32. Seventh-day Adventism matches nearly all the criteria for being classified a "cult."

Answer: Walter Martin, a recognized specialist on cults, made an extensive study of Seventh-day Adventists and wrote in his book The Kingdom of the Cults: "It is my conviction that one cannot be a true Jehovah's Witness, Mormon, Christian Scientist, Unitarian, Spiritist, etc., and be a Christian in the Biblical sense of the term, but it is perfectly possible to be a Seventh-day Adventist and be a true follower of Jesus Christ despite certain heterodox concepts" (p. 359). Today this opinion is widely accepted by other Christian scholars.

The video compares Seventh-day Adventists to a list of five criteria characteristic of cults. These are listed below, along with a brief response.

A. "Cults or false religions usually have a single powerful human leader who becomes the cult's 'Messiah.'"

The video portrays Seventh-day Adventists as placing Ellen White in that role. However, unlike leaders of cults, Ellen White never held an elected or appointed leadership position in the Seventh-day Adventist church. She wrote in 1903, "No one has ever heard me claim the position of leader of the denomination."--Testimonies for the Church, vol. 8, p. 236.


B. "The cult leader's word, or teaching of the cult, become absolute truth, overshadowing the teachings of the Bible."


This criterion should be contrasted with the manner in which Ellen White (identified on the video with the "cult leader") continually uplifted the Scriptures as "the standard by which all teaching and experience must be tested" (The Great Controversy, p. vii). She wrote, "God's Word is the unerring standard. The Testimonies are not to take the place of the Word. . . . Let all prove their positions from the Scriptures and substantiate every point they claim as truth from the revealed Word of God."--Evangelism, p. 256. See also item 2 above.


C. "Cults use pressure tactics to coerce members into submission."


The word "coercion" is defined as "forcible constraint or restraint." All who possess Christian love toward one another will be motivated to persuade and try to reclaim those who are drifting away from the tenets of the faith as understood by the community, but forced submission is incompatible with kingdom of Christ and is rejected by Seventh-day Adventists.


D. "Cults deny the central truth of the Gospel, that Jesus is the divine Son of God without beginning or ending. They deny that His death has provided salvation for the entire human race. As a result, salvation is earned by adherence to the teaching of the cult rather than accepting Christ and following Him."


Seventh-day Adventist teaching on the deity of Christ and His complete atonement for sin is summarized in the official statement of "27 Fundamental Beliefs," numbers four and nine:

"God the eternal Son became incarnate in Jesus Christ. . . . Forever truly God, He became also truly man, Jesus the Christ. . . . In Christ's life of perfect obedience to God's will, His suffering, death, and resurrection, God provided the only means of atonement for human sin, so that those who by faith accept this atonement may have eternal life."

See also items 20 and 23 above.

E. "Cults often urge their converts to leave their families."

As the video correctly states, Seventh-day Adventists do not encourage new members to abandon or reject their families. Rather, having themselves experienced the joys of salvation, including the excitement of expecting the soon return of Jesus, new converts are urged to work and pray for the conversion of their relatives so they, too, can experience the same peace and happiness that comes when one accepts Christ Jesus.

Most cults have interesting ideas that are fairly unique to them. Seventh-day Adventism does not really have anything original. All we believe is spread out among other respectable churches and respectable scholars. Even the elements to the Investigative Judgment is held by different respectable churches and scholars. We are more a unique complileing of what is believed among others, not some odd belief that these others do not have.

So why are we a cult? Because of some Calvinistic ideas we have, or because of some Weslyan ideas that we have? Most churches tend to be only Calvin or Weslyan with out their ideas mixing, and they tend to have friction between them. We have ideas from both. If we are a cult for or ideas from Calvin, then are all Calvinists cults? If we are a cult for our ideas from John Wesley, are all Methodists cults.

This is the delema in calling us a cult. The Calvinist may not like how we are influenced by John Wesley and how we combine both elements from Calvin and Wesley, but they would be hard pressed to say we are cults just because we mix Calvin and Wesley which they don't do.

Amazing how often the SDA Church is compared to a cult and how often it is debunked (spell??).

Those who most often buy into the SDA Cult theory really don't know any Seventh-day Adventists. I had a coworker recently say "It's hard to believe you're SDA." I inquired "Why do you say that?" I found the answer interesting, "You seem to like us." Sometimes I think we withdraw and stay within our own circle of friends, and do not allow the "world" to see that we are just people who love God and man and try to live a good Christian life.

The reason an organization is considered cultic is not whether or not it can be defined as Christian, but because of its tendancies to manipulate, control, and shame its memebers.

This would include many other Christian organizations. Adventistism has certainly exhibited many of these characteristics in its use of shame and doctrines that have been expressed in religiously abusive ways.

The fruit of these cultic methods is people who live in fear and shame and are unable to see the difference between God and the organization.

Studying our evangelistic methods in the past it is not hard to demonstrate that we have used various forms of double speak, bait and switch, fear, and some very subtle deceptive practices.

I have done an experiement. I have had friends who did not grow up adventist simply randomly open up something like Messages to Young People. There comment is generally, "You have got to be kidding! You are actually taught to believe this?"

The frightening thing is that many in Adventism consider these statements to be wonderful words of truth. I have done similar experiments with Morman and Jehovah Witness material. I observe simular lives filled with fear and tension. The constant questioning if they are doing God's will as defined by their church. Its like trying to water ski and continuing asking yourself if you are water skiing. Its pretty distracting and counter productive. Only if we are to complete the model, if you don't water ski God is going to abandon you.

Here is an example of the attitude that I am talking about in the writings of Ellen White....

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"I had resolved not to engage in prayer for anyone unless the Spirit of the Lord should dictate in the matter. I had been shown that there was so much iniquity abounding, even among professed Sabbathkeepers, that I did not wish to unite in prayer for those of whose history I had no knowledge. I stated my reason. I was assured by the brethren that, as far as they knew, he was a worthy brother. I conversed a few words with the one who had solicited our prayers that he might be healed, but I could not feel free. He wept, and said that he had waited for us to come, and he felt assured that if we would pray for him he would be restored to health. We told him that we were unacquainted with his life, that we would rather those who knew him would pray for him. He importuned us so earnestly that we decided to consider his case and present it before the Lord that night; and if the way seemed clear, we would comply with his request.
     That night we bowed in prayer and presented his case before the Lord. We entreated that we might know the will of God concerning him. All we desired was that God might be glorified. Would the Lord have us pray for this afflicted man? We left the burden with the Lord and retired to rest. In a dream the case of that man was clearly presented. His course from his childhood up was shown, and that if we should pray the Lord would not hear us; for he regarded iniquity in his heart. The next morning the man came for us to pray for him. We took him aside and told him we were sorry to be compelled to refuse his request. I related my dream, which he acknowledged was true."...
..."What if we had been less cautious and carried the case of this man before God while he was practicing iniquity, would the Lord have heard? would He have answered?" (Testimonies for the Church, Volume Two, page 349 paragraph 3-page 350 paragraph 1, and page 351 paragraph 1.)

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I didn't observe Jesus making this distinction. He healed and offered love to anyone who asked. A case in point is the 10 lepers. Only one returned to thank Him.

In my experience it is the shame of the person themselves that often prevents them from receiving God's blessing. If we have to wait for a person to be healed before we heal them, then there is no need for God's healing power.

Ellen White has been one of the most destructive forces in my life and it amazes me that people continue to endorse her writings. This only confirms the power of a cult. Its ability to gain support for craziness from people, who are otherwise very intelligent.

Richard

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B. "The cult leader's word, or teaching of the cult, become absolute truth, overshadowing the teachings of the Bible."


This criterion should be contrasted with the manner in which Ellen White (identified on the video with the "cult leader") continually uplifted the Scriptures as "the standard by which all teaching and experience must be tested" (The Great Controversy, p. vii). She wrote, "God's Word is the unerring standard. The Testimonies are not to take the place of the Word. . . . Let all prove their positions from the Scriptures and substantiate every point they claim as truth from the revealed Word of God."--Evangelism, p. 256. See also item 2 above.

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This is based on a technique of double speak. One denies that they are claiming any authority and yet in practice say another. This allows one to go on doing evil without feeling any guilt. Let me illustrate.

"In ancient times God spoke through the mouths of prophets and apostles. In these days he speaks to them by the Testimonies of his Spirit" (Testimonies, Vol. 4, p. 148; Vol. 5., p. 661)

She says that the Testimonies are equal to what God spoke through the prophets and apostles. Pretty clear here.

"The Holy Ghost is the Author of the Scriptures and of the Spirit of Prophecy." (Selected Messages, Vol. 3, p. 30)

"In the night season the Lord gives me instruction in symbols, and then explains their meaning." (Manuscript 22, 1890)

So not only the visions, but the explanations are the Lords. Doesn't leave much room for mistakes in interpreting the visions. So I guess the Lord explained to her that people were alive on Jupiter.

"These books contain clear, straight, unalterable truth and they should certainly be appreciated. The instruction they contain is not of human production." (Letter H-339, Dec. 26, 1904)

Unalterable truth? Not of human production?

"Some are ready to inquire: 'Who told Sister White these things?' They have even put the question to me: 'Did anyone tell you these things?' I could answer them: 'Yes; yes, the angel of God has spoken to me.' But what they mean is: 'Have the brethren and sisters been exposing their faults?' For the future, I shall not belittle the testimonies that God has given me, to make explanations to try to satisfy such narrow minds, but shall treat all such questions as an insult to the Spirit of God. God has seen fit to thrust me into positions in which He has not placed any other one in our ranks. He has laid upon me burdens of reproof that He has not given to any other one." (Testimonies, vol. 3, pp. 314, 315)

This reproof method that she used came in to question and rather than take it as an insult to herself, she deflects, quite skillfully I might add, the insult against the Spirit of God. So the terrifying vision of Jesus turning his face didn't work, so lets bring out you are insulting the Spirit of God by questioning me presentation. Its pretty hard to win when you are supposedly fighting God. This is not honesty, this is using authority to manipulate.

These all illustrate cultic ways of gaining authority over scripture, while at the same time denying that one is doing it.

Richard

But don't forget Richard that many who we would not classify as being a "Cult" feel that Paul was never understood prior to Luther, was completely understood by Luther and if we want to study Paul the only way to do it is through Luther.

Also, let's not forget the influence of Darby and the Scolfield Reference Bible.

The effect of Mrs. White is small compaired to these. And also I noticed that you liked to take what Mrs. White would take to one extream do deal with specific problems, you force them into a fundamentalist mold (which Mrs. White fought against) and avoided her ballancing quotes. When you take those quotes in context, and with the ballancing quotes, and with Mrs. White's self discription of what inspiration does and does not do, your argument goes "Poof"

I think the discussion runs into emotional issues very quickly because the definition of a cult is so vague, but almost everybody agrees that belonging to one is bad.

So the members/supporters of any belief system do NOT want it categorized as a cult, and the opposition does.

The following is an interesting article
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_countercult_movement

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Historically, one of the most important leaders of the movement was Walter R. Martin (1928-89), whose numerous books include the 1955 The Rise of the Cults: An Introductory Guide to the Non-Christian Cults and the 1965 The Kingdom of the Cults: An Analysis of Major Cult Systems in the Present Christian Era, which continues to be influential. He became well-known in conservative Christian circles through a radio program, "The Bible Answer Man", currently hosted by Hank Hanegraaff.

In his 1955 book, Martin gave the following definition of a cult, a definition that continues to be used within the movement:

By cultism we mean the adherence to doctrines which are pointedly contradictory to orthodox Christianity and which yet claim the distinction of either tracing their origin to orthodox sources or of being in essential harmony with those sources. Cultism, in short, is any major deviation from orthodox Christianity relative to the cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith.

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However Martin already had an axe to grind when he proposed this definition. He did not invent the word.

Merriam-Webster simply says
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=cult&x=17&y=14

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1 : formal religious veneration : WORSHIP
2 : a system of religious beliefs and ritual; also : its body of adherents
3 : a religion regarded as unorthodox or spurious; also : its body of adherents
4 : a system for the cure of disease based on dogma set forth by its promulgator
5 a : great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work (as a film or book); especially : such devotion regarded as a literary or intellectual fad b : a usually small group of people characterized by such devotion

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Roman Catholicism, Southern Baptists, SDA, and Mormon all fit.

So - the phrase "SDAism is a cult" has such a wide range of meanings as to be useless.

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So - the phrase "SDAism is a cult" has such a wide range of meanings as to be useless.

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Well this is probably true. Maybe we need a different phrase or word. My intent is to show that Adventism and other Christian organizations, once they become hierarchical, demonstrate a tendancy to control through various forms of manipulation either consciously or self protectionally. And there are various forms of double speak and newspeak, as defined by George Orwell, that perpetuate a certain layer of assumptions that provide a way to justify the use of shame as a means to keep the organization alive. In Adventism much of this has gone underground and only shows up in rather ingenius and subtle ways.

One way is to use the balance arguement or to generalize Ellen White to a point where the specifics can be ignored no matter how improbable or rediculous or shaming the particular Ellen White passage is. This is so classically doublethink that if it weren't so sad, it would be almost laughable.

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The very vocabulary of the people was under Party Control; a system called “newspeak” was encouraged. One of the most dreaded words in the arsenal of Newspeak was the most heinous offence according to the Party – that of “thoughtcrime” which was sure to be punished by the Thought police. The slogans of Newspeak are “War is Peace” Freedom is Slavery” and “Ignorance is Strength.”

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We have the promotion of "low self esteem is humbleness." "Low self-esteem is a virtue" "God's love requires that He be harsh" "To disagree is to have pride" "Our nature is sinful, so we can't trust our insights when they disagree with Ellen White." "We are saved by grace, but we have to have works"

All of these and others are easily demonstrated. Not that Ellen White has a corner on this market, but when she is put forth as this wonderful, spiritual, person and we find some of the most shaming language used to describe God excused by a few good statements, I become very suspicious of the whole enterprise.

Richard

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But don't forget Richard that many who we would not classify as being a "Cult" feel that Paul was never understood prior to Luther, was completely understood by Luther and if we want to study Paul the only way to do it is through Luther.

Also, let's not forget the influence of Darby and the Scolfield Reference Bible.

The effect of Mrs. White is small compaired to these. And also I noticed that you liked to take what Mrs. White would take to one extream do deal with specific problems, you force them into a fundamentalist mold (which Mrs. White fought against) and avoided her ballancing quotes. When you take those quotes in context, and with the ballancing quotes, and with Mrs. White's self discription of what inspiration does and does not do, your argument goes "Poof"

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Ellen White was extreme. I'm not making her extreme. The quotes I provided are very difficult to put into any context where they would make sense. They are simple statements of what Ellen White believed to be true. And you would sweep them under the rug with some sort of balance concept that allows us to ignore these statements without really looking at them.

The mental gymnastics to keep these statements in line, with what one might WANT Ellen White to be, really stretch the imagination at times. And a simple claim that my arguements go "poof" without any real acknowlegement of the problems demonstrates the depth of mystification her teachings cause.

Lets just take one of them....

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"The Holy Ghost is the Author of the Scriptures and of the Spirit of Prophecy." (Selected Messages, Vol. 3, p. 30)

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Now this says that the Holy Ghost is THE AUTHOR of the Spirit of Prophecy. She uses this kind of language when her "gift" is being attacked. She uses what you might call more balanced language when she is moving away from critics that say her writings are considered equal with the Bible.

You really can't have it both ways. But this paradox is maintained so that control over what is "truth" can be maintained by those in authority. And then appeals to what I would call manipulative Biblical texts are used to justify Ellen White's paradoxial and conflicting statements. There is very little effort put into really reading what is being said because the object is not to find what is true, but to defend Ellen White. I know because I used to defend her. I finally came to a point where I woke up and realized what I was defending was nonsense.

So you are going to have to come up with some specifics and avoid the generalizations.

Richard

I believe that Ellen White was a prophet. So of course I believe it was the Holy Spirit that guided her writings.

Whether or not you or anyone for that matter, believes that, you MUST DETERMINE by scriptures. The Holy Spirit will speak on the same themes no matter who the messenger is. "Dispise not prophecying, but test the spirits"