Inspired by the light of the Qur’an, I replied as follows:

“Firstly: Out of love of religion, someone who is religious may say: ‘The truth is this; in reality, the matter is thus; Almighty God commands such-and-such.’  But he would not make God speak to suit himself. Trembling at the verse,

Who,   then  does   more  wrong   than  one   who   utters   a  lie  concerning God?(39:32),

he would not overstep his mark to an infinite degree, imitate God, and speak on His behalf.

“Secondly: It is in no way possible for a human being to be successful in doing such a thing on his own, in fact, it is completely impossible. People who resemble each other may imitate one another, people of the same nation look the same as one another, people who are close to one another in rank or status may impersonate one another and temporarily deceive people, but they cannot do so for ever. For in any event, the falseness and artificiality in their behaviour will show up their imposture to the observant,  and their deception will not last. If the person who is attempting to imitate  another  under  false  pretences  is  quite  unlike  them;  for  example,  if  an uneducated man wants to imitate in learning a genius like Ibn Sina, or a shepherd to assume the position of a king, of course they will not deceive anyone at all, they will only  make  fools  of  themselves.  Everything  they  do  will  proclaim,  ‘This  is  an impostor.’

“Thus, to suppose – God forbid!, a hundred thousand times – the Qur’an to be man’s word is utterly impossible; no rational being could accept its possibility; to do so  is  a  delirium  like  imagining  to  be  possible  something  that  is  self-evidently impossible, like a firefly being regarded by astronomers as a real star for a thousand years; or a fly appearing to observers in the form of a peacock for a year; or a bogus common private posing as a famous lofty field marshal, taking over his position and remaining  in  it  for  a  long  period  without  giving  away  his  deception;  or  like  a slandering, unbelieving liar affecting the manner and position of the most truthful, trustworthy,  upright  believer  throughout  his  life  and  being  completely  unruffled before even the most observant while concealing his fraud from them.

“In just the same way, if the Qur’an is supposed to be man’s word, then it has to be supposed, God forbid, that that Perspicuous Book – which is clearly a brilliant star; indeed, a sun of perfections perpetually scattering the lights of truth in the heavens of the world of Islam – is like a firefly, a spurious sham made up by a counterfeiting human; and those who are closest to it and study it most carefully do not realize this, and consider it to be a perpetual, exalted star and source of truth.