ABSTRACT
This chapter starts from Weber’s charismatic power or charismatic leadership, one of the most widely used conceptual tools in political sociology or even political science. However, just as in the understanding of modernity, we need to go beyond the mainstream reading of Weber’s ideas and to point out certain inherent limits in Weber’s own perspective. Weber turned the theological term charisma into a sociological concept by intimately connecting moments of crisis, out-of-ordinary situations to the rise of charismatic power or leadership. However, the problems with Weber’s concept also start here, as Greek charis, the root word of Christian charisma, evokes the vital qualities of harmonious, undisturbed life and a benevolent social order where the main source of pleasure is derived from being with others in the world, and has nothing to do with crisis. To illustrate this point, the chapter confronts the uplifting message of charis with the dark world of early Christian burial customs, the deprived ones.
