(Clearwisdom.net)
Dear Editors of Minghui/Clearwisdom Website:
Greetings.
My name is Fan Jinping. On February 14, 2001, the "610 Office" (1) in Nanyang City, Henan Province sent me to Shibalihe Women' Forced Labor Camp in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province. I would like to tell you about the death of three practitioners, Ms. Zhang Yali, Ms. Zhang Baoju, and Ms. Guan Ge.
I was detained in the Second Group with three particular others in Shibalihe Women's Forced' Labor Camp. Zhang Baoju and Guan Ge were transferred from the Third Group to the Second Group in October of 2002, while Zhang Yali was transferred from the Fourth Group in February of 2003. Since then we had been detained in the same Group. At that time, the persecution in the labor camp had reached its peak. The police used brutal and inhumane methods to torture practitioners. Head of the labor camp, Wu Hongru, had meetings with other policemen and decided to torture all the firm practitioners until we wrote repentance letters to give up practicing Falun Dafa. Otherwise, they would not allow any of us to leave the labor camp. All of a sudden, our terms in the labor camp were extended indefinitely.
On April 22, 2003, they set up a special Group in the labor camp to implement forced "reform." They started from the Third Group, where most practitioners were detained. The other Groups had relatively fewer practitioners. In the Second Group we learned that none of the twelve practitioners in the Third Group could bear the inhumane torture and gave in. We thought that the police must have used extremely cruel methods. We had discussions together to see how to oppose such a persecution. Our conclusion was that we would not write anything to the police even if it meant that we had to die.
Because we couldn't get together to talk under the surveillance, we sought opportunities to discuss the issue. Zhang Baoju said, "We cannot just watch our fellow practitioners be tortured and forced to renounce their belief''. We should give up fear of death and shock the evil." We talked about what Teacher said in the article "Eliminate Your Last Attachment(s)": "If a cultivator can let go of the thought of life and death under any circumstance, evil is sure to be afraid of him." We saw practitioners in the Third Group being tortured every day, tortured to such an extent that they did not look like human beings any more. In the end, Zhang Baoju said, "All we can do now is to get rid of the attachment of life and death and give up our flesh bodies." (2) They were completely standing on the point of safeguarding Dafa and they decided to do it from the perspective of safeguarding Dafa with their lives (3).
At that time, Zhang Baoju, Zhang Yali, and Guan Ge all wrote their wills and carried them wherever they went. Zhang Yali wrote two copies and gave one to practitioner Bai E. It declared, "This is not suicide. We do this under the circumstance where the evil rampantly persecutes practitioners. As real practitioners, we all know that Teacher states clearly in Chapter Seven of Zhuan Falun about the issue of killing. In order to oppose and protest the torture of practitioners, and in order for them to be released from the labor camp, we are willing to give up our young lives." (4)
Zhang Baoju said to us, "Those of you who can get out of the labor camp alive, please tell people that we didn't commit suicide." Bai E and I told her, "Don't worry. As long as we can get out of the labor camp alive, we will for sure tell people that you didn't commit suicide." The three of them hanged themselves at around 8 o'clock in the evening of June 4, 2003 in a room that had not been used for a long time (4).
Their death really had a shocking effect on the evil. On the night of June 4, they gave their lives for the truth. On June 5, the "Reform Group" was dissolved. Several days later, Wu Hongru, head of the labor camp, did not show up in the labor camp any more. The police in the labor camp were not as rampantly vicious as they had been. They did not treat practitioners as brutally as before.
Note: Shibalihe Women Forced' Labor Camp announced in the Zhengzhou Evening Post that they had committed suicide.
Written by practitioner Fan Jinping from China on June 25, 2004
Notes:
(1) "610 Office" ¨C An agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute power over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems.
(2) The three practitioners, under the severe persecution in Shibalihe Women's Forced' Labor Camp, chose to shock the evil and show their refusal to renounce their belief by taking their own lives, so as to protect other practitioners. As everyday people, they were kind and unselfish. They deserved the sympathy of all kind-hearted people. All the people with conscience in the world should condemn the brutal persecution and the Jiang's 'regime, the one who initiated the persecution. As cultivators, however, the three practitioners didn't meet the standard of a cultivator on the issue of life and death. They didn't understand the principle of "giving up the attachment of life" with rationality. As a result, it is a great pity for them to abandon their lives like that.
Falun Dafa is a cultivation practice of both mind and body. It cultivates the main consciousness. The cultivation practice cannot be done without the flesh body. How can we think of giving up our flesh body at will? Besides, giving up the attachment of life doesn't mean to kill oneself (to deliberately give up one's body). Rather it means to be able to get an insight into the nature of life and death. It means not to be attached to life and to take death lightly, unlike an everyday person. Thus one can cultivate oneself in the human world with less and less attachment. From the perspective of higher levels, the path Teacher arranges for practitioners is to reach consummation with the cultivated flesh body. To give up the flesh body before reaching consummation is not following the path arranged by Teacher. On the contrary, it complies with the arrangement of the old forces and their intention of damaging Dafa.
(3) The so-called "safeguarding with one's life" is an unrighteous thought held by practitioners that was generated from their human notions. "Safeguarding with one's life" is the Party's principle of struggle. In the cultivation of Falun Dafa, there is no such connotation. For example, the purpose of Dafa cultivation is to start from the level of everyday people and become a good person. Ultimately, it is to go beyond the human realm and cultivate Buddhahood and godliness. How would gods fight with human beings by ways of human methods and human notions? In addition, the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners is not a persecution of everyday people carried out by everyday people, nor is it a struggle among everyday people. Rather it is a persecution imposed on practitioners by the bad people in the human world who are used and manipulated by the old force in the cosmos. Practitioners are on higher levels. Therefore, during their efforts to fight against the persecution, there are higher principles to follow. Only when we completely break away from the mindset of everyday people to have a struggle with the everyday people in the human world, can we eliminate the evil and dissolve the persecution.
(4) The Falun Dafa principles forbid killing, including suicide. It is clearly stated in the principles that killing can create huge karma (which is opposite to the direction of cultivation practice), and that one's soul will be in a deplorable condition after committing suicide. To give up one's flesh body deliberately is committing suicide. As long as one takes such an action, one will face the serious problem of breaking the law of forbidding killing. On matters like this, the practitioners shouldn't fall into the same mindset of everyday people. If one considers himself as a practitioner, he should, under any circumstances, keep a calm, rational, and clear mind towards cultivation and value his life.
