Eckankar - is this a cult religion?

[AHiddenSaint]

I just found a book at half price books called the Art of spiritual dreaming by Harold klemp apparently they call themself Eckankar which they discribe as spiritual exercises to experience the Light and Sound of God. From what I can tell they are using dreams as a spiritual path to God. Here is there website http://www.eckankar.org/whatis.html So what do you think a cultish religion or legit religion? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eckankar

[AHiddenSaint]

Nobody want to touch this one? Is it that bad on posting this?

[Universal Mind]

It sounds nice, like pretty much all religions do at their beginnings. But give it a hundred years or so, and people will be killing over it, turning people into slaves in the name of it, and screaming at people for eating roast duck during the holy month of Ugobourgcoghekigaghe.

[AHiddenSaint]

It sounds nice, like pretty much all religions do at their beginnings. But give it a hundred years or so, and people will be killing over it, turning people into slaves in the name of it, and screaming at people for eating roast duck during the holy month of Ugobourgcoghekigaghe. so is it a cult deal or the next sciencetology only with dreams guides?

[27]

Define "Cult". The primary definition of the word cult in most dictionaries is "a system of religious worship."

[Howie]

A CULT: 1.a particular system of religious worship, esp. with reference to its rites and ceremonies. 2.an instance of great veneration of a person, ideal, or thing, esp. 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. 6.a religion or sect considered to be false, unorthodox, or extremist, with members often living outside of conventional society under the direction of a charismatic leader. 7.the members of such a religion or sect.

[Original Poster]

I think its legit because its about discovery, it doesn't claim to have answers, it just suggests this is a way to find answers, and that is a mark of a true religion. The gnostics were like this, as well as sects in nearly every popular religion. I define a cult as a religion that worships symbols instead of truth and what truth it has is noncontestable as opposed to simply wise suggestions

[AHiddenSaint]

Going back to sleep, but the reason why I posted this is because in another thread on beyond dreaming we were talking about DreamWalkers. Now the person within the highest position of the religion is said not to be worshipped, but instead visit students of the religion in dreams. That was the part from the book that worried me because even though you aren't worshipping a person it still sounds like the structure is there for a single person giving a order. Keep in mind I still haven't read a lot of the book only on the first part. How do you view that part of it? In the book it was giving examples of how the person gives people wisdom in their dreams relating to events that happen. Also I did leave a little bit of information about the book in that thread, but I tried not to get to much into a discussion of it there. Since it was a religion I felt a separate post in this forum might be needed. I honestly do not know enough about this religion to comment fully I just picked up a book randomly. I just wanted to see what everyone else thought because I find reading about alternative religions interesting. P.S. I'm not going to go out and join the religion myself, but I just thought it would make a interesting subject to discuss here.