To, Carl Sagan. Friend, Islam is not borrowed from Christianity and Judaism but rather, we accept all the three as divinely inspired Abrahamic faiths, Moses, Jesus and Mohammed all being direct descendants of the Prophet Abraham. We do not distinguish between the Prophets of God and respect Moses and Jesus and Mohammed. We only do not ascribe divinity to anyone but God. Neither do we believe that Gabriel appeared only to Mohammed. Gabriel appeared to every Prophet. As regards Jesus, the Qur'an states that he is the only child of a virgin mother. Mohammed is not attributed with this miracle. We never say Jesus lied. Jesus like every other Prophet always spoke the truth - he is an honored Prophet of God. We believe that people after Jesus ascribed the 'son of God' bit to him. During the lifetime of the Prophet, there were just two wars and both were defensive. They occurred when vested interests who wanted to perpetrate class distinctions attacked the early Muslims and ended when the muslims successfully defended themselves from being overrun. Of course, post founders, probably every religion has been altered and I am in no way taking up cudgels for Islamic fundamentalism which is certainly sinful. I hope I have addresed all the points raised by you with the Muslim viewpoint. In summation, we respect every faith and every man of God. We refer to Jesus as an honored Prophet of God while you think of him as the 'Son Of God.' While we diasgree on this, we love and
