Even After Death, Deng An Innovator

In a country that savors ceremony and invests great symbolism in public events, China’s formal farewell to its paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, is a big deal.

So it attracted a fair amount of attention, the day after Deng died last week, when authorities announced he would be cremated a day before the memorial service is held Tuesday. That precludes the usual practice of displaying the deceased in a bed of flowers, to be circled by those who come to say a final goodbye.

Even more surprising, the announcement specified that the Deng family wanted to respect the patriarch’s wishes that his corneas be donated to an eye bank and body parts offered for medical research.

That may have shocked the Confucian faithful, who hold that the body should remain intact, even after death. So combining cremation and organ donation was a double attack on the old way of doing things, which was exactly how the authorities wanted to make it look: Deng, known for his bold strokes in life, would be fighting tradition in the name of selflessness and science, even in death.