On Being A Muslim is pure Chauncey Gardiner meets Felicia Mabuza-Suttle. On this religious road well-travelled, Farid Esack's vapid reflections and insights are weaved in with present day pop psychology (a PR guru's dream) and finally contriving legitimacy by dropping in names and events. While it would not be totally untrue to say that Esack was appointed by Nelson Mandela to serve on Commission for Gender Equality, a more careful study of the process would reveal that the names of the selected commissioners (after a shortlisting and interview process) were submitted to Mr Mandela, who merely appended his signature to the recommended names. But as Esack will retort, this is open to interpretation.

I first encountered Farid Esack in the pages of that well distributed American contribution to world journalism, Time magazine. As a woman, exiled, I was at first struck by the courage of my fellow countryman (or should I resort to the puerile attempts at gender sensitivity and use countryperson) who tried to prevent a frenzied mob from killing a South African police officer. The two-page colour spread showed Esack confronting the mob and the subsequent frames see him covered in blood. It was the blood of the officer who was killed by the mob. Secondly, I was captivated by the almost primeval masochism displayed by Esack - it was stirring stuff indeed. But just like the text, images will always be hostage to the lens of the beholder.

On return from exile, I have seen Mr Esack pop up at appropriate times, befriending the just cause, whether it be gender equality, Radio Islam, or taking on the bosses after the dismissal of Muslim workers who refuse to work on Muslim holy days. There can be no doubt that Esack is an articulate spokesman for the causes he knows will guarantee him maximum media coverage.

Esack writings are an attempt to explore and expose the vicissitudes that present day Muslims confront and are confronted with. The challenge for Muslims, according to Esack, is to mediate between the claustrophobic interpretations of traditional and cultural values of one's faith and the seduction of modernity. This is not new. Since the advent of Islam, if not all the different faiths, this has been an ongoing struggle. Religious history is replete with the writings of individuals who pushed the limits - the only constant was the context at a particular moment in history. It is no different today.

Esack's self deprecation is a useful technique that easily endears him to his readers. But just like an old stand up comic, self parody, after a while becomes out-dated, boring and unfunny. It's better to get people to laugh with you than at you.

Esack's treatment of the gender debate is at once simplistic and archaic. By employing gender inter-changeability in linguistics, Esack effortlessly manoeuvres and manipulates the debate to a new low. While the approach is novel, it trivialises the concerns of many who have travelled far beyond linguistic mutations. Esack employs all the rhetoric of a good gender fight, but he has yet to demonstrate that he is prepared to engage in serious discussion - what is popularly regarded as not being able to "walk the talk". Is Esack just exhibiting symptoms of the "male syndrome" - the inability to make a commitment- or is it beyond him to conceive that he does not possess the tools to take the discussion beyond mere hyperbole?

Esack's style can at best be described as high-brow journalese. While On Being a Muslim is at times funny, it suffers greatly when Esack flirts between anecdotes and selective quotations to give credence to his numerous inquisitions. Esack's simplistic, over-generalizations (exaggerations?) tend to mar the obviously significant issues that he raises which Muslims and other followers of other faiths find uncomfortable to deal with. Esack is always writing "about things", never engaging the substance.

Another literary device (is this too much of an offence to great scholars who used this technique to devastating effect?) that Esack employs with laughable consequences is the open letter to oneself and the subsequent reply. Its significance is that the two letters (one to himself and the other his reply) could have been the sum total of his book. The publishers, Oneworld, evidently are in dire need of an editor more disposed to the liberal use of the red pen.

Esack's book is a catharsis. It is a reflection of his own weaknesses and failures. These far too often are projected onto the rest of us. Some of us would rather have seen a psycho-analyst. Esack preferred to write a book. I am sure that Esack will find an audience - the difference is that I paid for the book.