Prem Rawat and Raja Yoga
The first discourse by Prem Rawat (Shri Guru Maharaj Ji) in America, Los Angeles, July 17, 1971.
People write in their books, "I have heard." People have been taught, they say, "I have heard." But for the people who have experienced, then the words, "I have heard," go off. Suppose I am saying to you out there that I have heard that there are rubber roads in Paris. Now I have experienced it, so I won't say, "I have heard;" I will say, "I have experienced it. I have seen it. The roads in Paris are like rubber, rubber roads." So now - now we are just saying that we should know God, we should realize Him, we should do that, we should do that. But when you realize, then somebody will ask you what you have done, "Oh, I have realized that Supreme Being, that Supreme God." So, you have to realize God and there is a special technique, that Raja Yoga - not yoga - Raja Yoga: yoga of mind and not of body. Of mind. That yoga of mind which I teach, Krishna taught to Arjuna. Krishna says, "Arjuna, this is the Raja Yoga and every yoga started from it." Every yoga started from it.
There is no mention in the Bhagavad Gita of Krishna teaching Arjuna anything similar to Prem Rawat's Knowledge meditation techniques. Neither do the Upanishads, the "Yoga Sutras of Patanjali", the works of Shankara or "Raja Yoga" by Swami Vivekananda.
In 1971, with the success of his Western career still in doubt, the young Guru Maharaj Ji had to pretend that his Knowledge was Raja Yoga to impress those in the audiences who actually knew something about Yoga. He had to deflect questions about Raja Yoga basics like kundalini and chakras pretending they were too insignificant to discuss.
The young guru successfully parried questions about yoga: Satsang and Answers from Shri Guru Maharaj Ji Johannesburg, 3rd May 1972
Can you explain to me this Knowledge in terms of yoga?
What is the meaning of yoga? Actually, yoga is an Indian word meaning union. One and one, when they yog, when they combine, make two. And what is the real yoga which Krishna teaches in t Gita? He says it's Raja Yoga. This means King Yoga. Amongst all the unions, this is the greatest union, the greatest communication, because it is between us and God. Taking a drop and putting it into the glass, that's it. That's called real yoga.
But what I want to know is where does God fit in relation to our chakras?
God is omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent.
Guru Ji, how does the Knowledge tie up with the awakening of the kundalini?
You must know the Knowledge and realize it for yourself. How can I tell you? This is not something that can be put into words. Words are just used for representation of a thing, but if something hasn't got any representation, how can you apply words to it? There are so many questions and people get so worried about them. A question is like a white ant eating a man from inside. But questions can be dissolved by taking the right medicine, and then everything will be all right.
At Hans Jayanti 1978, to his largest ever Western audience of more or less devoted premies he could acknowledge he didn't know any of the kundalini shazam and laugh it off though he remembered the questions being more difficult than they actually had been.
Prem Rawat (Guru Maharaj Ji) / Hans Jayanti Festival / Kissimmee, Florida / November 11, 1978, evening program
And these questions are really intense questions: "How does this whole array of liberation work?" "What is this whole chakra of this kundalini, this chakra that sits here to this place to that place, and by doing this you can open this chakra so that you can open up the realization through the chakras, and open up the top one …" Like some kind of a hydraulic valve job. And I don't know what happens with chakras. I never studied all that -- never cared to -- whether this chakra has to open before that will open. It's like this whole immaculate electronics. To me, there's only one valve, and that's mind. Get rid of that valve and it'll all flow. Because Guru Maharaj Ji is all-giving. And all we need is to accept.
In an ashram satsang in Rome, 1980 he was sure that discussion of the chakras was riff-raff and his pure simple unsophisticated words were what this world needs. He was wrong. This world has gone on successfully without him.
the aspirants will be able to come and listen to pure simple unsophisticated words. What we really need, in this life what we really desire, what our true heart really desires what we really should have because satsang is never sophisticated if it's satsang, a lot of riff-raff gets sophisticated, liberation and the seven chakras and the eight chakras times squared and the fifth and the fourth goes off and then you know like a fuel injection system so complicated and one little thing goes off and there you have it but a simple, simple, simple thing. Yes we all know what it means, I mean, I know what this world needs, you know it was just this thing, how about doing a public program? And so, you know, so I finding a place where should we do it? I mean should be place where people are really going to be receptive. You know, people are really gonna be ready to understand.
At times he forgot what 'chakras' meant and he used 'chakras' when he should have used 'mandalas.'
At other times he uses 'chakras' when he seems to mean 'samsara.'
His eldest brother, the more studious and intelligent Satpal Maharaj who is an Indian spiritual guru turned politician and an éminence grise in Uttarakhand understands the chakras and kundalini as explained on his website, Manav Dharam.