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evelation 137just the meaning of the word ‘sun’. The word ‘moon’ signifies, orbetter is, the moon in space, not just the signified meaning of ‘moon’.Allah’s word ‘nose’ is the nose, not just the signified meaning of‘nose’, and so forth. In other words, the essence of Allah’s wordscannot be found in the qur"anic text but in the objective, materialexistence of the universe, that is, in the general laws that govern thecosmos, nature and human history. Or, if put dialectically, the wordsof God are the essence of the entire universal existence which, in itsstatus as the divine signified, is the essence of God’s words (kalim§tAll§h).Because of this extra-textual link between Allah’s words and theirsignified essence, we are assured that His words cannot be changedor modified. Since nobody can interfere with the course of natureand since nobody can turn the clock back, human beings can onlyaccept or ignore God’s words but they cannot be changed.And recite (and teach) what has been revealed to you of the book ofyour Lord: none can change His words [la-mubaddil li-kalim§tihi], andnone will you find as a refuge other than Him. ( Al-Kahf 18:27)This verse proves that the essence of Allah’s words reside outside thetext. Just imagine someone reading the following verse as representing(essentially) the word of God:God (thus) directs you as regards your children’s (inheritance): to themale, a portion equal to that of two females… ( Al-Nis§" 4:11)Imagine further that someone came along and a) ignored this instructionand gave his daughters twice as much as his sons, and b) tamperedwith the text by changing its words around, then verse 27 ofSårat al-Kahf (‘none can change His words’) would actually be contradictedby what this person just did. And if someone is able tochange ‘His words’ so easily, the self-definition of the text that itcannot be changed would actually be a lie. But to find a lie in Allah’stext is, categorically, impossible. We have to accept the fact thatAllah’s words encompass more than what any human language canever express (as text). If He were to express His words, that is, thetotality of objective reality, in written (human) text, ‘oceans of ink’would not be enough to exhaust Allah’s knowledge:Say [Prophet], ‘If the whole ocean were ink for writing the words ofmy Lord [kalim§t rabbÊ], it would run dry before those words were