Charisma and the Disciplined Body

This chapter focuses on the bodily disciplines practised within the Sufi site that lead to the generation of individual charismatic power. Specifically, the chapter argues that charismatic power in this site was cultivated primarily through a set of bodily disciplines that emphasised the development of the individual along a three-stage path (sancheng), each stage being necessary for the development of the next. In this context, miracles were seen as proof of an embodied charismatic power.