page_title: Maitreya
section_title: Maitreya claimants
hierarchical_section_title: Maitreya / Maitreya claimants
caption_attribution_description: Thikse monastery. This statue of the Maitreya Buddha is about 30 ft tall!
context_page_description: Maitreya or Metteyya is regarded as a future Buddha of this world in Buddhist eschatology. In some Buddhist literature, such as the Amitabha Sutra and the Lotus Sutra, he is referred to as Ajita.
  According to Buddhist tradition, Maitreya is a bodhisattva who will appear on Earth in the future, achieve complete enlightenment, and teach the pure dharma. According to scriptures, Maitreya will be a successor to the present Buddha, Gautama Buddha. The prophecy of the arrival of Maitreya refers to a time in the future when the dharma will have been forgotten by most on the terrestrial world.
  Maitreya has also been adopted for his millenarian role by many non-Buddhist religions in the past, such as Theosophy, the White Lotus, as well as by modern new religious movements, such as Yiguandao.
context_section_description: The following list is just a small selection of those people who claimed or claim to be the incarnation of Maitreya. Many have either used the Maitreya incarnation claim to form a new Buddhist sect or have used the name of Maitreya to form a new religious movement or cult.
  In 613 the monk Xiang Haiming claimed himself Maitreya and adopted an imperial title.
  In 690 Wu Zetian, empress regnant of the Wu Zhou interregnum (690–705), proclaimed herself an incarnation of the future Buddha Maitreya, and made Luoyang the "holy capital." In 693 she temporarily replaced the compulsory Dao De Jing in the curriculum with her own Rules for Officials.
  Gung Ye, a Korean warlord and king of the short-lived state of Taebong during the 10th century, claimed himself as the living incarnation of Maitreya and ordered his subjects to worship him. His claim was widely rejected by most Buddhist monks and later he was dethroned and killed by his own servants.
  Lu Zhongyi (1849-1925), the 17th patriarch of Yiguandao, claimed to be an incarnation of Maitreya.
  L. Ron Hubbard, founder of the belief systems Dianetics and Scientology, suggested he was "Metteya" (Maitreya) in the 1955 poem Hymn of Asia. Numerous editors and followers of Hubbard claim that in the book's preface, specific physical characteristics said to be outlined—in unnamed Sanskrit sources—as properties of the coming Maitreya were properties with which Hubbard's appearance supposedly aligned.
  Samael Aun Weor (1917-77) – stated in The Aquarian Message that "the Maitreya Buddha Samael is the Kalki Avatar of the New Age." The Kalkian Avatar and Maitreya Buddha, he claimed, are the same "White Rider" of the Book of Revelation.
  Ram Bahadur Bomjon openly identifies himself with the "Next Buddha" Maitreya, calls himself Maitriya Guru and his followers claim "He plans to unite the world through a single Maitri religion, Maitri language and Maitri culture." He is a controversial figure  currently under investigation for rape, and separately for the disappearance of four of his ashram members.
  Adi Da was suggested by his devotees to be Maitreya: 
  An All-Surpassing God-Man yet to come – a final Avatar, the ultimate Messiah, a consummate Prophet or Enlightened Sage, a Spiritual Deliverer who will appear in the 'late-time', the 'dark' epoch when humanity is lost, apparently cut off from Wisdom, Truth and God. Buddhists call that Expected One 'Maitreya'.
  Followers of B.R. Ambedkar in the Dalit Buddhist Movement regard him as a bodhisattva, the Maitreya, although he never claimed it himself.
  Many scholars and analysts claimed Hindu Avatar Kalki as Maitreya.
  Some Muslim writers including of Ahmadiyya Muslim Community claimed Islamic prophet Muhammad as Maitreya.
caption: Close-up of a statue depicting Maitreya at the Thikse Monastery in Ladakh, India. Depictions of Maitreya vary among Buddhist sects.
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