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Ahmed Deedat: The Man and His Mission by Goolam Vahed

The usual arena for religious discussion is a place other than a stage. But this is where Ahmed Deedat found himself during apartheid’s heyday, publicly defending his beloved Islam against what he perceived to be the unbounded ignorance and slander dished out by Christian missionaries of the time.

This book chronicles the fascinating story of how Deedat, the son of a struggling Indian tailor in KwaZulu-Natal, progressed from being a salesperson in a remote rural grocery shop to become a figure of great renown in many parts of the world. By the 1980s, crowds in their thousands were cramming into lecture halls across the United States, Europe, Australasia, and, of course, the Middle East, to hear him speak. Always eager to challenge and debate, Deedat confronted leading evangelical Christians on their interpretations of biblical teachings, often on their own turf. Hundreds of thousands of his pamphlets, books, videos and audio recordings have circulated globally.

In the pages of this book, the life’s work of one of South Africa’s most well known and controversial Muslims is recounted in detail. It explains how, in the Muslim world, Deedat became a highly revered figure. Offering new insights to anyone whose life has already been touched by Deedat, this book also provides a wealth of information for anyone interested in the message of Islam, in interfaith dialogue, in religious polemics, or in the less documented aspects of South African and anti-colonial history.