Abstract

Religious communities often tend to distinguish themselves from otherreligious communities – especially from diverging communities rooting in their own tradition. Social stigmata are brought forward to describe these deviant socalledsects: They were immoral, their adherents sexually deviant and havingstrange, improper acquaintances. Calling themselves religion is said to be a trickto fool the simple ones out of their money. These topoi can be found in heresiographies,guidebooks on sects and in public discourse throughout the centuries.They are not even restricted to religious groups, but are part on the polemicalliterature against secularist groups (as the German Monist League). By this continuity in terms and motives, debates on sects are a superb object toreconstruct borders of tolerance and constructions of “the other” historically.The paper restricts itself to sources from the German Early Modern Period andModernity to strengthen the arguments; but the thesis can be held in general.With this temporal and local focus, we encounter a sphere of cultural continuityas well as cultural change, seeing the structural continuities as well as assimilationsand thus internal developments.