Anneke van Baalen, HIDDEN MASCULINITY, Max Weber's historical sociology of bureaucracy.
Amsterdam 1994. Chapter 4 Relations between men: from routinization of charisma to patriarchal
domination over men.
73
In the chapter on charismatic domination in part II, however, where he introduces the
concept 'charismatic education', Weber extends his statement on the recruitment of
charismatic staff to the 'charismatic education' of warriors as a whole:
'He who does not pass the heroic trials of the warrior's training remains a "woman", just as he who cannot be
awakened to the supernatural remains a "layman"
.'
32
It is interesting to see that in Weber's view only military charisma is connected with social
masculinity. Weber sees heroic military training by the practice of 'warrior asceticism' as the
base from which the 'men's house developed:
'The basic Hellenic institution of the 'epheboi', a component of the individual's athletic-artistic perfection, is only a
special case of a universal kind of military training, which includes in particular the preparations for the initiation
rites, that is, for the rebirth as a hero, and the reception into the male fraternity ('Männerbund') and the communal
house of the warriors, which is a kind of primitive barracks. (This is the origin of the "men's house" which Schurtz
traced everywhere with such loving care.)
'
33
The elements of charismatic education are:
'Isolation from the familiar environment and from all family ties (among primitive tribes the novices - 'epheboi' -
move into the forests); invariably entrance into an exclusive educational community; complete transformation of
personal conduct; asceticism; physical and psychic exercises of the most diverse forms to awaken the capacity
for ecstacy and regeneration; continuous testing of the level of charismatic perfection through shock, torture and
mutilation (circumcision may have originated primarily as a part of such ascetic practices); finally, graduated
ceremonious reception into the circle of those who have proven their charisma'.
This kind of education thus involves a 'regeneration of the whole personality.'
34
Empirical and rational elements
can be introduced; I will deal with these later
.
35
A similar analysis of a charismatic education which is concluded by proofs of manhood, can
be found in Weber's essay on Stages in the formation of political association in the Chapter
on Political Communities.
36
Here he also connects such charismatically educated warrior
groups - 'men's leagues' in Schurtz's terminology, - in general with the 'men's house' in
particular.
37
The decisive concept in the understanding of the routinization of charisma is
thus 'masculine military consociation', 'Männerbund', not 'men's house'. According to Weber
wherever the 'myth of the rebirth of the hero' exists, the status of women is low.
38
In his
chapter on religious groups Weber suggests that this myth also has the practical significance
of helping the warriors to realize 'superhuman actions and powers'.
39
32
ES p. 1144, WG p. 677.
33
Ibid. ES p. 1144, note 11a refers to Heinrich Schurtz, Altersklassen und Männerbünde (Berlin 1902).
34
'since heroic and magical capacities are regarded as inborn; only if they are latent can they be activated', ES p.
1143, WG p. 677.
35
Ch. 9,4.
36
'The bearer of arms acknowledges only those capable of bearing arms as political equals. All others, those
untrained in arms and those incapable of bearing arms, are regarded as women and are explicitly designated as
such in many primitive languages,' ES p. 904 ff., WG p. 516 ff.
37
ES p. 1144, WG p. 677. According to Weber the men's house recurs in various forms in all parts of the world;
see for another standpoint below n. 56.
38
ES p. 489, WG p. 298.
39
'... highly systematized procedures frequently played significant roles in those awakenings to charismatic
rebirth which promised the acquisition of magical powers. This animistic trend of thinking entailed belief in the
incarnation of a new soul within one's own body, the possession of one's soul by a powerful demon, or the
removal of one's soul to a realm of spirits. In all cases the possibility of attaining superhuman actions and powers
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