One of the greatest problems of humanity is how to live in a multi religious society without losing one's religion - without relativising everything.

The word Habib in Arabic means both lover and beloved. At the heart of it is that the Prophet loves God, God loves him. But God designated him to be also the founder of a new world order of a civilization of a society.

In the traditional Islamic world, the hierarchy of the arts was not based on whether they were "fine" or "industrial" or "minor". It was based upon the effect of art on the soul of the human being.

The Islamic world doesn't stop in the Arab world or Persia. There is the whole Turkic world, the Central Asian world, South Asian world, Southeast Asian world, and African world.

The Shariah has many other functions but also protects the tarqiah; it protects the spiritual path.

Muhammad sets the model for being a good statesman. He also sets the model for being a good warrior, for chivalry, of nobility, of all the things which the Quran and Hadith [The recorded collections of the sayings and traditions of the Prophet] says of treating your enemy with dignity and kindness.

In Islam, there is no priesthood and each person stands before God, like in the daily prayers, without an intermediary. That's in contrast to Christianity, where during the Eucharist, a priest has to officiate and the priest functions as a link - at least in Catholic Christianity - between the laity and God.