Page - 78 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 04/02

Charivari or the Historicising of a Question | 77www.jrfm.eu 2018, 4/2, 67–79 dorf, exclaimed at the Mannesfest in Herrnhaag that all brothers would now be sisters because all souls are female, therefore men would only temporarily be male.44 The body-reflexive45 reproductions of the lyrical expressions of bridal mysticism – singing is an outermost bodily activity46 – combined with the excla- mation by Christian Renatus identify and incorporate the depicted masculinity. Hence, the hegemonic masculinity within the Moravian community can be defined twice, which is in line with Connell’s plurality of masculinities.47 The pri- mary hegemonic masculinity is virtual and transcendental – it is the masculin- ity of Jesus Christ as savior and bridegroom, “ultimately, Christ is the only true male”.48 He becomes the indicator and center for all constructions of gender within the Moravian community, for which reason, Peter Vogt suggests, we should talk of a “gendered theology”.49 The construction of the actual hege- monic masculinity – not virtual and transcendent like the masculinity of Christ, but human and immanent – is in direct relation to the transcendental mascu- linity. It becomes somewhat passive and effeminate by being the bride of the transcendent masculinity50 but is still hegemonic in relation to femininity within the community. It is also marginalized – there were recurring accusations of homosexuality by “white heterosexual males” outside the community51 – by society’s hegemonic masculinity. The hegemonic masculinity of the Moravians presented within the lyrical expressions of bridal mysticism is thus an ambiva- lent and multi-relational masculinity that is and is not hegemonic as well as be- ing marginalized and effeminate. CONCLUSION In this article I have discussed connections between lyrical expressions of piety, i.e. bridal mysticism, heteronormative constructions like the rite of passage that is marriage, virtuality, body, and masculinity. Even if heteronormative structures 44 See Peucker 2002, 71. 45 See Connell 2000, 79–85. 46 For the connection between religion, music, and body see Laack 2015. 47 See Connell 2000, 98–102. 48 Atwood 1997, 31. 49 Vogt 2015, 66. 50 Peucker explains: “By remaining passive the individual was playing the role appropriate for a bride”, Peucker 2006, 58. 51 On heteronormative reactions and attempted regulation by white heterosexual males, see Peucker’s remarks on Volck, Peucker 2002, 51. Aaron Spencer Fogleman still insists on a “metaphorical, spiritual homosexuality”, Foglemann 2003, 309. Faull suggests the connection between male Moravians and Jesus Christ be described as a “mode of performative bi-sexuality” (Faull 2011, 56) and sees masculin- ity – apparently the Moravians’ as well as Christ’s – as “vulnerable masculinity” (55–56.74.). Even if this line of thought seems compelling – especially because all human existence might be described as somehow vulnerable – a binary conception of gender, on which all fluidity in the constructions of gender in the Moravian community seems to be based, can hardly contain two vulnerable masculinities functioning as bride and bridegroom.