ABSTRACT
This chapter explores an important dimension of the work of Max Weber. Weber's theory of meaning and modernity is articulated through an understanding of his account of the way in which the pursuit of meaning in the modern world has been shaped by the loss of Western religion and how such pursuit gives sense to the phenomena of human suffering and death. The philosophical anthropology, the human need for meaning is given a different, crucial conceptualisation by Weber in terms of 'ideal interests'. In their magnitude and breadth of topic the primary writings of Weber himself are daunting enough, but the secondary literature is so extensive that it might now well lie beyond the reach of any one human life of devoted study. Weber's own stress on the fate of specialisation in modernity, and especially in academic work, proves eerily apt when reflexively applied to his own legacy.
