But I signed that affidavit partly because it was so ridiculous and written in EV cultspeak that I thought anyone reading it would recognise it as absurd cult propaganda.

Tom, you and I may recognise "cultspeak" in the document but the courts clearly didn't. To sign a legal document, having read it and knowing it to be false, is perjury, and cannot, to my mind, be explained away as the result of 20 years of marriage. I think that very few people in a similar position would have signed the affidavit. They would have accepted that their wife will find out about leaking the documents and taken the consequences. That is why I speculated that you haven't dealt with your cult membership in spite of 'leaving' 25 years ago. Of course, I don't know you or your wife, but given that your action has impacted my life, and may do more seriously in the future if the cult takes legal action against me, I feel entitled to speculate.

You also wrote:-

My motive for contacting John was straightforward. I cannot understand how the people who became premies in the early/mid 1970’s have been able to accept the changes involved in the practise and "experience" of "Knowledge" over the last 30 years as I stopped circa 1980 when it became apparent that no actual consciousness evolution was occurring no matter how much satsang, service and meditation was done. This is a difficult question and not one I wish to discuss with people to whom I am close. To me premies are just normal people with a religious belief in Prem Rawat and no special "experience". Unfortunately, John was unable to answer this question in a satisfactory manner.

After all that his been written here about cult membership, I am a little surprised, to say the least, that you need to ask this question. Read the extracts from "Cults in Our Midst" linked in the intro to this forum. Once the thought reform process has happened, some cult members will accept any changes initiated by the cult leader without critically thinking about them. Whatever rationale they are told they will accept. (Of course this doesn't apply to everyone, all the time, as this forum demonstrates.)

So I think the crux of your problem (and yes I do think you have a serious problem here) is this:-

To me premies are just normal people with a religious belief in Prem Rawat and no special "experience".

Tom, you need to further educate yourself in cult indoctrination, and you need to accept that your wife is a member of a cult, and has been subject to an insidious thought reform process. As long as you treat her cult membership as simply a religious belief, you may be able to have a comfortable marriage, but you will be lying to yourself.

The consequences of this lying are illustrated by bizarre acts such as signing legal documents that you know are false.