As a clergyperson, educator, ecumenist, counselor, civil rights activist, and author, Benjamin Elijah Mays achieved national and international renown. After earning a Ph.D. in Christian theology from the University of Chicago, Mays became Dean of the Howard University School of Divinity. Serving in that capacity from 1934 to 1940, Mays's contributions turned the Divinity School into a nationally recognized institution, and earned him an invitation to become the sixth president of Atlanta's Morehouse College. In that post until his retirement in 1967, he inspired generations of students to work for racial justice in the nation that denied them their constitutional rights. His 1948 chapel address introduced Martin Luther King Jr., a Morehouse student, to Mohandas Gandhi's philosophy of nonviolence. This and other contributions from his teacher led King to call Mays his most important "intellectual and spiritual mentor". Mays delivered the eulogy at King's funeral in 1968. This legacy made Benjamin Mays one of the most influential educators in twentieth-century America.

Lawrence Edward Carter, Sr. has brought together in one volume eighteen essays that enunciate and celebrate Mays's rarely equalled significance as an educator and minister in twentieth century America. Other essayists include Miles Mark Fisher, Mark L. Chapman, John Hope Franklin, Samuel DuBois Cook, Lerone Bennett, Jr., Charles Shelby Rooks, and others. This is a most important volume on Martin Luther King's most important mentor.