Prem Rawat (Prem Pal Singh Rawat) whose devotees call him Maharaji (meaning Ultimate Ruler) first came to attention in the West as Guru Maharaj Ji - the self-proclaimed Perfect Master and Lord of the Universe ridiculed in the media as a fat, squeaky-voiced God boy. He had inherited his titles and position as the Satguru, The True Revealer of Light and Spiritual Master of the Divine Light Mission, India (Divya Sandesh Parishad) when his father died in 1966. His father, Hans Rawat, was a successful Indian guru, self titled HRH (His Royal Highness) Yogiraj Param Sant Satgurudev Shri Hans Ji Maharaj. As a child the youngest Rawat son was informally called Sant Ji, more formally Balyogeshwar ("Born King of the Yogis") and even more formally Param Sant Satgurudev Shri Sant Ji Maharaj. In the West Rawat dropped these more verbose titles in the early 1980's and instructed his followers to call him Maharaji. He has also changed the names of his organisations many times: Divine Light Mission (DLM), World Welfare Association (WWA), World Peace Corps (WPC) and Divine United Organisation (DUO) became Elan Vital in the early 1980's and in 2001 The Prem Rawat Foundation (TPRF) was created and from 2010 his major orgs are Words Of Peace Global (WOPG) registered in Holland, Words of Peace International (WOPI) in the USA, HDSK (Human Development through Self Knowledge) in Great Britain and Raj Vidya Kender (Royal Knowledge Society) in India. He no longer claims to be an Incarnation of God but an internationally famous humanitarian leader and teacher of peace. He's neither.

The Golden Age

Excerpts from Guru Maharaj Ji's meeting with the North American Community Directors in Orlando, Florida, November 12, 1976.

One of the most important functions of this Divine Light Mission, is the community. Community is your final link-up. First, there is an organisation which is incredible, which is very big, and then this organisation links itself up to the particular community so that it can relay information and function through the community to the outside world.

A couple of years ago, we did not exactly realise the importance of community. Premies would receive Knowledge, and then there would be one premie in Maine, and one premie in Orlando, and one premie in California, and one premie in Texas. But they could never really come together.

Finally, we realised - of course, through grace - that we needed something like community. We needed a community, a group, an association, a bunch of people who would then participate and focus their energy. We are a very unique organisation. And the reason is that we are dealing with premies - people who have received Knowledge, who have understood Truth. To begin with, it's a very emotional problem. Everybody who receives Knowledge, who receives sat-sang, is full of a bursting energy and wants to go out and tell everyone, "Here it is! Here it is!"

But that would be like a madman, who will get arrested in about two minutes if he runs down the street just screaming, "I have received Knowledge, I have received … " Can you imagine that happening? It would have been happening right now if we had not had any organisation.

So what we did was to bring all these premies together so that all the energy that they had just realised, that they had just focused on, would develop to a point where, instead of being like one drop of water per hose, all that pressure would be combined into one hose. What we ended up with was a very strong, powerful pressure and a very strong, powerful hose with tremendous effects. This is what community basically is.

The community has functions that have to be performed. Otherwise we cannot even define it as a community. I was saying to Lou, community can be a bunch of elderly people who get together and say, "Okay. Let's make a group and let's get it together and let's go play golf and tennis." But that is not what we are talking about here. We are talking about a practical experience and a practical result from a community.

Community is a friendship between premies who are dedicated to Guru Maharaj Ji. Community is made out of only those people who are dedicated to Guru Maharaj Ji, who want to serve Guru Maharaj Ji and who say, "Okay, we are going to serve Guru Maharaj Ji. We'll all get together and focus our energy at one point because we know it will be a lot stronger that way than if we all try to go out and do it alone."

See, Divine Light Mission is like an upside-down funnel, and this is the way you have to see it. I sit on the top. And I am supposed to control the whole situation. Well, it's hard for me, so I give the responsibilities to people who I think are responsible, who can govern and follow my agya, my administration, and who will do things that I want to be done. So it's like an upside-down funnel.

We have to come to a point where Knowledge can really spread into this world, and we need to form a foundation to make that possible. We came to the conclusion that this foundation has to be the community. Because how many ashram premies can really go out and do propagation? Not a hundred percent; not as many as we require. So community is what we have to focus on, and community is what will help us form a proper funnel so that the system will work.

(Somebody asks Maharaj Ji about the possibility of his doing public programs in the future.)

If they are not ready for me, then I am not going to do anything. I don't care which country it is. They have to be ready for me. I am always ready; I am always on the go, but you have to be ready too. Where do I go if you are not ready? When I come, I want you to take full advantage of me. I am going to go there, and I will give satsang, and there will be an energy focused at a certain point. So, I want you to be ready to take that energy and focus it into right channels.

If I make a public tour, then it not only becomes your responsibility to take care of the aspirants who come after they hear my satsang, but also the premies who are already there, to divert them into that real consciousness that they need to be in so that they can really, really propagate. See, propagation is the end of the line, and that's what makes it sail. That's the last part of our ship, and that's our rudder. If propagation is sloppy, what can we do? Then what good is it to us?

We have to really propagate through a proper channel. I am not saying to go out and tell people, bluff people, say, "Guru Maharaj Ji can speak thirty-four languages." I am not saying that. I am saying, tell them the right thing so that they can really come and understand and realise it for themselves, "Yeah. The guy wasn't speaking false. He was really true." Then to really plug them into the community so that when they receive Knowledge they don't have to go through the drastic change of plugging into the community.

So, do your job right. If you are devoted to me, if you are really my premies, if you are really that servant who has dedicated his life in all manners, in all respects, to Guru Maharaj Ji, then you will do whatever I tell you to do. Then you will not do a sloppy job.

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Prem Rawat's "Knowledge" has three parts: regularly listening to his speeches, doing voluntary work for organisations serving him or donating money and daily meditation correctly practicing the four techniques he recommends. The techniques are so simple it's hard to see how they could be practiced incorrectly. First technique ("Divine Light") involves sticking your thumb and middle finger on your eyeballs (NB: with eyes closed) and your index finger between your eyebrows. Second technique: ("Heavenly Music") poking your thumbs into your ears and listening. Third technique: ("Holy Name") thinking about your breathing (NB: continue to breathe). Fourth technique: ("Nectar") curling your tongue backwards and tasting. Rawat's father taught slightly different techniques but either way it's difficult to see how these could produce the benefits claimed for them especially as Rawat claims His Knowledge is the only method of attaining real happiness and love in this life.