years following the event.
The Branch Davidians as a group started long before Koresh got involved. They started as just the Davidians back in the 1930s [2], according to Vox. They were a spinoff of the Seventh-Day Adventists, a religion based in Christianity. The Davidians were created by Bulgarian immigrant Victor Houteff, "who dissented from aspects of standard Seventh-Day Adventist theology. Houteff believed that the Messiah prophesied in the biblical book of Isaiah was not Jesus, but was yet to come," Vox writes.
At the core of their beliefs, the Branch Davidians, as they later became known, believed the apocalypse was coming. And when Koresh (who was born Vernon Howell) ascended to top leadership of the group, he claimed to be the Messiah. He and the group lived in seclusion at Mount Carmel, established by Houteff. Former Davidian David Bunds told ABC News in 2018 that they lived the way they did to avoid the world [3]. "One of the things about being a Branch-Davidian . . . was you're supposed to separate yourself from the world," Bunds said. "The world is the sins, the flesh, the desires of the world, and you're supposed to be spiritual." That also meant that the Branch Davidians were celibate — all except for Koresh who "bore the burden of sex" and used it just as a means to procreate with his many "wives" in the house, of which he had upwards of 20 at one point [4].
Koresh believed in the Seven Seals from the Bible [6], which were in the book of Revelation. The seals were symbols of the second coming of Christ and the start of the apocalypse. As a self-proclaimed Messiah, Koresh believed he and his group were preparing for this apocalypse that was surely coming. He believed he could "open the book sealed with Seven Seals [7]" and claimed he could speak to God, who told him that he and the Branch Davidians should prepare for the end of the world.
During the notorious standoff at Mount Carmel, depicted in Waco, Koresh tried to negotiate with the FBI and the ATF and said he was writing a manuscript interpreting the Seven Seals and once he was finished, he and the Branch Davidians would surrender. However, the authorities prematurely raided the house. One of the Branch Davidians, Ruth Riddle, managed to escape and she came out of the house with a copy of the manuscript [8], according to Newsweek. In it, Koresh reinforces his belief that he is the lamb of God, there to usher [9] in the apocalypse. And while the authorities may have seen Koresh as unstable, Newsweek reports that "two religious scholars who won Koresh's trust during the standoff have analysed the manuscript, and say that far from the ravings of a madman, it is a serious exegesis, carefully organised and reasoned."
Koresh died in the 51-day siege at Mount Carmel [10], but there are still a few Branch Davidians around the world today. These days, though, the group remains incredibly low key [11].