Reply To: Is there any difference between a religion and a cult?

A couple of years ago there was a story here on YWN about some young man who got semicha (I don’t recall from whom) and then immediately declared he was starting his own chassidus with himself, of course, as “the Rebbe”. No idea what has happened to his chassidus but I don’t think this would qualify as a “cult”. Conversely, it would seem among yidden, the Lev Tahor types along Berland and his frequently violent followers clearly fall within most notions of a cult expressed above.