When does a particular belief go from being considered a "cult" to being accepted as a "religion"?
Historically, practically every "religion" started out being seen as a cult, whether it was the belief that Jesus is the son of God, that Zoroaster was a witness for the true dual-nature of God, that Buddha is the avatar of the divine, ect. In time all these beliefs were accepted as legitimate religions, while other "cults" were quickly abandoned or persecuted to the point of non-existence. What does it take for a cult to become elevated to the status of "religion"?
Please answer with tolerance, here, as I respect all religious & spiritual beliefs, thank you!
By a combination of time and social tolerance. Mormonism, for example. In my mind, it is patently laughable as far as legitimacy and theological reasoning. Yet, with time and social tolerance, we have someone running for president who believe in the absurdities of Joseph Smith.
About 30 years ago, I asked this question of my father-in-law, who is a world-reknowned Christian theologian and professor at Yale University. He acknowledged that Christianity began as a cult during the life of Jesus and shortly thereafter. So, he agrees, every religion began as a cult.
Signs of a cult changing into a religion:
- no longer depending on one leader.
- lasting more than one generation, passing tradition onto children and/or getting new converts
- becoming more open-minded and diverse. For example, Christianity began as a cult of Jewish people, but became popular among Greeks and Romans. Islam became popular near or shortly after the end of Mohammed's life as it helped tribes in the Middle East that were no longer isolated from the world make sense of the world.
Not being persecuted is not a sign of a cult becoming a religion. Buddhism did not face persecution much in its early years. Christianity was persecuted for over 200 years, long after it was a religion.
And, of course, cults spin off from religions all the time. But that's another story!
One definition would be surviving the death of the group's founder. Many cults fall apart after the death of a charismatic leader. Another definition would be surviving past the lifetime of all disciples, having successfully passed on beliefs and practices past the lifetime of all who knew the leader.
You may belong to a cult, but if your grandchildren hold the same beliefs 80 years later, it is a religion.
By definition - all religions are cults.
From Dictionary.com:
cult 
noun
1. a particular system of religious worship, especially with reference to its rites and ceremonies.
2. an instance of great veneration of a person, ideal, or thing, especially as manifested by a body of admirers: the physical fitness cult.
3. the object of such devotion.
4. a group or sect bound together by veneration of the same thing, person, ideal, etc.
5.Sociology . a group having a sacred ideology and a set of rites centering around their sacred symbols
I answer with utmost respect, and tolerance - merely providing definitions. So, the act of one religion calling another a cult is just a little off.
It's not a question of "when" they changed - they didn't - the way in which we view the religion/cult changed.
Thanks for a cool question.
Dictionary.com gives 2 definitions for cult -- "1. A system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object.; 2. A relatively small group of people having religious beliefs or practices regarded by others as strange or sinister." A cult in the first sense is not distinct from a religion but rather may function inside of a religion. For instance, in Catholicism there is a cult of the Virgin Mary, a cult of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and so on; in Hinduism there is a cult of Shiva, a cult of Krishna, and so on; each variety of Christianity is a Christ cult; there is a Haile Selassie cult in the Rastafari Movement; in ancient Rome there was an Athena cult, a Dionysus cult, and so on. The second definition is subjective, so pretty much a cult becomes a religion when you join it. What seems strange or sinister to one person is for another person traditional and ordinary. Be dubious of uses of the word cult in a derogatory sense. The time for concern is when members of a cult give up the guidance of their own consciences and power of reason and unquestionably follow a leader, who for whatever motives leads the group beyond the pale, such as to group suicide, to taking child brides, to refusing medical attention to a hurt or sick child, or whatever. What is and is not beyond the pale is a fuzzy and shifting border. Such cases are rare. Mostly "cult" is used as an accusation comparable to "heretical" or "unorthodox" or "different from the cultural norm here".
to krillco, cont'd: ..intelligent, thoughtful people. I am very reluctant to put modern Mormons into the same category as their founder, as odd as it sounds
simply put - as soon as it gains some sort of traction or power. Historically, christianity was a jewish sect - a cult - until it became the state religion of rome. Then, as its power grew politically, it turned into a "religion"
Although I know a lot of christian apologists today that claim that christianity isn't a religion at all - it's a philosophy.
There's a popular saying that the difference between a religion and a cult is a million members. However, the true definition of a cult is a system of beliefs that don't work, but brainwash its followers into believing in nasty consequences if they admit this and leave. Therefore, a cult can never become a true religion.
by Liam Hallam 12 years ago
I'm in the position of choosing not to follow a religion. Why do you follow your choice of religion? Do you consider you have a choice in your religion? Ans would you ever consider or have you considered switching faith?
by cjhunsinger 9 years ago
For most theists the idea of evolution is a contradiction to the supremacy of a god and the creative powers bestowed upon it. For the Atheist the claim of a creative god violates the current capacity of humanity to reason. That is not to say, that 25,000 years to the advent of modern science...
by Mahaveer Sanglikar 10 years ago
Is atheism becoming another religion? I am asking this question because many atheists are loudly talking against 'other' religions, like many of the the propagandists of religions do.I myself am an atheist, and I think it is not necessary to speak against religions. Instead of that we should...
by klarawieck 13 years ago
For some time now, Christians have been traveling to the farthest, most remote places on earth with the intention of helping tribal people live a more civilized lifestyle. While committed to a charitable cause, they don't only change their way of life but take the initiative to convert them to...
by charlie 7 years ago
For Christians ONLY.. Do you believe it is ok to have beliefs you cannot defend with scripture ?Many that profess Christianity have beliefs that they have taken as their own, yet they cannot provide scriptural proof of how they apply to Christianity. Do you believe a Christian should...
by kirstenblog 14 years ago
I was reading a different thread that got me thinking about the history or religion and that it goes far back into history with many incarnations in different societies. Atheism on the other hand does not seem to have such a strong presence in history. As I understand the societies of say my...
Copyright © 2024 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. HubPages® is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Copyright © 2024 Maven Media Brands, LLC and respective owners.
As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.
For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy
Show DetailsNecessary | |
---|---|
HubPages Device ID | This is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons. |
Login | This is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service. |
Google Recaptcha | This is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy) |
Akismet | This is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Google Analytics | This is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Traffic Pixel | This is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized. |
Amazon Web Services | This is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy) |
Cloudflare | This is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Hosted Libraries | Javascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy) |
Features | |
---|---|
Google Custom Search | This is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Maps | Some articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Charts | This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy) |
Google AdSense Host API | This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Google YouTube | Some articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Vimeo | Some articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Paypal | This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Login | You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Maven | This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy) |
Marketing | |
---|---|
Google AdSense | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Google DoubleClick | Google provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Index Exchange | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Sovrn | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Ads | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Unified Ad Marketplace | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
AppNexus | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Openx | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Rubicon Project | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
TripleLift | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Say Media | We partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy) |
Remarketing Pixels | We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites. |
Conversion Tracking Pixels | We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service. |
Statistics | |
---|---|
Author Google Analytics | This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy) |
Comscore | ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Tracking Pixel | Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy) |
Clicksco | This is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy) |