Becoming a God: Max Weber and the social construction of charisma

Abstract

This article seeks to demonstrate that implicit within Weber’s writings on charisma are tools that can enable a processual, social constructionist understanding of charismatic formation. A corollary of this point is that Weber’s writings represent an historically crucial turning point in the progression from a Carlylian idea of leaders as inherently powerful to a non-essentialist, sociological perspective, and that Weber’s inspiration for this progression is best understood not through reference to his nineteenth-century forbearers in the social sciences, but rather in his contrast with the very few theological writers (namely Rudolph Sohm and the writers of the New Testament) who actually had employed charisma as a term prior to Weber’s famous appropriation of it. A reinterpretation and retranslation of Weber’s writings on charisma that gives priority to the social constructionist elements in his thought can provide tools for navigating through many of the interpretational controversies that have plagued charisma research.