The article deals with the concepts of charisma and leadership in two non-Western Islamic
cultures from the linguistic perspective. The concepts of charisma and charismatic leadership
have a long tradition of studying in sociology, political science and psychology since M.Weber.
Charisma can be defined as compelling attractiveness or charm that can inspire devotion in
others. Cognates of this Greek word are found in most European languages. The English word
leader has been borrowed by many related and non-related languages. The questions we are
addressing in this article are: How to translate charisma and leader into Bambara and Persian?
What Bambara and Persian words can be translated with the English words charisma and
leader? What is the origin of these words in Bambara and Persian? How these words function
within the two languages and two cultures? To answer these questions we analyze a wide range
of lexicographic and textual sources. We come to a conclusion, that in both languages the
vocabularies consist of layers of different origin: Soninke and Manding in Bambara, Iranian
and Altaic in Persian, Arabic in both languages. Despite long histories of Islamization both
languages, though influenced by Arabic, have kept their core vocabularies in what concerns
charisma and leadership.