All of the cults claim some kind of divine mandate. At the least to be in contact with a higher power or to have a guaranteed method to create success and plenty. It is the key by which they enslave the minds of their followers.
A classic example of a man directly claiming to be GOD is the leader of a group called “Heavens Gate”, a group which committed mass suicide in April 1997. The leader of this group, Mr Applewhite ( more commonly known as “Do”) explains his divine authority in a tract entitled : “Undercover Jesus surfaces before departure” . Therin he says:
… “ This ‘return’ requires that I prepare to lay down my borrowed human body in order to take up, or re enter, my body belonging to the Kingdom of God, as I did 2000 years ago, as Jesus, when I laid down the human body that was about 33 years old in order to re enter my body belonging to the Kingdom of Heaven…. This time, my Heavenly Father, my older member, came with me. In the early 70s we incarnated into adult human bodies that were in their 40s. 2000 years ago I incarnated into a body that was 29 years old …at the time of baptism by John the Baptist”…
The leader of the Raelians. Rael, while not actually being Jesus, is closely related to Jesus. Rael received a very important revelation 3 years after he was initially taken by aliens to their planetary utopia. However the deeply significant revelation was kept under lock and key until the world was ready to receive it. Eventually though, in 1986, it was revealed to those with ‘eyes of understanding’ in his book : “Lets Welcome our fathers from Space”. Page 112 Tells us, (Yahweh is speaking to Rael) :
…“The person who you looked upon as your father was not your father…We selected a woman…this woman was taken aboard one of our ships and inseminated as we had done with the mother of Jesus….Your real father was also the father of Jesus, and that makes you brothers. You are presently looking at your real father….From this moment on you may call me father, because you are my son”….
Deeply moving isn’t it, to discover that Rael is actually the son of Yahweh, and the latter day Jesus. Superior even to Jesus because he brings the FINAL message to humanity wheras Christ only laid the path which Rael walks upon.
These are pretty direct claims of divine mandate due to being a divine creature.But some of the larger and more established ‘cults’ do not go quite so far.
The Mormon prophet, Joseph Smith, while not actually being divine himself, was personally appointed by both Yahweh and Jesus to restore Gospel practises to the earth. The famous “first vision” of Joseph Smith is recorded ad nauseum in numerous Mormon publications. Here is the account from a book called: “Gospel Principles” The prophet himself speaking :
… “ I saw a pillar of light exactly above my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me….When the light rested upon me I saw two personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing unto the other- This is my Beloved Son, hear Him! ”….
I wont tax the readers intelligence by recounting what the “Beloved Son” said next. Lol.
The Adventist Prophet, Ellen G White, while not actually having MET God, HAS met Jesus and held conversation with him while on a guided tour of heaven. This is still, surely, more Divine authority than the rest of us can claim. The Adventist tract : “A word to the little flock”... ..published in May 1847 by her husband, James White, adequately describes her being whisked off, John like, to heaven to meet Christ:
… “While praying at the family alter the Holy Ghost fell upon me, and I seemed to be rising higher and higher, far above the dark world”…
Straight to heaven along with the rest of the 144,000. Well, after what must have been a very tiresome journey of 7 DAYS that is:
… “We all entered the cloud together, and were 7 days ascending to the sea of glass, when Jesus brought along the crowns and with his own right hand placed them upon our heads. He gave us harps of gold and palms of victory”…
A bright and shiny building soon caught her attention:
… “I asked Jesus to let me see what was within there. In a moment we were winging our way upwards and entering in. Here we saw good old father Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Noah, Daniel and many like them”….
So even this is sufficient authority to establish a person as having the right to direct the lives of millions of Church followers.
But then, the most extreme and dangerous cult I ever personally was involved with was led by a triumvirate of three women, one of whom was merely in contact with a highly advanced alien called “Elonias”.
Proof positive that you don’t have to claim to be GOD to start a cult. Claiming to merely be in communication with The angel Gabriel will suffice very nicely.