Works Of God

Starfarers, 24.

When Zeyd has established that the Tahitians' antennae are compasses, he comments:

"'Manifold are the works of God.'" (p. 230)

We are so used to Biblical quotations that we might think that we have found another one. But it is not inside quotation marks, other than Zeyd's. And he is Muslim. But is the phrase scriptural, i.e., in this case, Koranic?

In a Manchester gurdwara, my host, Daljit Singh, confused me no end by referring to "the Bible." When questioned, he explained that he was using the to me familiar term, "Bible," to refer to the Sikh scripture which is called the Granth. I explained that "scripture" is the generic term and that "Torah," "Bible," "Koran," "Granth," "Veda," "Gatha," "Avesra," "Sutra" etc are the specific terms.

In any case, when I googled that phrase, "Manifold are the works of God," there were no results. It is so good to be able to check so easily. The phrase is simply dialogue attributed by Poul Anderson to his character and, if there is such a verse anywhere in the world's scriptures, then it is too obscure to come up in a google search.