God and Allah – are they not merely two names for the same god? That is how most non-believers see it, as do many believers. But is it that simple? Many, believers and seculars alike, are claiming, and increasingly so, that God and Allah are essentially different, and that the differences we see between the Christian and the Muslim cultural groups today is a result of this essential difference.

Bruce Lawrence, Professor at Duke University and one of the world’s leading academics in Religion Studies, has, among other things, written a number of books about the relationship between Islam, Christianity and other religions. At the House of Literature, he is joined by Norwegian writer and journalisr Åsne Seierstad for a conversation about one of the most fundamental religious questions: Who is God?