David Berg
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{{Infobox Celebrity
| name = David Brandt Berg
| birth_date = {{birth date|1919|2|18|mf=y}}
| birth_place = [[Oakland, California]], [[United States|U.S.]]
| death_date = {{death date and age|1994|10|1|1919|2|18|mf=y}}
| death_place = [[Costa de Caparica]], [[Portugal]]
| occupation = Founder, [[Children of God]]
| spouse =
| children =
| footnotes =
}}
'''David Brandt Berg''' (born [[18 February]], [[1919]] in in [[Oakland, California]], [[United States]] and died [[1 October]], [[1994]] in [[Portugal]]), frequently known by the pseudonym '''Moses David''', was the founder and leader of the religious movement formerly called [[Children of God]], now called "The Family International".
==Early years (1919 - 1968)==
Berg was born to Hjalmer Emmanuel Berg and Rev. Virginia Lee Brandt, the youngest of three children. Virginia Brandt, a Christian [[Evangelism|evangelist]], was the daughter of Rev. John Lincoln Brandt (1860 - 1946), a [[Disciples of Christ]] minister, author, and lecturer of [[Muskogee, Oklahoma|Muskogee]], [[Oklahoma]]. David Berg graduated from Monterey High School (in [[Monterey, California|California]]) in 1935 and later attended Elliott School of Business Administration.
David often said that his rich heritage played a key role in shaping his character and religious convictions. Many of his forefathers, as well as both of his parents, were deeply committed Christians who boldly challenged the status quo of their day. His maternal forefathers were German Jews who converted to Christianity in the mid-eighteenth century. They subsequently joined the Dunkards, a radical offshoot of the Lutheran Church which later became known as the Church of the Brethren. State persecution of the sect soon drove the Brandt family to America, where they settled in Pennsylvania and Ohio around 1750.
Dr. John Lincoln Brandt, David's grandfather, previously uninterested in his family's religion, had a dramatic conversion in his mid-twenties, and immediately entered full-time Christian service. For years he was a Methodist circuit rider. He later became an outstanding leader of the Alexander Campbell movement of the Disciples of Christ, an informal drop-out group that was frequently at odds with the established denominations of its day. David wrote of his grandfather Brandt:
{{cquote|"I admired him greatly; he was a real hero to me. He was a truly great man who really loved the Lord and survived many vicissitudes of life. He had a great history and a great record. He built 50 churches, won thousands to the Lord, and over 400 men volunteered for the ministry under his persuasion."}}
Virginia Brandt Berg, David's mother, is the individual whom he credits for influencing him the most. In his later years David said:
{{cquote|"My mother undoubtedly had the greatest influence over me of anybody in my whole life, and helped to make me what I am today.
<br/>
"I can never remember her teaching me anything but the Bible and about the Lord and true spiritual values. My mother was in love with Jesus, thank God, and she instilled that love in me.
<br/>
"She was an evangelist. ... She was always witnessing to people wherever we went, on the train, in restaurants, or anywhere. I can always remember her talking to people about the Lord."}}
Although raised in a Christian home, Virginia became an atheist and wild society girl during her college years. Despairing of her frivolous lifestyle, she devoted her life to social work. However, shortly after the birth of her first child, she broke her back in an accident and spent the next five years as a bedridden invalid, often hovering near death. After a conversion experience, she was miraculously raised from her deathbed, and spent the rest of her life with her husband, Hjalmer, in active Christian service as a pastor and evangelist. Virginia and Hjalmer were no strangers to controversy. They were expelled from the Christian Church after publicly testifying of her divine healing, which was contrary to church doctrine. They subsequently joined a new denomination, the Christian and Missionary Alliance, shortly before David's birth in 1919. In later years, their missionary zeal and disdain for denominational politicking often set them at variance with the conservative faction of that church's hierarchy, causing them to work largely as independent pastors and evangelists. David would later recount:
{{cquote|"My mother and father were rebels, revolutionaries, and thrown out of their church, outcasts ... as far as the church was concerned. ... Even though they kept the forms and ceremonies of the church and within the buildings, they often had meetings out of the buildings too and were pretty radical ... in the eyes of the churches."}}
David spent his early years traveling with his parents, who pursued their evangelical mission with a passion. In 1924 they settled in Miami, Florida, after Virginia successfully led a series of large revivals at the Miami Gospel Tabernacle. This became David's home for the next 14 years, while his mother and father pastored a number of Miami churches.
He later wrote of the upbringing he shared with his two older siblings:
{{cquote|"The Lord was the greatest influence of all through our teachers and mother and dad teaching us. ... The Sunday school teachers read us the Bible and told us Bible stories, and I loved and believed them, and I'm sure they were a tremendous influence in my life ... because I really knew it was God and the voice of God, and the Book of God!"
<br/>
"I'm sure glad I had years of experience of living by faith with my mother and father. What a wonderful, wonderful foundation they gave me in the life of faith!"}}
As is the case with many pastors and their dependents, the Berg family depended entirely on the generosity of their parishioners for their support, and often had difficulty making ends meet. This instilled in David a lifelong habit of frugality, which he encouraged his followers to adopt. He wrote:
{{cquote|"I certainly hate to see God's money wasted in any way! It was partly my rearing in the Depression that made me that way. That was part of my preparation to make sure we don't waste money. I don't mind living well; we can live where we can be comfortable and convenient and safe and have enough, but I'm not wasteful and extravagant. If anything, I pinch the pennies!"}}
In the late 1930s, Virginia Berg returned to her favorite ministry, that of a traveling evangelist. David accompanied her, and for most of the next 10 years acted as her chauffeur, song leader and general helper. He felt very strongly that assisting his mother in her evangelistic outreach was God's calling for him at the time. Of this time, he would later recall,
{{cquote|"From the time I was 16 until I was nearly 30 -- even for five years after I got married -- my mother's messages and sermons and testimonies were the biggest influence [in my life]."}}
Like his father, Berg became a minister in the [[Christian and Missionary Alliance]], and was placed at [[Valley Farms, Arizona|Valley Farms]], [[Arizona]], USA. Berg was eventually expelled from the organization for differences in teachings and for alleged sexual misconduct with a church employee. In Berg's writings he claimed the expulsion was due to his support for greater racial diversity among his congregation.
Fred Jordan, Berg's friend and boss, allowed Berg and his personal family to open a branch of his Soul Clinic in [[Miami, Florida|Miami]], [[Florida]], USA as a missionary training school. After running into trouble with local authorities for his aggressive disapproval with evolution being taught as fact in public schools. Berg moved his family to Fred Jordan's ''Texas Soul Clinic''.
==The Children of God/The Family (1968 - 1994)==
David Berg (also known as King David, Mo, Moses David, Father David, Dad, or Grandpa to members of the [[Children of God]]) founded the organization known as the Children of God, later known as "The Family of Love" or "The Family" and currently "The Family International", in 1968.
David Berg called on his followers to devote their full time to spreading the message of Christ's love and salvation as far and wide as possible, unfettered by convention or tradition, and to teach others to do the same.
Berg also decried the de-Christianization and decay in moral values of Western society. He viewed the trend towards a New World Order as setting the stage for the rise of the Antichrist, a godless world dictator whom the Bible predicts will rule the world in the last days before Christ's return.
David Berg remains a paradox to those who did not know him well. He was the leader of a militantly evangelistic organization, yet he shunned the limelight, instead choosing to live in seclusion, communicating with his followers and the public via the nearly 3,000 epistle-like "Letters" that he wrote on a wide variety of subjects. His writings were often extreme and uncompromising in their denunciation of evil, yet he always admonished the reader to "love the sinner but hate the sin." Those who knew him described him as a warm, self-effacing, loving and good-humored individual with the genteel mannerisms of a kinder era. He espoused doctrines that some mainstream Christians denounce as heretical, yet his writings are permeated with the same love for God and passion for winning others to Christ that has motivated the truly great missionaries throughout the ages.
Berg died in 1994 and was buried in [[Costa de Caparica]], Portugal. (His remains have since been cremated.) His organization is currently led by his widow Karen Zerby (whom he took as a "second-wife" in August of 1969; known as Mama Maria or Queen Maria in the Children of God) and [[Steven Douglas Kelly]] (an American also known as Christopher Smith, Peter Amsterdam, or King Peter to the Children of God).
==Controversy==
He lived in total seclusion and secrecy from his followers and, along with [[Karen Zerby]] is thought to have used a fake [[Australia]]n passport when traveling.
He was also outspoken, and widely reputed to be an [[antisemitism|anti-Semite]] and, by some, a [[pedophilia|pedophile]].<ref>[http://www.xfamily.org/index.php/Berg_and_Anti-Semitism Berg and Anti-Semitism] on xFamily.org </ref><ref>[http://xfamily.org/index.php/Berg_on_Pedophilia Berg on Pedophilia - XFamily - Children of God]</ref><ref>[http://xfamily.org/index.php/David_Berg#Alleged_sexual_abuse David Berg - XFamily - Children of God]</ref><ref name="Kent2000">{{cite web |title=Lustful Prophet: A Psychosexual Historical Study of the Children of God's Leader, David Berg |author=Kent SA |year=2000 |url=http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/~skent/Linkedfiles/lustfulprophet.htm |accessdate=2008-06-20}}</ref>
In a child-custody case in the [[United Kingdom]] Berg's granddaughter, [[Merry Berg]], testified that Berg sexually molested her when she was a young teenager. Another of Berg's granddaughters, [[Joyanne Treadwell Berg]], spoke on American television about being sexually abused by David Berg. Berg's adopted son, [[Ricky Rodriguez]], wrote an article on the Web site [http://www.movingon.org/ MovingOn.org] in which he describes Berg's deviant sexual activity involving a number of women and children. [[Davida Kelley]], the daughter of Rodriguez's nanny, [[Sarah Kelley]], accused Berg of molesting her in a June 2005 [[Rolling Stone]] article.<ref>[http://www.xfamily.org/index.php/Rolling_Stone:_The_Life_and_Death_of_the_Chosen_One Rolling Stone: The Life and Death of the Chosen One]</ref> In the same article, a woman identified as Armendria alleged that David Berg sexually abused her when she was thirteen years old.
Berg sometimes predicted possible [[apocalypse|apocalyptic]] events, though some of his predictions failed. His most well-known prediction was that [[comet Kohoutek]] (1974) would cause much havoc and possible destruction (Letter No.283), this view was shared by others like in the article, "The Christmas Super Comet Kohoutek" by Joseph F. Goodavage in the January 1974 issue of SAGA magazine. He also guessed that the [[tribulation]] would begin in 1989 and that the second coming of Jesus would happen in 1993.
Berg wrote or dictated over 3,000 booklets, known as "Mo Letters"<ref name=moletters>[http://pubs.xfamily.org xFamily.org Publications Database] — contains the entire text of "Mo Letters"</ref> ("Mo" being abbreviated from his pseudonym "Moses David"), which typically covered spiritual or practical subjects and were used as a way of disseminating and introducing policy and religious doctrine to his followers. Due to his obsession with secrecy, until his death any photos of him appearing in the group's publications had his face covered with rudimentary pencil drawings, often depicting him as an [[anthropomorphic]] lion.
==Personal family==
David Berg married his first wife, Jane Miller (known as "Mother Eve" in the Children of God), on [[July 22]], [[1944]] in [[Glendale, California|Glendale]], [[California]]. They had four children together: Linda (b. [[September 10]], [[1945]], known as "Deborah" in the Children of God); Paul (b. [[June 21]], [[1947]], d. April 1973, known as "Aaron" in the Children of God); Jonathan Emanuel (b. [[January 9]], [[1949]], known as "Hosea" in the Children of God); and Faith (b. [[February 2]], [[1951]]).
Berg also informally adopted [[Ricky Rodriguez]], the son of his second wife [[Karen Zerby]] (who continues to be a leader of the Children of God). In the 1970s and 1980s sexually suggestive photographic depictions of Rodriguez (aka "Davidito") with adult caretakers were disseminated throughout the group by Berg and Zerby in a child rearing handbook known as "The Story of Davidito". <ref>[http://www.xfamily.org/index.php/Story_of_Davidito Story of Davidito] on xFamily.org</ref> In January 2005, Ricky Rodriguez murdered one of the female caretakers also shown in the book before taking his own life several hours later.
==Sociological views==
The sociologist Dr. [[Thomas Robbins (sociologist)|Thomas Robbins]] argued that Berg's leadership of the [[Children of God]] was based on [[charismatic authority]].<ref name="Robbins">Robbins, Thomas. [http://hirr.hartsem.edu/ency/charisma.htm ''Charisma''] in the ''Encyclopedia of Religion and Society'' edited by William H. Swatos (February 1998) ISBN 0-7619-8956-0</ref>
==References==
{{reflist}}
==External links==
*[http://www.thefamily.org/about/davidberg.php TheFamily.org] - Biography of David Berg on The Family's official website
*[http://www.xfamily.org/index.php/David_Berg David Berg] on xFamily.org, a [[wiki]] about the Children of God
*[http://www.mun.ca/rels/restmov/people/jbrandt.html John Lincoln Brandt] [http://www.mun.ca/rels/restmov/texts/wwarren/ccr/CCR19B.HTM] - speech at [[Carnegie Hall]]; photo
*Jones, Paul (1998). [http://religiousmovements.lib.virginia.edu/nrms/Family.html "The Family (The Children of God)"] ''New Religious Movements''
==See also==
[[Children of God]]
{{Children of God}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Berg, David}}
[[Category:1919 births]]
[[Category:1994 deaths]]
[[Category:Children of God]]
[[Category:Members of the Children of God]]
[[Category:Founders of religions]]
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