In any case, even if Thomas was addressing him, "My Lord, My God," that has precedent in Scripture. The Muslim may not like it but the precedent is there of other people who were addressed as God without being God. When Moses spoke to the angel in the burning bush he called the angel, God. Stephen explains later that it wasn't actually God that was God's angel. When God Sends an angel and you speak to him you might call him God.

Moses was told, "I'm sending you as god to Pharaoh and your brother Aaron will be your prophet." In fact the word "as" is added in Italics in most English translations, it is not there in the Hebrew. God says I am sending you to Pharaoh, you will be god, as far as Pharaoh is concerned. This and other cases, the precedent is there for a human being or some other being to be addressed as God without being God. Paul talked about Satan as being the god of the world, so there is a question of god as capital "G" or small "g".

There are various ways of looking at it but I'm not arguing that your understanding is wrong, so much as trying to point out the case in not closed by that. Other things are possible. It is ambiguous. In a session like this it may sound like I'm trying to tell some people that they are wrong. My intention is more to say if you think you have proved something think again. Find something unambiguous or all-inclusive then wrap it up. If you can do that, then I will say, "Yes, you are right."

For now, what passes as proof is largely what is called SYNTHETIC reasoning. That is not a criticism. Synthetic reasoning is when you take a lot of things and you form what seems to be a sensible conclusion. IT IS NOT AN INEVITABLE CONCLUSION. That is analytic reasoning. Synthetic reasoning is when you say it is cloudy, the wind is blowing and the weatherman said rain - It's gonna rain. That's synthetic reasoning. You have not proved it's going to rain.

Analytic reasoning is where you have said A and B makes C, there is no other possibility. That's analytic reasoning.

These types of things are sold, in my opinion, as synthetic reasoning I've never seen it sold any other way. It is very coherent but it is not an inevitable conclusion that one arrives at, OTHER CONCLUSIONS ARE POSSIBLE BASED UPON THE SAME INPUT.

I want to give someone a turn who has not spoken; did I ask you before? (Miller addressing audience)

QUESTIONER7: Sir, we've talked about the Christian scriptures and their view of themselves, could you very quickly explain the Quran's view of itself in relationship to Christian scripture? What validity does it give for its own superiority, if it claims that?

DR MILLER: Yes, to start with, it's not so much a superior kind of a scripture, if that's what you mean. That is largely a Muslim misrepresentation, which is an over enthusiastic patriotism.

The Quran does not claim superiority in the usual sense that people are talking about because the Bible and the Quran are different kinds of books. The Quran reads approximately like most of the so-called Minor Prophets and some of the pronouncements of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. It is not like most of the Bible, which are stories. That is, the book of Jonah begins by saying the Word of the Lord came to Jonah, the son of Amittai, saying, quote, what you are about to read came from God, through Jonah.

Whereas the book of Luke begins by saying, in effect, what you are about to read is what I have gathered and put together because it seemed like a good idea, saying, "It seemed the appropriate thing to do" to gather the evidence and write this story. He doesn't say, what you are about to read are words God has handed to me and I'm now putting down on paper for you.

Those are two different kinds of things. The Quran is like the former. That is why it is really rather short, it is about 80% the size of the New Testament. It is pronouncements: if you read "I" it is God speaking, if you read "you" it is you, it is God talking to whoever is reading this. So they are different kinds of books, largely.

What it says of previous scriptures for one thing is that it says of itself that it confirms the truthfulness of WHAT IS IN previous scriptures. That is certain things that have fallen into debate, people were arguing about certain things, and if they were really important things the Quran touches on them. To say, it was correctly reported in that scripture on this matter that it really happened like that.

It confirms the truthfulness of previous scriptures, and this verse also in the 5th chapter, also says of itself that it is, and the Arabic word is MUHAYMIN, which maybe best translated by the words, quality control. It is kind of a test against other scriptures. That is, if somebody brings something and says this is scripture and it says such and such, it may well be the Quran says that specifically is NOT so, and the evidence is in that place, go and look. It is acting as quality control in that regard.

But, of course, it does not go step by step all the way through the Bible, the Hindu Gupta, and various other scriptures and say chapter 1 is correct, there one mistake in chapter 2, 3 in chapter 4 and so on. It doesn't do that. It just talks about certain issues and the advice traditionally given to the Muslim right from the beginning was that if, for example, the Christian comes and he says such and such is true and it says so in my book, and you don't have a reason to agree with him - then give him the benefit of the doubt. He might be right; he might be wrong but don't insist he's wrong. Leave him with it unless you evidence to the contrary.

And so it is, a lot of what Muslims commonly talk about are really things they may have picked up from the Christian or the Jew. Often to their detriment, I'm afraid, they pick up some of the fairytales and carry them over as well. That's the key, it is confirming the truthfulness of key issues and it's also setting the record straight on certain other things that people have misrepresented. A great deal else it does not comment on because it doesn't really matter.

QUESTIONER7: It's a man-made instrument to confirm or not confirm another supposedly man-made instrument?

DR MILLER: Oh, no, it doesn't say of itself it is a man-made instrument. As I said, it's the Speech of God's commandments. When you read it, it says, "I" as God, and "you" the reader. It's a pronouncement like as I said some of the 18 of the 66 books of the bible are like that, they don't just tell the story of so and so, but they say, God told Hosea this, quote. It's of that nature.

QUESTIONER7: The point I'm trying to make is that its validity is based on the fact that in part that it says it has a right to confirm or not confirm other books of scripture.

DR MILLER: Well, as to its validity, there are various approaches to that. But the one that is easiest to explain is that the Book by its physical existence, the paper and ink, demands an explanation of where did it come from? What it repeats many times is that if somebody says the origin of this Book is such and such, then ask him or her so and so to see if they still thinks that's true. In another place, If they think this Book came from such and such, remind them of this. So a person is confronted with the Book and has to come up with an explanation of where did it come from, and the person pursuing that comes to the conclusion that that is not so easily answered. All of the usual ideas have probably already been discussed in the Book itself with an explanation of why that can't be so. You'd better come up with another reason. It's when you run out of options it becomes a proof by exhaustion. It comes down to either this man was deceived or was himself a deceiver, if you are going to explain all of the facts you need BOTH of those assumptions and the point is they eliminate each other. You cannot at one time think you are a prophet and lie to people about it. You cannot have it both ways. You can be neither a liar nor deceived; you might be one or the other, but you can't be both. You're left with still this paper and ink, unexplained - what is its origin?

That's one way of looking at how does it establish that it deserves respect.

There's also the influence that it has had. It has accomplished certain things that's why historians of science, language, and philosophy will still point to the Quran that's the reason why the Arabs were suddenly civilized after 10,000 years of NO preparation for civilization. Something in that book is a stimulus. I hesitate to mention that, I suppose, because Islam is not an Arabic sort of thing, don't get that idea. 80% of Muslims don't speak Arabic, anyway. The point is that it had a sudden impact. That needs an explanation, it calls for some kind of answer.

QUESTIONER8: Is there a difference between the word "gospel" and the word "bible" as it contributes to the scriptures?

DR MILLER: Oh, yes, that's a point maybe I should have dealt with. He's asking about words like bible, and gospel. The Quran when it talks about gospel it means Injeel, in Arabic, Injeel, which is related to the Greek, evangel, which is translated "gospel." A long time ago, it might have been better translated as "Good News." Injeel was a message it wasn't a book some place. It was in the 2nd century that the collections of the accounts of the life of Jesus got the nickname, gospels.

When technically any Christian that makes that distinction to say well these are the four gospels but the gospel of Jesus is a message. It is not these four books. These four books have the gospel in them somewhere. So the Quran is talking about what was it Jesus said not what are those four injeels.

As to bible, that is just an English nickname. It just means library; it is a collection of writings. In other languages, they sometimes don't call it that, the Germans call it "Helige Geschrift," holy writings. The "Bible" is just a convenient name. The Quran talks about people who use books, or use the book, or book people but it doesn't say people that use THAT book, the Revised Standard of 1881. People who are in the habit of using a book to support their position are people of the book without spelling out bible or the gospel according to Matthew.