Julius Schacknow

Julius Schacknow was born into a poor Orthodox-Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York in 1924. He served in the Navy and was severely wounded during World War II. As a result of his head wounds and trauma, years lated he proclaimed himself to be the Christ and called himself Brother Julius.

In 1976 he stopped making public appearances and developed multi-million dollar real estate and construction businesses, which reportedly did $100 million in sales in the mid-1980s. The business collapsed with the real estate market at the end of the 1980s, and many of his followers left to find employment elsewhere.