Some famous culrs
Thus, in the cosmology of the Navajo people of the American Southwest, the body is symbolically positioned within the hogan, or traditional house, and the hogan is positioned in proper relation to the four cardinal directions within Navajoland (which is defined by four sacred mountains), and Navajoland is positioned at the centre of the world. The body is viewed as a microcosm which reflects within its nature the organic principles that motivate the greater universe. Most cultic systems place the human form at the very centre of the cosmos as they understand it. The human body is often a profoundly meaningful cult symbol. In religious terms, the human body is simultaneously a symbol, an agent, and a problem. But instead of falling apart after the death of their leaders, these ‘cults’ endured, continued to attract adherents, and grew into vast, world-wide organizations.
They began as small, localized organizations led by charismatic leaders like Jesus, Mohammed, and the Buddha. It is important to understand that all the world religions began as ‘cults’ in the more common sense of the term. Buddhists have the teachings of the Buddha pertaining to awakening and the cessation of suffering, and carry out pujas and other kinds of devotional and meditative rituals. The Roman Catholic Church has its set of standardized beliefs and ritual practices, such as the Mass, ‘doing the rosary’, marriage ceremonies, and baptism services. Used in this sense, all societies on earth, as well as all religious institutions in our own Euro-American societies, have their cult aspects. For scientific purposes, a cult is simply a set of institutionalized beliefs and ritual practices pertaining to cosmological, spiritual, and religious knowledge. Social scientists who study religion use the word ‘cult’ in a more technical sense. Groups of this sort may or may not be loose-knit in their organization, and may or may not endure much beyond the death of their leaders. Such religious groups may advocate beliefs and carry out practices that sometimes lead them into trouble with authorities, and may, in certain extreme situations, lead members to bodily injury and even death, as with the tragic Jonestown cult. Hinduism has spawned cults of this sort, as with the groups centred around such charismatic teachers as Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) movement. People are beginning to realize that Hitler's Nazi movement in Germany was also a kind of mystical cult.Ĭults pop up all over the world, and have done throughout human history. Ron Hubbard of the Church of Scientology, or Elizabeth Clair Prophet of the Church Universal and Triumphant. David Koresh, of the Branch Davidians, an offshoot of the Seventh Day Adventists, or science-fiction-writer-turned-guru, L. The more famous cults are often organized around a charismatic leader, like Vernon Howel, a.k.a.
Cults vary in beliefs and scope of activities, and range from zealous and satanic groups at one extreme to New Age religions and healing circles at the other. What most people seem to mean by the word is a social group whose members adhere to a strange, unorthodox, and even dangerous set of religious beliefs and practices. But few realize that the word ‘cult’ has both a common and a technical meaning, and that these meanings are significantly different. Cults and the body Everybody knows what a cult is.