the religious law and creed brought by any prophet are intended to address the public as a whole. It is also clear and well known that the precise understanding required for a sound affirmation of divine oneness—acknowledging the Maker as one and exalted above quantity, quality, place, time, position, and change, so that He is believed to be a single essence that can have no counterpart of the same species, nor be within it, nor occupy a location where one could point to Him as being here or there—cannot be conveyed to the general public. If this were presented in this form to the native Arabs or the uncouth Hebrews, they would hasten to oppose it and unanimously conclude that the faith to which they were being called was faith in something utterly nonexistent.

For this reason, everything in the Torah is expressed in terms of likeness to created beings. Furthermore, the Quran contains no reference to