Manmut - Apostasy and Backsliding in Prem Rawat's Devotees
A Manmut (manmath, manmat) is Rawat's Hindi word for an apostate, someone who was once a devotee or at least "received Knowledge" ie was initiated and has realized that Rawat was an ignorant child who was proclaimed to be God incarnate but is no Master and his "Knowledge" is a simplistic set of meditation techniques. Or maybe he/she just got bored with it.
Rawat liked to claim that his followers did not have a set of beliefs but an experience that set them above and beyond those who were merely religious. Not everyone who apostasised from Rawat had a crisis of conscience or were disgusted by Rawat's luxurious lifestyle and hypocrisy. It may be as simple as finding Rawat's speeches boring or the meditation unsatisfying or something more interesting may have come up in their life, like Scientology or watching paint dry. There were many reasons to apostasise, Rawatism is a deeply unsatisfying religion. Rawat declared some of the most prominent followers of his father manmaths in a letter to his administrators after they rejected him as Satguru. These included his mother, his elder brothers, the administrators of Divya Sandesh Parishad (Divine light Mission in India) that were appointed by his father including Ram Babu and Professor C.L. Tandon and Mahatma Satyanand his father's senior mahatma.
Prem Rawat Explains Ex-Premie Backsliders Go To Deepest Pits Of Hell
At the Hans Jayanti festival in Kissimmee, Florida on the afternoon of Thursday 8th of November, 1979 he taught that to be a manmut is to be the worst, in hell of hell.
You know what manmut means? Manmut is what has been described as a devotee who is not a devotee, who has been sent beyond everything. A manmut is the worst. That's it. If there's the pits, then that's the pits. That's the end. That's the back room of hell. That's the hell of hell. And what manmut means is: the follower of mind. But before being a manmut, you have to be a devotee. First you have to be a devotee, follow Guru Maharaj Ji, and only then you can become a manmut. Because you leave Guru Maharaj Ji and start following your mind. And then you end up in the pits. That's it.
Rawat preached and ranted that manmuts ie apostates would rot like a house full of vegetables and would break apart into fragments. This does not appear to be true, especially as the overwhelming majority of one-time premies are now manmuts. In the West, most people who have been involved with Rawat have not continued to have any involvement with him or his organisation and Rawat and his followers, for obvious reasons, rarely mention them. However those people who are prepared to publicly criticise him and discuss his career and his techniques of meditation have sometimes been slandered as hate speech perpetrators and mentally ill.
At the Hans Jayanti festival of 1990, held in Delhi, Rawat ranted about manmats. They were like zombies coming out of their graves and that was natural. To followers of Prem Rawat, the greatest of all manmats is Satpal Maharaj, Prem's eldest brother who was appointed Perfect Master (Satguru) by their mother after she disinherited Prem and has both the infrastructure, property, wealth and followers that their father had gathered. But as usual Prem is mistaken or telling porkies. His brother has not grown thin, quite the opposite. Satpal is a very fat, successful politician (who in 2014 abandoned the Congress Party and was welcomed into the BJP) and Godman whose sons are continuing the family business.
There are people who turned manmats (devotee of mind) and went away, though I haven't seen myself, but people say that they have now become very thin and feeble, as if they have come directly out of their graves. And that is natural.
On the 2nd May 1974 in Denver, Colorado he taught that an apostate premie would rot like 3 tons of vegetables
But I think the premies who are not meditating, you know what they are doing? They're getting three tons of vegetables in their house and not eating it. You know what that means? When it'll start rotting, phew, it's going to rot like a hell. I mean, if it was one vegetable, one teeny weeny vegetable, it would dry out somewhere in the closet, doesn't even matter. But if you had three truckloads of them, and they start rotting, man, you are looking for some real trouble. And that's the way this Knowledge is. But this Knowledge, it's like you've got the vegetables of the whole universe with you. And if you don't meditate, can you imagine how it's going to rot?
On 23rd April, 1975 in Calcutta (now Kolkata), he said
I told Mata Ji a long time ago, "Mata Ji, if you have any doubts, any confusions or desire, please don't bring it among the premies. Because premies are for the Knowledge, for Guru Maharaj Ji. Premies are not for other matters." But it has been said that those who are manmat, followers of mind, have no discipline. No one knows what they can do. Today that time has come to show that premies are with Guru Maharaj Ji. Shri Hans Ji Maharaj was also blamed by some disciples. The same thing is happening with me.
In Munich, Germany on April 10, 1977 he compared an apostate premie to a corpse
And it's just like, okay, mind and trips and so on and so forth. You can look at it any way you want; but to me, satsang, service, and meditation are food, you know? To keep me alive, when Guru Maharaj Ji is my life. So, if I leave Guru Maharaj Ji, and I keep on eating, then it's like a corpse trying to eat food: what would be the point?
On Memorial Day satsang, Malibu, California, May 28, 1978 he defined 'sin':
It's just like our love for our Guru Maharaj Ji can never, can never, cease to exist. If there is a definition … Okay, this is a little harsh way to put it. But I'll put it: If there is a definition to sin - if there is one - then it definitely applies to the place of ever leaving that Love, of ever forgetting that Love of Guru Maharaj Ji.
On 27th August, 1978 in Philadelphia, he said
And mind says. "But I promise you more than that." Mind has always promised us but never given us anything. Guru Maharaj Ji has not only promised us but given us more than what he has promised. Always. Always. And as that battle begins, the things get even more tense. And if that faith is not there, if that faith is not completely in Guru Maharaj Ji, you're going to fall in so many fragments that you wouldn't be able to count them yourself. You will run right out of count. Right out of it. You will go beyond zillions, billions, everything.
Prem Rawat Discusses His Violent and Abusive Father Beating a Manmut
At the Hans Jayanti festival in Kissimmee, Florida on the afternoon of Thursday 8th of November, 1979 he told a strange story about his violent and abusive father who regularly beat people with wooden walking sticks and his shoes.
So many people would come so many times in a day and they would all be turned away at the gate. There were these devotees, I guess, who try and try to have an experience of Knowledge. And they haven't really done anything wrong. And they're just told, "Go back. Come later."
But whenever this guy would show up, even when Shri Maharaj Ji was out driving and he would be standing there: "Stop the car." Right at the gate, he'd come out there and there'd be this guy. It's like, he was the luckiest manmut. He was the most fortunate sinner in this world, I guess, in one sense. Because every time Shri Maharaj Ji - somehow, sometime - he would get a whoof of it…
And one time I was travelling with Shri Maharaj Ji and somehow he got a whoof of it. Shri Maharaj Ji saw him on a roadside. And the car was going really fast. And Shri Maharaj Ji spotted him and said, "Back the car up. Go to him." Stopped in front of him, got out and let him have it.
It's just beautiful. In one sense it's just beautiful because so many premies never could get Shri Maharaj Ji's darshan. This guy would not only get Shri Maharaj Ji's darshan but personal attention. Somehow in that maybe the devotees will find the bliss. (Not being manmut. You don't have to go out there and become a manmut so that's what Guru Maharaj Ji will do to you every day.) But Guru Maharaj Ji has that compassion. And Guru Maharaj Ji has that love.
Because to me, that became obvious. If Guru Maharaj Ji didn't have that love, why would he say, "Stop the car"? There is this, you might say, highway. And this guy is standing on the side of it. And, "Stop the car", or "Back it up." The car would go past it. "Was that him?" "Yes, Maharaj that was him." "Okay. Turn around. Go back." And then for ten, twenty, fifteen minutes, this would go on. And then, "… and I never want to ever see you again." Close the door and go off. Two days later he would show up at the residence. Same thing would happen, "… and I never, ever want to see you again." Turn around and that stuff. But you would see that sometimes he would get angry at somebody and say, "Get out of here. Go away." Then two minutes later, "Where is he? Call him back. Send people out. Call him back. What's happening to him?"
Prem Rawat Recalls Another Episode Of His Father Beating a Manmut
Sometimes he'd get mad, really just thunder and storm, you know. Hurricane is just a little whoof of a wind compared to when he would just really manifest in that way. Everybody would be completely super, super scared. Everybody. The neighbors or anybody walking by - just everybody - completely would lose it. Sometimes you would look at the planning office - the one I was talking about. There'd be all these people working in there, right? And Shri Maharaj Ji would be in the backyard some day. And you could see the backyard from this office. And if he'd get mad at somebody - you would not even see a single person out in that office. Everybody would sort of just disappear somewhere, didn't want to be yelled at or be a part of it or anything.
When Shri Maharaj Ji would be really angry at somebody, it wouldn't end. For me, it wouldn't end. It'd be going on for "hours and hours" - and probably it'd be ten minutes. But it'd be going on for "hours and hours and hours and hours." And here I was trembling and shaking. Didn't even … Here he would really be angry or mad at somebody - really mad. Really mad!
I remember there was this one guy. And every time Shri Maharaj Ji would see him. Shri Maharaj Ji'd get really upset with him. Really upset! And he would take his cane and start letting him have it. And he would take his shoe and start letting him have it. And it was incredible because this guy, just about every week that Shri Maharaj Ji was there, would show up. There would be other people who would come. All they would get to is the door and then they would leave. But this premie had the fortune, you might say, of getting called all the way into Shri Maharaj Ji's veranda. And there he would sit and this guy would sit not three feet away from him. And he enjoyed every moment of it. One day I was looking at this whole scene happening. Shri Maharaj Ji had a stick and he was hitting him to the point where even the stick broke. … Shri Maharaj Ji almost broke his shoe hitting him.
On November 9, 1990 at the Hans Jayanti celebrations in India he said he'd heard manmats looked like zombies:
There are people who turned manmats (devotee of mind) and went away, though I haven't seen myself, but people say that they have now become very thin and feeble, as if they have come directly out of their graves. And that is natural. If once anybody gets the taste of these surroundings, this atmosphere here - it becomes very difficult for them to give it up.