Leader and Founding

Shoko Asahara, born Chizuo Matsumoto, was the original founder of the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult. Before he founded Aum Shinrikyo in 1986, Asahara made money selling medicinal herbs with supposed healing powers and managing his chain of yoga schools. In 1982 Asahara was jailed for twenty days after being convicted for selling fake cures. 

Many followers claimed Asahara attained the ability to levitate through deep meditation.

Asahara’s spiritual journey began with his trip to the Himalayas where he decided that he was a prophet. Upon returning to Japan Asahara was further encouraged by a vision he recieved on the beach. In this vision, Asahara was spoken to by the god Shiva and told that he had been chosen to lead God’s army. Finally, less than a year later, Asahara met with a historian on a mountainside who claimed that armageddon would come by 2000 and that only a “godly race will survive”. Additionally the historian claimed that the leader of this race would “emerge in Japan”. Asahara took this as his final sign and not long after in 1987 opened the first office of his new cult.