ChristianDenomination

I don't think that's historically how they emerged. Rather it seems to be more like: if enough members of a group don't like a particular thing (which may be doctrinal or political) then they may leave and start their own group. The resultant group may merge with other like-minded groups. It depends on priorities. Most disagreements do not result in factions. --Bobacus

They seem to, but that may just be due to proximity of observation. (i.e. we know better what's going on in Christianity than Islam) --Bobacus

Well, Judaism does split; it formed Christianity for starters...  There's also the same basic splits as Christians, in that there are orthodox, eastern orthodox and western Judaism.  Islam splits in ways that I don't understand, but there's Sunni and Shia at least.  I think Islams splits seem to stay in close proximity more often - but my knowledge is very shaky here.  --Vitenka (Corrected by PeterTaylor and Requiem)

[Bahá'í] is related to Islam the way Islam is to Christianity and Christianity is to Judaism. It claims that Baha'ullah is the last prophet (in the line including Jesus and Mohammed) and he's right. Islam disregards it, and insists it's not an Islamic sect, which is fair enough, since describing Islam as a Christian sect is also extremely inaccurate. That's what I've picked up from a couple of Bahá'í posting on ukrc. I *think* they regard themselves as counting as Christians (and Muslims?) but both religions disagree - SunKitten

Aha!  So... when is a cult not a cult?  --Vitenka (Or, less snappily - at what point does a sect become a new religion?)

Size, maybe? Longevity? I don't think the Bahá'í religion is accepted as a religion by every country, while Chrisitianity and Islam (among others) are. Out of interest, I think every church in France that isn't the state denomination is legally defined as a cult, although it makes little difference in practice (but if you want to get nasty with a church that isn't a state church, it's easy because of that). I have no idea where Islam or Judaism stand in France, much less anything else ^^;; - SunKitten

(PeterTaylor) France has a state denomination? What happened to its rabid secularism?

Rabidly secular, as long as you don't diss catholics too hard.  --Vitenka

The information came from a Christian friend who lives in France. I assumed she was correct and not lying *shrug* I suspect Vitenka is right - SunKitten

I'd expect it's when it disagrees with the central tenet. Most Christian denominations would agree that the matters they differ from other denominations on aren't "salvation issues", and would AIUI dispute that, say, someone who denies the divinity of Jesus is Christian; so Bahá'í would cease being a Christian denomination as soon as it said Jesus was no different from any of the other prophets. I don't know how that translates for other religions. This is basically a more general version of the same question as that being discussed on Christian - check out the answers there for duplicates. (insert standard please-don't-have-the-same-conversation-in-two-places rant here). - MoonShadow