According to Max Weber, charisma is opposed to bureaucratic order. This collection reveals the limits of that formula. The contributors show how charisma is a part of cultural frameworks while retaining its ecstatic character among American and Italian Catholics, Syrian Sufis, Taiwanese Buddhists, Hassidic Jews, and Amazonian shamans, among others.

Sara M. Bergstresser, Boston University, USAYoram Bilu, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, IsraelRuy Llera Blanes, University of Bergen, NorwayGisele Fonseca Chagas, Fluminense Federal University, BrazilC. Julia Huang-Lemmon, National Tsing Hua University, TaiwanEric Michael Kelley , Boston University, University of Massachusetts Boston, and Wheaton College, USAPaulo G. Pinto, Fluminense Federal University, BrazilBrendon Jamal Thornton, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USAKeping Wu, National University of Singapore

Introduction: Charisma in Theory and Practice; Charles Lindholm PART I: PERFORMING CHARISMA 1. Performing the Charismatic Ritual; Keping Wu 2. Knowledge and Miracles: Modes of Charisma in Syrian Sufism; Paulo G. Pinto PART II: GENDERING CHARISMA 3. Female Sufis in Syria: Charismatic Authority and Bureaucratic Structure; Gisele Fonseca Chegas 4. The Gender of Charisma: Notes from a Taiwanese Buddhist Transnational NGO; C. Julia Huang-Lemmon 5. Residual Masculinity and the Cultivation of Negative-Charisma in a Caribbean Pentecostal Community; Brendan Jamal Thornton PART III: CHARISMA AND POLITICS 6. Extraordinary Times: Charismatic Repertoires in Contemporary African Prophetism; Ruy Llera Blanes 7. The Routinization of Improvisation in Avá-Guaraní Shamanic Leadership; Eric Michael Kelley PART IV: POSTHUMOUS CHARISMA 8. Unruly Miracles: Embodied Charisma and Modern Sainthood, from Padre Pio to"Papa Buono"; Sara M. Bergstresser 9. Habad, Messianism, and the Phantom Charisma of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Scheerson; Yoram Bilu