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Lei Feng's Immortal Spirit
Beijing Journal: A Maoist Hero's Ghost Tilts With Falun Gong
New York Times, May 30, 2001
Erik Eckholm
Lei Feng to the rescue, once again!
Ever since he was sainted by Mao himself in 1963 with the inspired
call, "Learn From Comrade Lei Feng!" this selfless, wise
and prematurely deceased soldier has been held up as a model to the
Chinese people.
Now his sturdy ghost has proved its mettle once again, the
Liberation Army Daily reported on Monday — this time in the
battle to purge heresies of the banned Falun Gong spiritual sect
from the minds of wayward citizens.
Lei Feng's unparalleled concern for his fellow man, documented in
the amazing diary filled with purity and good deeds that was
reported to have been discovered after his accidental death, has
more than once been specially featured in a time of social
uncertainty.
His steadfastness was loudly preached, for instance, after the
army's killings of demonstrators around Tiananmen Square in June
1989. And a couple of years ago, he was resurrected to help the
millions of newly laid-off workers to keep their upper lips stiff
and chins high.
These days Mr. Lei's spirit has apparently met one of the most
demanding challenges yet.
In the last year, the army newspaper said, about 500 "deeply
poisoned" followers of the banned group were taken from their
nearby "re- education through labor" camp to visit the Lei
Feng Memorial Hall in the northeastern province of Liaoning. Guided
by troops from Mr. Lei's former unit, those strayed citizens
"increased the pace of their mental transformation and
shortened the time it took to return to their families and
society."
As every child has been taught for the last 38 years, Lei Feng was
an orphan who was raised by his local Communist Party branch. He
served nobly in the military until the fateful, rainy day in 1962
when a truck accidentally knocked a telephone pole onto his head,
killing him.
From his astounding diary and comrades' testimonials, the propaganda
mavens soon announced, Mr. Lei was clearly a Communist icon. He was
so altruistic, a typical story held, that when a comrade was ill and
needed transfusions, he donated no less than three liters —
more than six pints — of his own blood, then spent the entire
$7 fee he received on gifts for fellow soldiers.
Once Mao gave his endorsement, Mr. Lei became a fixture of party
exhortations, surviving right through China's recent decades of
dazzling economic and social change, even as the public became more
worldly and Mr. Lei became a standing joke.
"This kind of propaganda may seem ridiculous," said Wu
Guoguan, a political scientist at the Chinese University of Hong
Kong. "But praising Lei Feng remains a way to show
loyalty."
"Even as the leaders praise economic liberalization and the
Internat, the Communist Party can't change its basic nature,"
said Mr. Wu, who in the 1980's dispensed the party line himself as
an editor at People's Daily. "And the propaganda machine is an
essential part of it."
Any doubts about the party's steadfast core were dispelled in other
pronouncements this week. A front-page editorial in People's Daily
on Monday emphasized the absolute need to observe the "Four
Cardinal Principles."
These guiding standards, propounded in 1979 by Deng Xiaoping, then
China's top leader, are: adhere to the socialist road, adhere to the
people's democratic dictatorship, adhere to the leadership of the
Communist Party and adhere to Marxism- Leninism and Mao Zedong
Thought.
Today, in yet another throwback to the Mao era, the Chinese people
were regaled with President Jiang Zemin's "Random Thoughts on
Climbing Mount Huang."
All of the major newspapers carried a large boxed feature about the
poem on their front pages. Mr. Jiang described the "carefree
and elated" feeling he had when he climbed the scenic peak and
offered the nation this work, its closing words hinting at a great
Communist vision:
Gazing at the reclining pine on Tiandu Peak,
And the two flying pinnacles of Lotus and Shixin Peaks.
I wield a scribe's brush to catch the splendid scene,
As the sun bursts through billowing clouds a thousand leagues in
red.
Critics have not dared to liken his verbal prowess to that of
Chairman Mao, whom many considered an accomplished poet. Nor has
anyone yet drawn comparisons with the inspirational diary jottings
of Lei Feng.
But the power of Mr. Lei's words were suggested by Monday's news
account. A recent group of Falun Gong prisoners taken to the Lei
Feng memorial, it said, spontaneously repeated and copied down
inscriptions from the diary like: "If you are a drop of water,
you have moistened an inch of soil; if you are a ray of light, you
have brightened a foot of darkness."
The shaken believers were moved to ask, the paper reported,
"Why would Lei Feng want to do so many good deeds?" To
which their tour guide replied, "To make other people's lives
happier!"
They asked, "Didn't Lei Feng ever think about doing things for
himself?" got this reply: "The first thing he thought
about was the party, the state and the people!"
And they asked, "How did Lei Feng get around to doing so many
good deeds?" The answer: "By devoting his limited life to
limitlessly serving the people!"
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