NRMs: terminology, typology, and characteristics

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NRMs terminology, typology, and characteristics

• 26.9.2007

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Readings

• Richardson Definitions of Cult From
  Sociological-Technical to Popular-Negative (in
  Dawson 1998)
• Wilson The Problem of Definition (in Wilson 1970)

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Discussion topics

• Terminology
• Problems with terminology
• Church vs sect
• Weber, Troeltsch, Niebuhr
• Characteristics
• Problems with generalization
• Wilson
• Typology
• Different bases for classification
• Aberle, Wallis, Wilson

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New religious movements

• In what sense new?
• Many trace origins to distant past
• Eg. Hare Krishna 16th c
• Eg. Soka Gakkai 13th c
• Waves of NRMs of Christian origin
• Europe
• Late Roman period, 4. c., 12. c.
• Reformation (first half of the 16th c.)
• Wesleyan revival (1720s/30s)
• American/US
• Great Awakening (1730s/40s)
• Second Great Awakening (1820s/30s)
• Third Great Awakening (1880s/1900s)
• Fourth Great Awakening (1960s - )

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New religious movements

• In what sense religious?
• Belief in a god/gods?
• But Buddhism, the Human Potential movements?
• Functional definition?
• any ideology (eg. Marxism)
• Having passed the test of time ?
• real religions vs cults
• gt Importance of definition
• financial implications
• Scientology gt a religion
• acceptability in schools
• Science of Creative Intelligence (TM) gt not a
  religion

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New religious movements

• In what sense movements?
• What about groups that withdraw from the world?
• Eg. Peoples Temple/Jonestown
• gt Alternative terms
• Emerging religions
• Alternative religions

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Sect / cult

• Problems with terminology
• Sect
• Pejorative meaning
• eg. custody awards
• Cult
• Pejorative meaning
• Context-specific meanings
• Eg. Ethymological vs theological vs sociological
  definitions

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Church vs sect

• Max Weber
• Church vs sect
• different modes of communal religious worship
• church - formal, rationalized
• sect - informal, emotional, charismatic
• Ernst Troeltsch
• The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches
  (1912)
• Ideal types of religious orientation
• Churchlike
• Sectlike
• (Mystical forms of religious orientation)
• Sect vs church
• Focus on medieval and modern Christian sects
• Criticism only applicable to Christianity

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Church vs sect

• Richard Niebuhr
• The Social Sources of Denominationalism (1929)
• Focus on religious organizations in the US
• Church vs sect
• Satisfy the needs of different social classes
• church middle and upper classes
• sect lower classes
• Sect gt church
• Dynamic relationship between the two
• a result of changes in the class composition

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Rodney Stark and William Bainbridge

• Theory of Religion (1987)
• Church
• a conventional religious organization
• Sect
• a deviant religious organization with traditional
  beliefs and practices
• Cult
• a deviant religious organization with novel
  beliefs and practices
• Deviance
• departure from the norms of a culture leading to
  costs

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Stark and Bainbridge

• Church
• a religious group that accepts social
  environment in which it exists
• Sects and cults
• in tension with the surrounding socio-cultural
  environment
• In reality - a continuum
• ideal sect ---------------------------------------
  ---------- ideal church
• Absolute tension Absolute acceptance

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Stark and Bainbridge

• Religious movement vs religious institution
• Churches
• religious institutions
• do not seek to cause or prevent social change
• Sects and cults
• religious movements
• seek to cause or prevent change

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James Richardson

• Oppositional" conceptualization of cult (1993)
• Two social dimensions
• Individualism vs collectivism
• Mysticism vs rationality
• Modern capitalist US - individualistic-rational
• Cultic responses
• hippie subculture / a communist cell / a
  religious commune
• Soviet Union collectivistic-rational
• Cultic response
• artists
• Medieval Catholic Europe collectivistic-mystica
  l

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Problems with generalization

• Enormous quantity
• Wallace (1966)
• 100,000 different religions with significant
  following
• What counts as membership?
• eg. TM etc
• double membership
• high turnover rate
• Stark and Bainbridge (1987)
• over 200,000 moderately successful cults

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Problems with generalization

• Varieties in complexity of belief system
• From elaborate to vague
• Varieties in social organization
• From community to normal life
• Varying attitudes towards
• sex
• material possessions
• authority
• political/social involvement
• salvation
• etc.

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General characteristics Bryan Wilson

• Religious Sects A Sociological Study (1970)
• 1) Voluntary membership
• 2) Exclusiveness
• 3) Merit
• 4) Self-identification
• 5) Elite status
• 6) Expulsion
• 7) Conscience
• 8) Legitimation

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Classification

• Different bases for classification
• 1) What is the ideological source?
• 2) What kinds of changes are sought?
• 3) What is the relationship with the world?

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Classification What is the ideological source?

• Christian vs non-Christian
• Non-Christian
• Human Potential Movements
• Eastern movements
• Hindu-based, Buddhist, Islamic
• Esoteric movements
• (Neo)-pagan movements
• But
• Mix of influences / no clear sources
• New Age
• Japanese group venerating Thomas A. Edison
• Kennedy Worshippers

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Human Potential Movements

• Western modernity
• Individualistic and success-orientated culture
• The world is full of opportunities
• If you don't succeed, you are a failure
• Humanistic psychology
• Abraham Maslow 'self-actualized' human being
• gt exploration of human potential
• improve individuals skills and well-being
• Reliance on unconventional means

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Human Potential Movements

• Silva Mind Control
• In 48 hours you can learn to use your mind to do
  anything you wish. ... There is no limit to how
  far you can go,... to what you can do, because
  there is no limit to the power of your mind.
• Transcendental Meditation
• Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
• The Maharishi Effect
• social consequences of the practice of TM
• Social ills decline if 1 (10) of the population
  uses TM
• study of 1,100 cities
• Wide variety
• Landmark Education, Neuro-Linguistic Programming,
  Insight, The Emin, Life Spring, Rebirthing,
  Scientology
• Especially US, recently Eastern Europe

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The Church of Scientology

• Founded by Lafayette Ronald (L. Ron) Hubbard in
  1954
• Dianetics The Modern Science of Mental Health
  (1950)
• doctrinal/sacred book
• influence of psychoanalysis
• Dianetics gt Scientology

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Eastern movements

• Indian/Buddhist influence in particular
• 19th c.
• translation of ancient Buddhist scriptures by
  European scholars
• Until the 1960s
• interest in Eastern religions - largely
  intellectual
• confined to an elite group of scholars and
  psychologists
• experiential, mystical approach limited

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Eastern movements

• Common characteristics
• Absolutism
• strict discipline
• obedience to a teacher (guru) and a tradition
• rejection of scientific materialism
• meditation
• Antiquity of the Eastern message
• Old original truth

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Eastern movements

• Examples
• Maharashi Mahesh Yogi
• Transcendental Meditation to the West in 1958
• Swami Prabhupada
• International Society of Krishna Consciousness
  (ISKCON)
• George Harrison
• Maharaji Guru Ji
• Divine Light Mission Elan Vital
• Other
• Movement of Inner Spiritual Awareness
• School of Economic Science

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Esoteric Movements

• Beliefs and practices
• emphasis on secret knowledge
• restricted to a select few
• unorthodox ideas
• magic and mysticism
• highly complex, and progressive teachings
• build up on each in steps
• eclectic
• borrow from several traditions
• schisms and offshoots frequent
• Examples
• Theosophy, Rosicrucians, Chaos magic, Raelian
  Movement, UFO cults

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Raelian movement

• Raelism/Raëlism
• Elohim
• scientifically advanced extraterrestrials
• derived from a Hebrew word appearing in the Torah
  
• created life on Earth through genetic engineering
• Immortality
• through human cloning and "mind transfer"
• Founded by Claude Vorilhon ( Raël)
• personal meetings with a 25,000 year old
  extraterrestrial
• came in a UFO in 1973
• 55,000 members in 84 different countries
• France, Japan, Canada, and the United States

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Raelian movement

• Clonaid
• claims to have cloned at least one human being
  (Dec 2002)
• Dr. Brigitte Boisselier, a Raelian bishop
• Reincarnation
• Jesus or Hitler
• for inspiration or to allow for retroactive
  punishment
• Geniocracy
• rule by geniuses
• a new form of government
• requirements
• to run for office
• at least 50 more above the average intelligence
  potential
• to vote

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Neo-Pagan Movements

• original usage of the term
• "pagan" "country-dweller"
• Romans gt the uneducated barbarians
• anthropological usage of the term
• follower the old native religion of their land
• rather than an imported religion
• Neo-paganism
• coined by Oberon Zell (founder of Church of All
  Worlds)
• "a revival and reconstruction of ancient Nature
  religions adapted for the modern world."

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Neo-Pagan Movements

• Characteristics
• usually includes worship of the Earth Mother
  Goddess
• pantheon of gods
• witchcraft and magic
• eclectic
• borrowing from several sources
• gt diversity
• ask two Pagans a question and you get three
  different answers.

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Neo-Pagan Movements

• Examples
• Wicca, Druidry, Neo-shamanism and Norse religion
• Accusations in satanism
• Especially in 1980s
• Witchcraft ? Satanism
• original Paganism - pre-Christian
• Neo-paganism - use of pre-Christian mythologies
• Satanism perversion / inversion of Christianity

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Classification What kinds of changes are sought?

• David Aberle The Peyote Religion among the
  Navaho (1966)
• Two dimensions of movements
• the locus of the change sought
• individuals
• supra-individual system
• Eg. economic, technological, political order
• the amount of change sought
• total change
• partial change

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Classification What kinds of changes are sought?

• gt Four types of movements
• transformative movements (eg. Aum Shinrikyo)
• total change in supra-individual systems
• reformative movements (eg. Quakers)
• partial change in supra-individual systems
• redemptive movements (eg. Peyote cult)
• total change in individuals
• alternative movements (eg. TM)
• partial change in individuals

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Classification What is the relationship with
the world?

• Roy Wallis The Elementary Forms of the New
  Religious Life (1984)
• Tripatite classification
• 1) world-rejecting new religions
• 2) world-affirming new religions
• 3) world-accommodating new religions

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Classification What is the relationship with
the world?

• 1) The world-rejecting NRMs
• The world is evil
• Prevailing social order departs from the God's
  plan
• gt Rejection of the world
• Examples
• ISKCON, Peoples Temple, the Children of God etc

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Classification What is the relationship with
the world?

• 2) The world-affirming NRMs
• The world is not evil
• world's secular values and goals OK
• Mankind
• restricted
• not using its full potential
• gt Unconventional means to achieve these goals
• Examples
• TM, Nichiren Shoshu (Sokka Gakkai), est (Erhard
  Seminars Training)

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Classification What is the relationship with
the world?

• 3) The World-Accommodating NRMs
• Pay little attention to the world one way or
  another
• provide stimulation for the individual's interior
  life
• Revitalize religious life
• Reaction to formalism
• Examples
• Neo-Pentecostalism, Subud

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Classification What is the relationship with
the world?

• Wilson Religious Sects A Sociological Study
  (1970)
• 1) World-denying cults
• The world is evil
• gt separate, communal lifestyle
• 2) World-enhancing cults
• seek to improve the skills and well-being of
  their members
• enhance enjoyment of and participation in the
  larger society
• self-transformation and self-improvement as
  ultimate goals
• 3) World-indifferent cults
• tolerate the secular society
• encourage seeking a purer, more spiritual life