I've now read all 15 pages of this RB Thieme thread. There seems to be a confusion between people who TREAT a person (here, Thieme) in a cultic manner (positive or negative), versus whomever the person so deemed, really is.

In short, people will act cult-like over someone they idolize, whether it's some movie star, athlete, or pastor. Children tend to do that; spiritual children, too. I've seen plenty of that kind of childish idolizing in every walk of life, and I saw it at Berachah -- which after all is just a collection of humans in various stages of (im)maturity. Mature people don't need idols.

On the other hand, there's the leader. Does the leader try to control your life? Does he/she want to regulate your private affairs? Must you devote your material goods (dead giveaway of a cult). If no, then maybe the 'cult' is something the idolizers are trying to make.

So maybe the first step in defining "cult" is to distinguish between what the LEADER advocates, versus what those who idolize him/her, advocate.

Too many people seem to be giving cult status to any religious organisation that they don't agree with or with whom they've had less than happy dealings with.

Recently I fell out with the (acting) pastor of my Baptst church because he wouldn't give me a reference. This doesn't make him a bad person or the organistation a cult.

However, some years ago I also fell out with another (self-appointed) pastor of another church in my home town because he wanted to dictate to me which home group I should be in. Again, I wouldn't necessarily call the church a cult because I was free to leave whenever. I would say that he is a control freak and under the wrong circumstances could easily take the church down the wrong road.

I'm not entirely sure I've understood all that you are saying. Are you comparing a leader forcing people to do things with 'the masses' needing to idolise and follow someone, or am I way off beam?
You say that mature people don't need idols; do you think it's a need for an idol, or a need for leadership? My own personaly belief is that we were created by God so we have an in built desire to follow his lead, but we so often get sidetracked into making someone else a god in our lives and what is real and touchable and standing in front of us is so much more real than a god we must blindly follow without seeing. The things we put in Gods place are wide and varied, people, money, job whatever.
Do you think that is our own choosing, that we choose to idolise something (or someone) else? Or do you think it's more subtle than that? A person appears to make sense, and be talking reason, so we follow them...
Do you think we are, in a majority, followers and we need leadership? What form do you think that leadership should take?

Hi, AJG and Polar Bear. The leader of either a small or large group will have a given purpose, which obviously can be non-cultic. On the other hand, the group will always have within it, some members who tend to make the leader [b:41bc58e9d1]into[/b:41bc58e9d1] a cultic figure, put him on a pedestal, right?

Then there are those who, having put him on that pedestal, furiously knock him down. The leader might not even know he's on a pedestal, to start with.

God of course wants no cults, but that doesn't stop us from creating them and giving godlike or demonlike status to the pastor or leader.

So you, AJG, had this experience with two domineering leaders, yet for all that they wouldn't be cult leaders, you said.

So you, Polar Bear, wonder if we are the ones making the idols, or whether the person tricks us. God says yep, both things happen, golden calf and the deceivers in Romans 1, Eph4:14, 1Jn2.

So it begs the question of when a "cult" becomes a cult, like AJG said. Term is overused, he said. And we all know that's true, huh. When someone doesn't like someone else's beliefs, "Cult!" is used as a kind of condemnation of them. So doesn't Matt7:1-2 counsel we be careful?

Of course, we sheep need leaders, Polar Bear. I don't recall God saying what political system we ought to have (i.e., democracy, monarchy, oligarchy, etc). What form it takes should be what we as a polity or other group, determine, right?

Interesting point, brainout. You made me think a lot. You're right, God doesn't say what kind of political system we should have, if any.
I realise this is not the place for discussing politics, but just reading thru the ten signs of a cult, do you think our government(s) display any of these signs...?!
What is the tipping point, when does a church, or belief system, or group of people become a cult or display cultish behaviour?