Guru Maharaj Ji, formally known as Prem Pal Singh Rawat, born December 10, 1957 in Hardwar India, founded the Divine Light Mission in 1971. The Divine Light Mission is a cult-like religion that uses deep meditation to obtain divine "knowledge" empowering people to make the world a better place. Maharaj himself passes down this "knowledge" to the members called premies. The process of obtaining "knowledge" is through a series of techniques involving deep meditation and yoga. In the late 70's and early 80's the mission lost a lot of support due to a number of events that displeased it's members, causing it to lose support and more importantly – money. The Divine Light Mission still exists today with nearly 500,000 world wide members.
             Derived from Buddhism and the Sikh religion, The Devine Light Mission originated in India and soon spread to the United States. Maharaj's father, Indian born Shri Hans Maharaj Ji (Elliot 4), originated the Divine Light Mission in the 1920. Maharaj's father died six years after founding the mission, but passed down the "knowledge" to all of his sons (Elliot 6). "Guru Maharaj Ji would call himself "the perfect master" and continue the Divine Light Mission that his father started" (Elliot 9). At age thirteen, Maharaj spoke in Colorado, thereby starting the Divine Light Mission movement in the United States. He soon married an American woman named Marolyn Johnson, a premie of the Mission, which ignited a split in the cult that turned away many members and separated the Mission from it traditions and foundations. Maharaj brought back some premies by reverting to the mission's traditional ways, but eventually the money started running out. As the premies started leaving so did the money, forcing Maharaj to retrench, making cost and program cuts. In the early 1980's, Maharaj, driving away many more premies, c...