Word: aum
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Buddhism and Shintoism, Japan's most common faiths. But religious scholars and the police are nonetheless alarmed by what they see as the proliferation of doomsday cults. Mystics consumed with signs of the apocalypse have a tendency to bring their visions horrifically to life. Japanese need no reminder of Aum Shinrikyo, the cult that staged a deadly chemical gas attack on commuters in Tokyo's subway system seven years ago, allegedly masterminded by Aum's Shoko Asahara. Last week, one of Asahara's top henchmen, Tomomitsu Niimi, became the eighth Aum member to be sentenced to death in connection with...
...Remaining members, who number in the hundreds, changed the group's name two years ago from Aum Shinrikyo (Supreme Truth) to Aleph (the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet). Japan's Public Security Investigation Agency assigns about 50 agents to keep tabs on them. The cult has seven main facilities throughout Japan and 20 smaller branches where followers can practice meditation; it also organizes yoga classes, computer seminars and student clubs on university campuses. These activities attract recruits like Ai Ozaki, 25. A shy, thoughtful woman, Ozaki (her cult name) joined Aum after the sarin attack, drawn in part...
...Aum still exists, but another movement has eclipsed it. Asai's Nichiren Kenshokai sect, which drew throngs to the Kawaguchi civic center, claims to have 881,865 followers. "Kenshokai is the biggest of the new religions," says Taro Takimoto, a lawyer who helped in 1995 to organize a group comprising family members trying to rescue relatives from cults. "There are many high school students quitting school, people quitting their jobs, to join Kenshokai." Kenshokai's nationalistic appeal is particularly popular among young men, including members of Japan's Self-Defense Force. The cult claims to have attracted...
...Using a similar appeal, Aum Shinrikyo drew tens of thousands of followers during the 1990s, and even ran political candidates in national elections. Aum's godhead was its founder, Asahara, an intelligent misfit who claimed he could levitate and who appeared regularly on TV talk shows. Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, preached distorted versions of Buddhism and Hinduism steeped in apocalyptic theology...
...dozen Tokyo commuters, dire prophecy came true. On a sunny March morning in 1995, Aum members, in an apparent attempt to create mayhem and distract a police investigation into their operations, used the tips of umbrellas to puncture plastic bags filled with liquid sarin, which they left behind on five subway trains. A poisonous, invisible cloud spread through the carriages and stations. Thousands of people were made sick, and 12 died...