Searching for god: Young gambians’ conversion to the Tabligh Jama’at

Abstract

Every morning my host Bachir,1 a Gambian Muslim in his late twenties, solemnly removed the lace doily protecting his cassette recorder against dust. In his small livingroom, decorated with Islamic wall hangings, posters of Mecca, and plastic flowers, we listened to tape-recorded sermons. That morning he selected an audiocassette of Ahmed Khatani, a South African preacher who visited The Gambia several times to deliver sermons in the mosque where Bachir and his comrades pray. On the tape Khatani preached in English with a strong Indian accent, alternated with words and Quranic verses in Arabic, about the purpose of human beings on earth, that is, worshipping God. When he raised his voice, Bachir’s one-year-old daughter, believing that the preacher was singing, started to dance. Bachir exclaimed, "Astaghfirullah (I seek forgiveness from Allah), this must be my mother’s influence."2.