How ‘Twin Flames Universe’ leader pretends to be Jesus to create an abusive multi-level marketing scheme

“If you really had the fire of Christ in you, you would do everything in your power to share this.”

Such language is common in evangelical churches, with the “this” referring to the hope of salvation through Jesus Christ.

But these also are the words of Jeff Ayan (also known as Jeff Divine, and formerly as Ender Ayanethos), leader of the religiously charged match-making company, Twin Flames Universe, shown in a recent Netflix docuseries.

In this case, Ayan was using his authoritative anger to sell courses and counseling sessions to members. But the kind of “Christ” one might find in Twin Flames Universe is far away from any beliefs about God asserted in the Christian tradition. This is a different fire.

Numerous people who joined his program, initially just looking for relationship advice, have realized they became part of a cult. Instead of finding their “Twin Flame” or “ultimate lover,” they were financially and sexually manipulated into promoting a multi-level marketing CEO posing as God.

Yes, Ayan tells his followers, he is Jesus. And this “fire of Christ” is a theological demand that members do everything he says without question.

Twin Flames Universe

Created by Ayan and his wife, Shalaiea (also known as Shaleia Divine, and formerly as Megan Plante), almost a decade ago, Twin Flames Universe began as a matchmaking company with spiritual elements but quickly developed into a religiously charged multi-level marketing scheme.

According to the recent Netflix docuseries on the organization, Escaping Twin Flames, as well as Sarah Berman’s investigative reporting for Vice News, Jeff Ayan had been trying to become a famous internet guru for years prior to creating TFU. After meeting Shaleia online, he married her quickly, believing she was his twin flame.

Ayan then realized he’d stumbled upon a marketing opportunity: Love.

That is when the couple began creating content about what they called their “harmonious union” between the “divine masculine” and the “divine feminine.” Then came Twin Flames Universe, a company that utilizes spiritual themes and practices borrowed from an array of different religions, offering spiritual guidance and coaching services to members who want to find their twin flame.

Many ex-members allege the Ayans facilitate a cult-like and abusive environment.

But over the near decade since the company’s inception, their matchmaking methods have become increasingly more aggressive and financially draining for members, and many ex-members allege the Ayans facilitate a cult-like and abusive environment.

According to Berman’s investigative reporting, members who believed they joined an organization that would help them find love were being financially and sexually manipulated. They allege they were guilted into estranging themselves from family, pressured into relationships and marriages with strangers, and sometimes manipulated into changing their sexual orientation or gender identity after being urged by the Ayans and other organizational leaders.

These accusations are further laid out in Escaping Twin Flames, which features the testimonies of ex-members and mothers of current members. The docuseries also gives a look into the organization’s conference calls, showing the extensive patterns of verbal, emotional, spiritual and financial abuse taking place in the online group.

In TFU, members search for their one true love, which they call their “Twin Flame.” The company’s curriculum teaches that all people have just one Twin Flame. Through a series of intense spiritual practices, anyone can be united with their twin.

According to ex-members, couples are encouraged to pursue their Twin Flame at all costs, despite legal consequences or potential physical danger. Members who relentlessly pursue their twin amid harsh or abusive circumstances are lauded as the most faithful in the group, and big relationship milestones, such as moving in together or marriages, are encouraged within months of the couples virtually meeting each other.

Once a person has found their destined life partner, they reach “Harmonious Twin Flame Union,” a state of spiritual achievement and sexual ecstasy. Every union must be comprised of one partner who is the “divine masculine,” and another who is the “divine feminine.” Although the partners may not be assigned the coinciding sexes at birth, the Ayans teach that a proper “ascension” into one’s spiritual journey should lead them to express their true masculine or feminine self.

Coerced conversion

Although the company claims to be inclusive of the LGBTQ community, it has faced criticism after allegations from ex-members who claim the Ayans pair members as Twin Flames regardless of their sexualities, especially pairs of women. In these same-sex unions, one partner is encouraged to complete a medical gender transition process, to ensure their Twin Flame union is comprised of both the divine masculine and divine feminine, even if the person is not trans.

Members are pressured to conform with sexualities and genders they do not truly identify with.

Although there have been several self-identifying LGBTQ TFU members over the years, those who have left insist the organization is doing more harm than good, as members are pressured to conform with sexualities and genders they do not truly identify with. Multiple ex-members claim they or others were pressured into gay and lesbian relationships, or the gender transition process.

Rather than being inclusive of members’ self-proclaimed identities, the TFU pairing system forces members to conform to what the Ayans claim relationships are supposed to look like.

Sexual manipulation

The TFU curriculum also emphasizes the importance of sexual intimacy between Twin Flames.

Unlike Christian purity culture, the Ayans do not prohibit members from having sex outside their marital harmonious union. However, they do teach the importance of having lots of sex with your Twin Flame. But while the promise of an extensive sex life helps the Ayans market their products to singles in search of love, ex-member testimonies claim their teachings about sex facilitate and normalize abuse.

TFU curriculum teaches members that wives should have sex with their husbands every day to maintain harmonious union, whether they want to or not.

Similar to Emmerson Eggerich’s popular Christian marriage guide, Love and Respect, which promotes sexual submission by likening male sexual desire to women’s emotional needs, TFU curriculum teaches members that wives should have sex with their husbands every day to maintain harmonious union, whether they want to or not. According to ex-members, this teaching facilitated instances of sexual violence by granting husbands constant and unadulterated access to their wives’ bodies and pressuring wives always to submit in fear of the spiritual consequences that may result if they lose harmony.

Due to the fast-paced, and often reckless, coupling of Twin Flames, multiple women who left TFU say their partners were abusive from the very beginning, but they stayed with them because the Ayans and other TFU leaders instructed them to. They never would have chosen their “twin” as a romantic partner had they organically met.

Multi-level marketing

After attaining harmonious union, couples are eligible to become “ascension coaches” for the organization, a position marketed to members as an opportunity to make great amounts of money while serving a company they believe in. Ascension coaches are responsible for coaching members who have yet to find or marry their Twin Flame and are often the ones tasked with convincing twins to change their sexual or gender identities to align with their Ayan-assigned masculine or feminine energy.

Ex-ascension coaches not only bear the spiritual and emotional burden of knowing they were used by the Ayans to abuse other members but were also drained of financial resources during their time in TFU.

Coaches receive little pay, which often is garnished by the Ayans (sometimes 50%) and have to constantly purchase new, expensive and never-ending TFU materials to maintain their status as an ascension coach. Isolated from their previous communities, many ex-ascension coaches had to continue the work they were doing for TFU regardless of how little the pay was, because they had no other source of income and feared the spiritual and social consequences of cutting ties with the organization.

As members with harmonious union rose in rank throughout the organization, they also are given more working responsibilities, but not always compensated for their labor.

Just like a common multi-level marketing scheme, members are encouraged to become ascension coaches as an entrepreneurial way to make a living by becoming lifestyle gurus, and they are expected to make public social media posts thanking the Ayans for their happy lives (even if they have to lie). Some members have even created off-shoot brands out of their coaching services, funneling more and more income to the TFU parent company.

A Euro guy with blue eyes and brown hair

And as spiritual identity within the organization has grown over the years, the Ayans realized the religious vulnerability of their members presented an even more profitable way to abuse.

According to the couple, historical artworks depicting Jesus share a prophetic resemblance to Jeff that is not coincidental.

In a video conference, the Ayans announced a revelation about the second coming of Christ. According to the couple, historical artworks depicting Jesus share a prophetic resemblance to Jeff that is not coincidental. Jeff Divine is the second coming of Christ, the Ayans claimed in the conference call, announcing to their members he was no longer just a CEO or spiritual guru.

He was their God.

Ayan told members, “Those images were images of me. Not a Jewish guy from Israel, but a Euro guy with blue eyes and brown hair.” Since the supposed revelation, Ayan has grown out his hair to mimic popular artwork depicting Jesus’ long, brown hair.

In January 2020, Ayan worked with TFU leadership to institutionally establish his divine status, creating the Church of Union as a branch of their company. The church publishes virtual sermons every Sunday at noon EST, and many TFU members serve as ministers.

But while it may look like a religious community, it was not founded out of faith, even for Ayan himself. “I’m going to turn our company into a religion, and this way, I don’t have to pay people. I can just have volunteers,” Ayan told TFU staff, some of whom he’d tasked with researching things for the company like how to make the most money, and how to avoid paying as much taxes as possible.

Just like the ascension coaches, the Church of Union ministers are preaching to fund a multi-level marketing scheme, likely with little to no personal reward or financial compensation.

Is this a cult?

Following the publication of Berman’s investigative articles and the recent Netflix docuseries, Twin Flames Universe released a media statement on their website rejecting allegations of abuse within the company, claiming media coverage critiquing the organization is “taking swipes” at their community. The Ayans publicly denied claims that TFU is a cult when reached out to by Vice News.

Despite multiple ex-members and families of current members sharing testimonies that exhibit situations of spiritual, social, religious and financial manipulation that would prohibit autonomy, the company claims to facilitate an environment of autonomy for members. According to the media statement, “The allegations levied against Twin Flames Universe not only distort our true aims, methods and curriculums but also misrepresent the autonomy of our community members, who are free to engage with our resources as they see fit.”

However, a close look at the allegations, conference call clips and curriculum available online from TFU show eerie similarities to other religious cults, such as the Church of Scientology cult with branches all around the world, or the Branch Davidian cult in Waco, Texas.

The Church of Scientology

The Church of Scientology, exposed in recent years by actress Leah Remini and other ex-Scientologists, upholds similar financial powers over members. Like TFU members and ascension coaches, Scientologists must purchase courses and materials that help them “clear” levels of spirituality until they reach “total freedom.” However, since there are constantly new course requirements being published, members trying to clear spiritual levels must continuously purchase these new and expensive materials (on top of expectations to regularly donate large amounts of money to the church) and start over at the beginning when earlier levels are updated.

Scientologists are also subjected to intense spiritual exercises to reveal inner truths about themselves, such as one process called “auditing,” in which members are forced to answer a series of questions that release “spiritual disabilities” and help them achieve “full spiritual potential.”

Similarly, TFU members are required to engage in the “mirror exercise,” a practice that claims to rid members of spiritual “upsets” in their Twin Flame union by requiring twins to reflect on things that upset them about others and make the statement be about themselves, instead. For example, members angry at a spouse for being unreasonable should use the exercise to call themselves unreasonable, taking on the blame for whatever instance of conflict occurred. This is intended to heal “Twin Flame blocks” that prevent members from maintaining harmonious union.

The Branch Davidians

The Branch Davidian cult is most prominently known for the deaths of 80 members, including their leader, Vernon Howell (David Koresh), after a two month attempt at hostage negotiations between multiple government agencies that ended in the tear gassing and burning of their compound in Waco, Texas. Despite attempts at hostage negotiations, most members of the Branch Davidian cult refused to leave the compound, believing they should die for their faith in God. This God was David Koresh.

Much like Jeff Ayan’s teachings, the Branch Davidians were taught they never could question the authority of Koresh, even in the most outlandish or dangerous circumstances. This eventually led members to allow Koresh to have control over the sexual relationships of cult members, with Koresh marrying or having sex with all the women in the group, including those already married or underage.

According to survivors, having sex with Koresh was likened to a spiritual practice.

This demand for ultimate submission seems to be what caused members to refuse to surrender, succumbing to death when their compound was destroyed. In the recent Netflix docuseries, WACO: American Apocalypse, one survivor explained that the decision to obey Koresh felt like a religious duty, not a personal choice. Of the cult mindset, she recalled feeling as though, “I’m not a person. I’m God’s tool.”

Likewise, many TFU ex-members felt the same way. Rather than choosing to move in with or marry their Twin Flame due to romantic, spiritual or physical attraction, many ex-members recalled feelings of religious duty once the Ayans announced who their twin was. Further, many former ascension coaches and TFU employees felt they had to do whatever they could to facilitate more Twin Flame unions and create profit for the company, even if they had moral qualms with their instructions, because their God was the one telling them what to do.

And Ayan made the consequences of disobeying God’s instructions clear on many occasions, including instances of verbal abuse, social shaming and assertion of financial control.

Also similar to Koresh’s assertion of inappropriate sexual power over members, although most Twin Flame unions only consist of two people, the Ayans have claimed their daughter is the third Twin Flame in their union and meant to be celibate for life. Together, the trio calls themselves “Mother Christ,” “Father Christ” and the “Princess of Creation.”

According to some ex-members interviewed in the Netflix docuseries, although their daughter should be celibate for life, Ayan has declared she is allowed to have sex with her God. And of course, Ayan is her God.

And while this piece of pedophilia theology is not the focal point of TFU curriculum, the Ayan’s daughter has been the focal point of their social media pages since her birth. Onlookers speculate what these religious assertions will mean as she ages, and if she is in danger of abuse at home.

TFU today

But despite these allegations of abuse, manipulation and perverted sexual intentions, Twin Flames Universe is still producing content today. Their website displays all the current harmonious Twin Flame unions between members and is advertising courses and products to prospective members with prices upwards of $8,000.

While the group meets primarily online, and holds only occasional meetings in person, the Ayans are allegedly working toward relocating all TFU members to a communal living site in Michigan.

And as the Ayans continue to develop more products to sell, promoting more complex theological beliefs, ex-members and families of current members continue to fight for an end to the Ayan’s manipulation tactics.

Because the search for love should not require a person to submit to abuse.

 

Mallory Challis is a master of divinity student at Wake Forest University School of Divnity. She is a former Clemons Fellow with BNG.