FBI Says Sect Leader Vows Not to Kill Himself : Standoff: Agents tell of raiding compound after receiving a tip that members of the sect were thinking of mass suicide.

WACO, Tex. —  The leader of the armed religious sect holding federal agents at bay no longer says he is Jesus Christ and says his followers fired on authorities in self-defense, the FBI said Friday.

David Koresh, leader of the Branch Davidian sect, also has expressed remorse for the shootout last Sunday that led to at least 14 deaths.

“But there is also very much a tendency to justify what did occur by saying that, in fact, it was an attack on his residence and that he was responding with like force,” FBI agent Bob Ricks said Friday.

In another development, a federal official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said federal agents raided the Texas compound after receiving a tip from the State Department that the group was contemplating mass suicide.

The shooting erupted when the agents of the Treasury’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms arrived with warrants to search the compound and arrest Koresh.

Though Koresh has previously called himself Christ, Ricks said the cult leader now resents the comparison. “He describes himself as a prophet,” Ricks said.

There had been speculation that Koresh might kill himself on a Friday, the same day of the week the Bible says Christ died. But Ricks said authorities asked Koresh directly if he planned to take his life and he denied it.

In the meantime, Koresh freed a 21st child from the heavily armed compound Friday. That brought to 23 the number of people who have left since the bloody shootouts left four federal agents and a reported 10 cult members dead.

Koresh has told authorities 47 men, 43 women and 17 children remain at the compound, and there was no word on when they might leave. Koresh had promised to surrender Tuesday, but now says he is waiting until God tells him to leave.

Branch Davidians broke from the Adventist church in the mid-1930s. Church spokeswoman Shirley Burton said she began keeping a file on the group after parents of some cult members expressed concerns to the church last Easter that Koresh had called for a mass suicide at the compound.

The State Department had relayed information from Australians connected with the sect that Koresh was contemplating a mass suicide in the compound, according to the ATF official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

With that information, ATF officials decided to stage a high-risk entry rather than surround the compound and demand the surrender of Koresh, the ATF official said.

“We did not believe we could besiege these people without the very real possibility of a mass suicide,” the ATF official said.

Funerals for two of the slain agents, Steven Willis and Todd McKeehan, were held Friday in Houston and in Elizabethton, Tenn. Funerals for agents Conway LeBleu and Robert Williams were held earlier in Louisiana and Mississippi.