~Home~ ~Life Lines~ ~Study Surveys~ ~Bibliology~ ~Tracts & Articles~ ~Our Printed Materials~
The many miracles recorded in the Bible have been the occasion for the rejection of the doctrine of the inspiration of the Scriptures. Since the rise of modern science in the 16th Century, some have argued that the miracles of the Bible are grounds for rejecting it as inspired of God. The reasoning goes something like this: since we now know that the universe operates according to the natural laws discovered by science, miracles do not exist; the Bible is full of miracles, therefore it must not be true.
Norman Geisler writes:
"The Biblical record is replete with miraculous stories. Moses stretched out his hand over the waters and the Red Sea divided. The sun stopped in the middle of the sky for a whole day. Elisha made an iron axe float on the water. Jesus gave sight to the blind, caused the lame to walk, and raised his friend Lazarus from the dead. He walked on water, turned water into wine, and multiplied a few loaves and some fish into food for five thousand people. This is the world of the Bible. It is a world of unusual and miraculous events-and a world almost totally foreign to the modern mind. The modern scientific world, by contrast, is a natural one. It is a world in which solid metal objects heavier than water sink, as do people who step into water. It is a world in which water flows to its own level but does not form vertical walls. It is a world where the dead remain in the grave and where winemakers cannot fill their wine barrels from the water faucet; they must wait for slow natural processes to produce wine from grapes. Indeed, the biblical world and the modern world are worlds apart. The one seems mythical and the other real. The one seems superstitious and the other scientific." (Miracles and the Modern Mind; Baker Book House: Grand Rapids, MI; 1992, p.13)
William Craig writes:
"The skepticism of modern man with regard to miracles arose during the Enlightenment, or Age of Reason, which dawned in Europe during the seventeenth century. Thereafter, miracles simply became unbelievable for most of the intelligentsia [the educated class]. The attack upon miracles was led by the Deists. Although Deists accepted the existence of God and His general revelation in nature, they strenuously denied that He had revealed Himself in any special way in the world. They were therefore very exercised to demonstrate the impossibility of the occurrence of miracle, or at least of the identification of miracle. They were countered by a barrage of Christian apologetic literature defending the possibility and evidential value of miracle....[M]uch of the debate was waged against the backdrop of the mechanical world-view of Newtonian physics. In his Philosophiae naturalis principia (1687), Isaac Newton formulated his famous three laws of motion, from which together with some definitions, he was able to deduce the various theorems and corollaries of his physics. In regarding the world in terms of masses, motions, and forces operating according to these laws, Newton's Principia seemed to eliminate the need for God's providence [His care over nature] and gave rise to a picture of the universe appropriately characterized as the 'Newtonian world-machine.' Newton's model of mechanical explanation was enthusiastically received as the paradigm [model] for explanation in all fields....Such a world view promoted the Deist conception of God as the creator of the world-machine, who wound it up like a clock and set it running under the laws of matter and motion, never to interfere with it again. Indeed, this harmoniously functioning world-machine was thought to provide the best evidence that God exists. The eighteenth-century French philosophe Diderot exclaimed, 'Thanks to the works of these great men, the world is no longer a God; it is a machine with its wheels, its cords, its pulleys, its springs, and its weights.' But equally, it was thought that such a world system also made incredible that God should interfere with its operation via miraculous interventions. Diderot's contemporary Voltaire said it was absurd and insulting to God to think that He would interrupt the operations of 'this immense machine,' since He designed it from the beginning to run according to His divinely decreed, immutable laws. For eighteenth-century Newtonians, such miraculous interventions could only be described as violations of the laws of nature and were therefore impossible." (Apologetics, An Introduction; Moody Press: Chicago; 1984, pp.99, 101-102)
Modern physics has modified Newton's principles somewhat so that the resulting current view of the universe is not quite so sure and rigid as he proposed. Nevertheless science does teach us that the universe operates according to regular laws. This has led many to the belief that everything that exists is part of the physical universe and that nothing exists apart from it or outside it. This "world view" or way of looking at reality is called naturalism.
Ronald Nash writes:
"The major competition to the Christian world-view in the part of the world normally thought of as Christendom is a system that often goes by the name of Naturalism. The touchstone proposition or basic presupposition of Naturalism states: 'Nothing exists outside the material, mechanical (that is, nonpurposeful), natural order.' William Halverson unpacks some of the details of this system: 'Naturalism asserts, first of all, that the primary constituents of reality are material entities. By this I do not mean that only material entities exist; I am not denying the reality-the real existence-of such things as hopes, plans, behavior, language, logical inferences, and so on. What I am asserting, however, is that anything that is real is, in the last analysis, explicable as a material entity or as a form or function or action of a material entity.' What about God and the notion of creation? Halverson explains: 'Theism [the belief in a personal God] says, "In the beginning, God"; naturalism says, "In the beginning, matter." If the theoretical goal of science-an absolutely exhaustive knowledge of the natural world-were to be achieved, there would remain no reality of any other kind about which we might still be ignorant. The "ultimate realities," according to naturalism, are not the alleged objects of the inquiries of theologians; they are the entities that are the objects of investigations by chemists, physicists, and other scientists. To put the matter very simply: materialism is true.' The second major implication of Naturalism's touchstone proposition is that the universe is a closed system. As Halverson puts it, 'Naturalism asserts, second, that what happens in the world is theoretically explicable without residue in terms of the internal structures and the external relations of these material entities. The world is, to use a very inadequate metaphor, like a gigantic machine whose parts are so numerous and whose processes are so complex that we have thus far been able to achieve only a very partial and fragmentary understanding of how it works. In principle, however, everything that occurs is ultimately explicable in terms of the properties and relations of the particles of which matter is composed. Once again the point may be stated simply: determinism is true.' The universe is a closed system in the sense that everything that happens 'within the universe' is caused by or explained by other natural events 'within the system.' Hence, there is never need to seek the explanation of anything that exists in some alleged reality that lies 'outside' the natural order....A consistent naturalist will view human beings as part of this great deterministic machine. Given these presuppositions, it is small wonder that people influenced by Naturalism object to major elements of the Christian world-view. Any naturalist is precluded from believing in God, spirit, soul, angels, miracles, prayer, providence, immortality, heaven, sin, and salvation as Christians normally understand these notions for one simple reason: such beliefs are logically incompatible with the naturalist's world-view....
"A naturalist, then, is someone who believes (or would believe if he or she were consistent) the following propositions: 1. Only nature exists....2. Nature has always existed....Nature does not depend upon anything else for its existence. 3. Nature is characterized by total uniformity. The regularity of nature precludes the occurrence of anything like a miracle. Miracles are impossible because there is nothing outside the box [reality, the sum total of the universe] that could bring about any occurrence within nature. But they are also impossible because the regularity and uniformity of the natural order precludes the occurrence of any irregular event. 4. Nature is a deterministic system. The belief in free will presupposes a theory of human agency whereby human beings acting apart from any totally determining causes can themselves function as causes in the natural order. That belief is incompatible with the presuppositions of Naturalism. 5. Nature is a self-explanatory system. Any and every thing that happens within nature must, at least in principle, be explainable in terms of other elements of the natural order. It is never necessary to seek the explanation for any event within nature in something beyond the natural order. It should be clear by now that any person under the control of naturalistic presuppositions could not consistently believe in the miraculous....Supernaturalism disagrees with the five identified features of Naturalism. 1. Supernaturalism affirms the existence of a God who transcends nature, who exists 'outside the box.' 2. Supernaturalism denies the eternity of nature. God created the world freely and ex nihilo [Latin for 'out of nothing']. The universe is contingent [dependent] in the sense that it could not have begun to exist without God's creative act and it could not continue to exist without God's sustaining activity. 3. With regard to the uniformity of nature, the position of Supernaturalism is a bit more complex....[T]heists believe that nature exhibits patterns of order and regularity. But theists also believe that this uniformity results from God's free decision to create the universe in a particular way. Supernaturalism recognizes the same cause-and-effect order within the natural order as the naturalist. But the supernaturalist believes that the natural order depends on God for both its existence and its order. The supernaturalist also believes that God is capable of exerting causal influence within the natural order; but this does not mean necessarily that such divine action entails a suspension or violation of the natural order. The world is not closed to divine causal activity. 4. Supernaturalism may permit or be consistent with some forms of determinism [i.e., Calvinism]....But...even should a theist be a determinist, he will recognize that God-a free moral agent-can act causally upon nature and with the natural order....5. Finally, Supernaturalism denies that nature is a self-explanatory system. The very existence of the contingent universe requires that we seek the cause of its being in a necessary being. The laws operating within the natural order owe their existence to God's creative activity. And many things that happen within the natural order are affected by or influenced by or brought about by free acts of the personal God." (Faith & Reason; Academie Books, Zondervan;Grand Rapids,MI;1988, pp.47,48,254,255)
For many people, their belief that miracles do not occur is based on the presupposition that no personal God exists. Once we admit that a personal God, the God of the Bible, exists, then we must also admit that miracles are possible.
What do we mean by a "miracle" in the first place? The word can be used in more than one sense. In a manner of speaking, many purely natural events are referred to as "miracles": the beauty of a sunset, the birth of a baby, the growth of a tree from a tiny seed. Sometimes modern medicines are referred to as "miracle drugs." But of course these are not actually miracles at all; they are purely natural events that have natural causes. For those of us who believe in a personal God, all natural events like those mentioned are works of God, but they are not miracles in the true sense of the word. God is at work in nature because He is the one who set it up to work the way it does, and He sustains the universe and everything in it. But a miracle goes beyond this. The word "miracle" stands in contrast to the word "nature;" nature is the usual, regular pattern of God's activity. Nature and the laws of nature are the ordinary works of God, but miracles are extraordinary works of God. But are all extraordinary works of God miracles? Very often Christians will say that the spiritual rebirth or conversion of a man is a miracle. And when God by His Spirit changes a man's character in salvation, it is certainly a miracle in a sense. But even this is not a miracle in the highest sense. When Paul lists among the gifts of the Spirit in I Corinthians 12 "the working of miracles," he has something more in mind than bringing men to Christ in salvation. Many times the statement that the new birth is the greatest miracle is nothing more than an excuse for not having miracles of the Bible kind today, much like the repeated though false claim that "love is the greatest gift." Miracles must be distinguished from the ordinary acts of God in nature and even some extraordinary acts of God in providence. Many times God may answer prayer by ordering certain events in such a way that we know He is at work, and yet nothing but natural causes are at work. Often a miracle is defined as a supernatural interruption or intervention of God in nature or a suspension of the laws of nature. But is it appropriate to say that God "intervenes" in nature as if He ordinarily had nothing to do with it? Isn't He at work at all times upholding the universe by the word of His power (Heb.1:3; Col. 1:17)?
Augustine defined a miracle as "a portent [that] is not contrary to nature, but contrary to our knowledge of nature." But this implies that all miracles are mere natural acts having a natural cause although it remains unknown to us. Certainly most of the Biblical miracles go beyond this. A stronger definition was offered by Thomas Aquinas-a miracle is "an event that is beyond nature's power to produce, that only a supernatural power (God) can do." Sir George Stokes said it best: "It may be that the event which we call a miracle was brought about not by the suspension of the laws in ordinary operation, but by the super-addition of something not ordinarily in operation." Norman Geisler offers this brief definition: "A divine intervention into the natural world; a supernatural exception to the regular course of the world that would not have occurred otherwise." Geisler goes on to note the three words used in the Bible for miracle-"sign," "wonder," and "power." He puts the three together in this definition: "a miracle is an unusual event ('wonder') that conveys and confirms an unusual message ('sign') by means of unusual power ('power'); it is an act of God ('power') that attracts the attention of the people of God ('wonder') to the Word of God (by a 'sign')" ( Miracles and the Modern Mind, op.cit., pp.98,99).
We may list the works of God in this way: 1. the work of God in nature, 2. the providential work of God, ordering and arranging our lives and events, 3. "ordinary" spiritual works of God such as the common activity of the Spirit in leading, guiding, and teaching the believer, and 4. miracles.
As we survey the miracles of the Bible, we see that there are perhaps several classes of miracles according to the degree of the supernatural involved. 1. Some, like the providing of quail to the Israelites in the desert, were not supernatural so much in the sense of a creative act but as in the timing involved. 2. Even though we say a miracle is due to the supernatural, unusual power of God, many miracles in the Bible were accompanied by natural factors as well. For instance when God parted the Red Sea for the Israelites and drowned Pharoah's army, it says that God caused the Sea to part by making a strong east wind blow all night (Exodus 14:21). 3. Many miracles of the Bible are supernatural restorations of nature such as the healings and restoring the dead to life. 4. But some miracles in the Bible seem to belong in a class above the others as far as the supernatural element is concerned: the sun standing still (Josh.10:12-14), the iron axe head made to float (2 Kings 6:5-7), Jesus walking on the water (Matt.14:25), feeding the 5000 (Matt.14:15-21), and Jesus' resurrection from the dead.
The miracles of the Bible may generally be divided into these kinds: 1. power over nature, 2. power over matter, 3. power over disease and demons, 4. power over death, and 5. miracles of judgment.
There are well over 100 individual miracles recorded in the Bible besides many wholesale unspecified healings, etc., in the ministry of Jesus. The following is a list of some of the more notable Bible miracles:
Creation (Gen.1), judgment at Babel (Gen. 11), blinding of Sodomites (Gen.19:9-11), destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot's wife turned to salt (Gen.19), Sarah's conception of Isaac (Gen.21), the burning bush (Ex.3), Moses' rod to a serpent, his hand made leprous, then restored (Ex.4), judgments on Egypt (Ex.7-12), pillar of fire, cloud (Ex.13), parting the Red Sea (Ex.14), sweetening waters of Marah (Ex.15), quail, manna (Ex.16), judgment on Nadab, Abihu (Lev.10), Korah and company (Num.16), Aaron's rod buds (17:8); water from rock (Num.20), healing through brass serpent (Num.21), Balaam's donkey speaks (Num.22), Jordan River divided (Josh.3), sun stands still (Josh.10), Elijah fed by ravens (I K.17), meal and oil supplied for widow, raising of her son (I K.17), fire consuming sacrifice on Carmel (I K.18), fire consuming two Syrian captains and men (2 K.1), widow's oil multiplied, raising Shunammite's son, a hundred men fed (2 K.4), iron axe head floats (2 K.6), dead man raised by Elisha's bones (2 K. 13), Ahaz's sun dial goes back 10 degrees (2 K.20), three Hebrew children in fiery furnace (Dan.3), handwriting on the wall (Dan.5), Jonah in the fish (Jon.1), water to wine (Matt.2), healing many sick, including lepers, paralytics, blind, deaf mutes, epileptics, casting out demons, raising widow's son at Nain (Lk.7), stilling the storm (Matt.8), raising Jairus' daughter from the dead (Matt.9), feeding 5000 (and 4000), walking on the sea (Matt.14), tax money in fish's mouth (Matt.17), raising Lazarus (John 11), cursing the fig tree (Matt. 21), restoring servant's ear (Lk.22), resurrection of Jesus (Matt.28), ascension (Acts 1), Peter heals lame man (Acts 3), Ananias and Sapphira killed (Acts 5), many signs and wonders (Acts 5), Philip at Samaria (Acts 8), Philip's translation (Acts 8), Peter heals Aeneas, raises Dorcas from the dead (Acts 9), angel kills Herod (Acts 12), Elymas the sorcerer blinded (Acts 13), Paul heals cripple at Lystra (Acts 14), casts demon out of fortune teller (Acts 16), Paul's handkerchiefs (Acts 19),Paul unharmed by serpent bite, heals father of Publius and others (Acts 28).
Often the statement is made, usually by those who deny or downplay miracles happening in our day, that miracles are rare even in the Bible, occurring only during four periods of time-the days of Moses and the Exodus when God was establishing Israel and the Law, the days of Elijah and Elisha when the nation was halting between the true God and false ones, the days of Daniel when the nation needed confirmation of God's purpose for them though they were exiled, and the days of Jesus and the apostles when the gospel and the church were being established.. But this is an argument from silence, commonly acknowledged as the weakest kind. The fact that most Bible miracles are recorded in one of these four time periods does not mean that no other miracles occurred. The miracles of the Bible are not isolated events but are directly connected to the narrative of the Bible which follows along Israel's history up through the Messiah. The focus is on the major events of this history, the national leaders, etc., and the Bible is not meant to be an account of everything God may have done in every individual's life. One indication that God may have been at work in the miraculous in individuals' lives all along is the account of Simeon and Anna concerning the birth of Christ. God spoke to Simeon supernaturally and told him he would not die before he had seen the Messiah. Then the Spirit of God moved on him to go to the temple right when Joseph and Mary brought the baby Jesus to be dedicated. Anna is called a "prophetess," indicating she had often been used to speak supernaturally for God through her long life. She prophesied over the baby Jesus and to Mary. The period between Malachi and John the Baptist was known as a long spiritual drought during which there was no prophet, at least in the fullest sense of a Biblical writer, a prophet of that status. But obviously, the account of Simeon and Anna shows us that even during this relatively dry spiritual period, God was at work even miraculously, although we would not have known about these two had it not been for their involvement in the Bible line of history which in this case was the birth of the Messiah.
The objection to miracles has taken many forms, including the following:
1. Miracles are impossible. This was the argument of Benedict Spinoza (1632-1677), a Dutch Jewish philosopher, whose views even today are mentioned in debates over miracles. He was the first to launch a major open attack on miracles and was expelled from the synagogue at age 24 for his views. His Tractatus Theologico-Politicus was published anonymously in 1670. In it he wrote:
"As men are accustomed to call Divine the knowledge which transcends human understanding, so also do they style Divine, or the work of God, anything of which the cause is not generally known; for the masses think that the power and providence of God are most clearly displayed by events that are extraordinary and contrary to the conception they have formed of nature, especially if such events bring them any profit or convenience: they think that the clearest possible proof of God's existence is afforded when nature, as they suppose, breaks her accustomed order, and consequently they believe that those who explain or endeavor to understand phenomena or miracles through their natural cause are doing away with God and His providence. They suppose, forsooth, that God is inactive so long as nature works in her accustomed order, and vice versa, that the power of nature and natural causes are idle so long as God is acting....Now, as nothing is necessarily true save only by Divine decree, it is plain that the universal laws of science are decrees of God following from the necessity and perfection of the Divine nature. Hence, any event happening in nature which contravened nature's universal laws, would necessarily also contravene the Divine decree, nature, and understanding; or if anyone asserted that God acts in contravention to the laws of nature, he, ipso facto, would be compelled to assert that God acted against His own nature-an evident absurdity....Thus in order to interpret the Scriptural miracles and understand from the narration of them how they really happened, it is necessary to know the opinions of those who first related them, and have recorded them for us in writing, and to distinguish such opinions from the actual impression made upon their senses, otherwise we shall confound opinions and judgments with the actual miracle as it really occurred, nay, further, we shall confound actual events with symbolical and imaginary ones. For many things are narrated in Scripture as real, and were believed to be real, which were in fact only symbolical and imaginary." (ch.6; from The Chief Works of Benedict de Spinoza, R.H.M. Elwes, vol.I; Dover Publications: NY; 1955, pp.81,83,93; quoted in Miracles and the Critical Mind, Colin Brown; Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, MI; 1984, pp.31-33)
Behind Spinoza's argument against miracles was his pantheism, or belief that God is everything, the sum total of the physical universe. Geisler writes:
"Spinoza believed that there could be only one infinite substance, and that therefore the universe was uncreated. In other words, God is identical with the universe. He could not have created it, for it is of his essence. God is not transcendent; he is not beyond or 'other' than creation. This means, then, that God's creativity is no more than nature's activity. Miracles, therefore, are impossible. For if God (the super- natural) is identical with nature, then it follows that there is no supernatural intervention into nature from anything beyond it....Spinoza's argument fails because, first, it begs the question [uses an argument that assumes as proved the very thing one is trying to prove] by defining miracles as impossible to begin with, namely, as a violation of assumed unbreakable natural laws." (Miracles and the Modern Mind, pp.15,21)
The presupposition that the universe is uncreated and eternal, once believed by many scientists, has practically been overthrown by the "big bang theory." It is interesting to note that the great physicist Albert Einstein rejected the big bang theory even though his own theory of relativity pointed to an expanding universe. His bias against the big bang was due to his conception of God:
"In 1921 a rabbi sent Einstein a telegram asking, 'Do you believe in God?' to which Einstein answered, 'I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists.'" (Ibid., p.19)
Many of the objections to miracles involve the idea that they "violate the laws of nature." But this is due to a misconception about what we mean by natural laws. George P. Fisher writes:
"What are natural laws? They are not a code super-imposed upon natural objects. They are a generalized statement of the way in which the objects of nature are observed to act and interact. Thus the miracle does not clash with natural laws. It is a modification in the effect due to a change in the antecedents [conditions]. If there is a new phenomenon, it is due to the interposition [insertion] of an external cause. There is not a violation of the law of gravitation when a ball is thrown into the air. A force is counteracted and overcome by the interposition of a force that is superior. The forces of nature are, within limits, subject to the human will. The intervention of the human will gives rise to phenomena which the forces of matter, independently of the heterogeneous [foreign or outside] agent, would never produce. Yet such effects following upon volition are not properly considered violations of law. Law describes the action of natural forces when that action is not modified and controlled by voluntary agency. If the efficiency of the divine will infinitely outstrips that of the will of man, still miracles are no more inconsistent with natural laws than is the lifting of a man's hand in obedience to volition....A miracle does not disturb our conception of the system of nature. On the contrary, if there were not a system of nature, there could not be a miracle, or, rather, all phenomena would be alike miraculous. A miracle, we repeat, being the act of God, does not compel us to alter our conception of the constitution of nature; for natural forces, or second causes, remain just as they were, and the method of their action is unchanged." (The Grounds of Theistic and Christian Belief; Charles Scribner's Sons:NY; 1891, pp.108,109,115)
2. Miracles are unbelievable. This argument is somewhat softer, a little like the claim to be an agnostic rather than an atheist. The atheist boldly proclaims that there is no God. Realizing that it is not possible for finite beings like ourselves to so positively make this judgment, the agnostic says rather that he doesn't know if there is a God or not. To say that miracles are impossible is too strong for many; rather, they say that no rational person can believe in them. And since the Bible is full of miracles, no rational person can believe the Bible is inspired. Either that or they cannot be taken literally, only figuratively.
The greatest proponent of this view was David Hume (1711-1776), a Scottish skeptic philosopher and historian who in 1748 wrote his classic essay on miracles in section ten of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. It is still "the most frequently discussed study of miracles" today, commonly offered in college philosophy courses.
Hume wrote:
"A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and as a firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined....Nothing is esteemed a miracle, if it ever happens in the common course of nature. It is no miracle that a man, seemingly in good health, should die of a sudden; because such a kind of death, though more unusual than any other, has yet been frequently observed to happen. But it is a miracle that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed in any age or country. There must, therefore, be a uniform experience against every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit the appellation. And as a uniform experience amounts to a proof, there is here a direct and full proof, from the nature of the fact, against the existence of any miracle; nor can such a proof be destroyed, or the miracle rendered credible, but by an opposite proof, which is superior....There is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men, of such unquestioned good-sense, education, and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves; of such undoubted integrity, as to place them beyond all suspicion of any design to have a great deal to lose in case of their being detected in any falsehood; and at the same time, attesting facts performed in such a public manner and in so celebrated a part of the world, as to render the detection unavoidable: All which circumstances are requisite to give us a full assurance in the testimony of men....The many instances of forged miracles, and prophecies, and supernatural events, which, in all ages, have either been detected by contrary evidence, or which detect themselves by their absurdity, prove sufficiently the strong propensity of mankind to the extraordinary and the marvellous, and ought reasonably to beget a suspicion against all relations of this kind....The pleasure of telling a piece of news so interesting, of propagating it, and of being the first reporters of it, spreads the intelligence. And this is so well known, that no man of sense gives attention to these reports, till he find them confirmed by some greater evidence. Do not the same passions, and others still stronger, include the generality of mankind to believe and report, with the greatest vehemence and assurance, all religious miracles?" (Hume's Enquiry, pp. 114-119, quoted in Nash, op.cit., 229,230,236,237)
Hume thought that his argument was unanswerable and would destroy Christianity. "I flatter myself that I have discovered an argument...which, if just, will, with the wise and learned, be an everlasting check to all kinds of superstitious delusion, and consequently will be useful as long as the world endures" (Miracles, Geisler, op.cit., p.25). It is true that Hume's essay is used today by secularists as though it had never been answered, but actually it has been refuted many times. The Bible miracles are not so much "violations of the laws of nature" (the very tone of which is prejudicial against miracles) as they are the power of God assisting, adding to, or restoring nature. And those who report them, in the case of the NT the apostles, do not fit his view of the gullibility and unreliability of witnesses for miracles. Accepting the Bible miracles because they are sufficiently attested to does not mean we must believe all reports of miracles.
Geisler writes:
"[F]or several reasons Hume's argument is not successful. First, in the 'hard' form he begs the question by assuming miracles are by definition impossible. Second, Hume['s argument] makes scientific progress impossible. In brief, to eliminate miracles before looking at them seems prejudicial, and not to do this is to leave the door open to their possibility. Wise persons do not legislate in advance that miracles cannot be believed to have happened; rather they look at the evidence to see if they did occur." (Ibid., p.31)
If we followed Hume's skepticism and rigid criteria for credible witnesses, we would have to doubt everything in all of history. Richard Whately in his famous tract Historic Doubts Relative to Napoleon Bonaparte (1819), poked fun of Hume's argument:
"Since Napoleon's exploits were so fantastic, so extraordinary, so unprecedented, no intelligent person should believe that these events ever happened. After recounting Napoleon's amazing and unparalleled military feats, Whately asks, 'Does anyone believe all this and yet refuse to believe a miracle? Or rather, what is this but a miracle? Is not this a violation of the laws of nature?' If skeptics do not deny the existence of Napoleon, they 'must at least acknowledge that they do not apply to that question the same plan of reasoning which they have made use of in others [Christ].'" (Ibid., p.30)
3. Miracles are unscientific. This argument takes on several forms, some of which we have already mentioned. It is true that miracles are not repeatable and therefore not observable and testable for determining the cause as are natural events. But all this means is that miracles are beyond the scope of science and not proofs against science. There is nothing inherently unscientific about events being caused by a supernatural power. When all possible natural causes of an event are considered but found insufficient, it would not be unscientific to hold the possibility that it had a supernatural cause.
4. Miracles are against nature. Certainly this objection might well apply to the miracles accepted by the Roman Catholic Church in medieval times and even today such as statues and pictures crying and bleeding, relics of dead saints, etc., and the fantastic tales found in apocryphal books such as the ones about the childhood of Christ. In the apocryphal Infancy Story of Thomas, the five-year-old boy Jesus is depicted as making clay sparrows which flew off when He clapped His hands.
Geisler writes,
"As C.S. Lewis notes, 'If we open such books as Grimm's Fairy Tales or Ovid's Metamorphoses or the Italian epics we find ourselves in a world of miracles so diverse that they can hardly be classified.' In them 'beasts turn into men and men into beasts or trees, trees talk, ships become goddesses, and a magic ring can cause tables richly spread with food to appear in solitary places.' If such things really happened, they would 'show that Nature was being invaded. But they would show that she was being invaded by an alien power.' These fantasies, like many early and medieval Christian miracles, do not really fit into nature. Indeed, some early and medieval miracle stories bear a much stronger resemblance to fantasy stories than to the biblical records of miracles. Most are in fact antinatural. Biblical miracles stand in strong contrast to these apocryphal miracles and fairy tales. While theists sometimes describe miracles as 'contrary to nature,' they do not mean against nature but rather beyond it....When a miracle occurs nature is not disrupted from its regular patterns. In fact, like a stick cast into the river, once a miracle occurs it is absorbed into the flow of natural law. For example, the blind eyes Jesus supernaturally restored saw in a natural way. A miracle interjects something new into nature that nature would not have produced, but once it is produced it is absorbed into the natural rhythm of the physical universe....'The fitness of the Christian miracles,' notes Lewis, 'and their difference from these mythological miracles, lies in the fact that they show invasion by a Power which is not alien.' They are, in fact, 'what might be expected to happen when she is invaded not simply by a god, but by the God of Nature: by a Power which is outside her jurisdiction not as a foreigner but as a sovereign.'...To some the virgin birth seems to be an antinatural way to be born. To be sure, it is unnatural, but it is not thereby against nature. After all, the virgin conception resulted in a normal nine-month pregnancy and a natural birth." (Ibid., 104,105)
The same may be said for the turning of water into wine and feeding the multitude by multiplying loaves and fishes. Water turns slowly to wine naturally and fish and wheat multiply naturally in fields and streams; the short time involved and the by-passing of the natural processes is what make these miracles. When Aaron's rod budded, it was doing what sticks do naturally as long as they are attached to trees; the miracle was in the fact that this particular branch had been severed from the tree. Most of the miracles of the Bible redeem or restore nature to the original intention of God before the fall or to what nature will ultimately be like in the future reign of God. Bible miracles, as opposed to medieval and apocryphal ones, "fit into" nature rather than remaining contrary to it.
5. Miracles are unnecessary. This objection usually comes from liberal "Christians" and theologians. The idea is that we should give up the miracles of the Bible, seeing they are such a stumblingblock to the modern mind, and salvage the moral teachings of the Bible, which are thought to be the real essence of religion anyhow. But we cannot reject the miracles of the Bible without destroying the Christian faith altogether. Paul says in I Corinthians 15 that if Christ was not raised from the dead, our whole faith is vain. At least two miracles are absolutely essential to the Christian faith-the resurrection and the virgin birth of Christ-and if these are true, then it is not unreasonable to accept the others Christ did. If He is the sinless, divine Son of God, it is not unreasonable to believe that such a Person could heal the sick, raise the dead, walk on water or do any of the other things the Gospels say He did. And the miracles of the Old Testament are not just collected in a separate part as great events; they are interwoven into the narrative of the history of God's dealing with Israel as His unfolding plan to bring the world redemption through Christ. The miracles are an integral part of the history and the Word that God gave His people, not isolated unconnected events. To reject the miracles is to reject the history and the commandments and everything else because these are all connected.
6. Miracles are myths. A myth is a story or legend passed down over many generations, usually religious in nature or about the gods, as in Greek mythology. In the traditional sense and in the way the NT uses the word, these stories are not real but false. In more recent times liberal theologians and philosophers have used the term in a softer sense as a story usually of a religious nature meant not as historic reality but as a means of conveying a religious truth. When it comes to the Bible, according to this view, the miracles are stories attached to otherwise historical figures like Moses, Daniel, and Jesus which are not historical events but whose value lies in the spiritual lesson or truth they contain.
The foremost exponent of this view is Rudolph Bultmann (1884-1976). Following the liberal theology of others before him, he "pioneered the method of interpreting the Bible by 'demythologizing' [taking the myths out of] it....[H]e sought to make the Bible...relevant to modern men by separating the core truths of Christianity from [what he called] the first-century worldview, which confuses us and is not part of our lives. The means of doing this is to strip away the myth (supernatural elements) from the ["true]] reality of the story. This higher and spiritual truth can be translated to any worldview and understood by men of any time. Unfortunately, it also destroys the historicity of the Christian faith and the authority of the Bible." (When Skeptics Ask, Norman Geisler; Victor Books [Scripture Press Publications]:Wheaton,IL; 1990, p.85)
It is true that the Bible miracles point us to truth about God, lessons conveying spiritual truth. But they are also more than this-they are real historical events as well.
"With unlimited confidence, then, Bultmann pronounces the biblical picture of miracles as impossible. For 'man's knowledge and mastery of the world have advanced to such an extent through science and technology that it is no longer possible for anyone seriously to hold the NT view of the world-in fact, there is hardly anyone who does....[N]ow that the forces and the laws of nature have been discovered, we can no longer believe in spirits, whether good or evil. [It is simply] impossible to use electric light and the wireless and to avail ourselves of modern medical and surgical discoveries, and at the same time to believe in the NT world of demons and spirits....[T]he only relevant...assumption is the view of the world which has been molded by modern science and the modern conception of human nature as a self-subsistent unity immune from the interference of supernatural powers....[T]he resurrection of Jesus is just as difficult, it means an event whereby supernatural power is released....To the biologists such language is meaningless...such a notion [the idealist] finds intolerable....Obviously [the resurrection] is not an event of past history....An historical fact which involves a resurrection from the dead is utterly inconceivable....[I]n claiming that miracles such as the resurrection cannot occur in space-time history, Bultmann is merely revealing an unjustified, dogmatic [asserted without proof], naturalistic bias....The dogmatism of his language is revealing. Miracles are 'incredible,' 'irrational,' 'no longer possible,' 'meaningless,' 'utterly inconceivable,' 'simply impossible,' 'intolerable.' Hence, the 'only honest way' for modern people is to hold that miracles are 'nothing else than spiritual' and that the physical world is 'immune from interference' in a supernatural way. This is not the language of one open to historical evidence for a miracle. It looks more like a mind that does not wish to be 'confused' with the facts!" (Miracles, op.cit., pp.69-72)
First, the charge that the NT miracles are myths fails to consider the credibility and authenticity of the NT documents. It takes much more time for myths to develop than is available in the case of the NT documents. They were written within decades of the events they record, still within the life times of people who would have been eye-witnesses of those events, which would have made such mythologizing impossible. The NT writers insist many times that its accounts are not myths but eye-witness accounts. Second, "The NT is not the literary genre [sort or type] of mythology" (Ibid., p.73).
7. Miracles are natural events that were mistaken for miracles by those who recorded them because of a lack of understanding on their part of how things work.
It has been often asserted that the miracles of the Bible have a natural explanation that those who claimed they saw them were either ignorant of or were so in awe of the person involved that they "elevated" in their own minds natural events to supernatural occurrences. Thus, the opening of the Red Sea was originally the crossing of a marshy swamp nearby of similar name and the subsequent flooding due to rainfall of Pharoah's army, all of which was elevated later to the "miracle" recorded in the Bible. And so with the rest of the Bible miracles. Jesus' walking on the water was an "illusion" arising in the minds of the disciples late at night when they saw Jesus walking on the shore or on rocks near shore.
Behind this approach to Bible miracles is usually the assumption that ancient people were quite stupid. While it is true that they did not know modern scientific principles as we know them now, it does not follow that they couldn't distinguish miracles from natural events or were so gullible they would believe anything. The account of the resurrection, for example, contains such detail of verification on the part of the disciples that it is impossible to hold they were merely gullible or taken in by a hallucination or illusion. People in Bible days were more prone to accept supernatural events, it is true, but this only means that an atmosphere more conducive to God's miracle power was present, not that the people were stupid. Some of the miracles of the Bible contain a natural as well as a supernatural element, it is true, as we have noted. But this does not mean that all the Bible miracles have a purely natural explanation. The contention that they do is, once again, due to the bias that the supernatural does not exist and everything in the universe is only material and has natural causes.
8. Miracles are pious frauds. It is true that most religions of the world claim miracles, at least in their founding. But this is no proof that the miracles of the Bible and Christianity are false also. The integrity and authenticity of the witnesses must be taken into account. Would the apostles and those who followed them die for things they knew were untrue?
Closely associated with this approach is the view that miracles are really only magic perpetrated on the unsuspecting as miracles. But Bible miracles differ from magic in that they have the purpose of glorifying God and doing good in the world rather than merely entertaining or astounding the viewer. Also, miracles are under God's control, not man's as in magic, and involve no use of incantation, spell, ritual, or instruments. It is true that Moses' rod and Paul's handkerchiefs were involved in working miracles, but not necessarily so. God could and did perform some of the same things without them.
9. Miracles are anomalies. An anomaly is "a departure from the regular arrangement, general rule, or usual method; an abnormality." These are "freaks" or accidents of unusual nature for which there is no known explanation. But the thing that distinguishes miracles from these is their context-miracles occur when people believe the gospel, trust God's promises, or are prayed for in Jesus' name. This gives them the connection of cause and effect, albeit a supernatural one, rather than just a random, unusual, unexplainable event like an anomaly.
One of the main things that makes Bible or true miracles "believable," that gives them that "ring of authenticity" compared to ancient or medieval claims of miracles is not only the way they usually "fit into nature" but the purpose apparent in them. The miracles of the Bible are not isolated awesome events but acts of God that demonstrate a purpose. The purpose of Biblical and all genuine miracles is that they manifest these purposes:
1. They bring glory to God. They do not just inspire awe and wonder or entertain. And those who are used in miracles always give God the glory and refuse any glory for themselves.
2. They reveal God's character and nature. They are thus distinguished from magic and witchcraft, which, more often than not, are performed in the atmosphere of wickedness. True miracles, on the other hand, induce worship and fear of God as loving, merciful, and holy.
3. They meet human need. Many of the apocryphal and medieval "miracles" fail here. Bleeding or crying pictures or statues or images on walls or screen doors meet no real human need but only excite the imagination and entertain.
4. They are redemptive or restorative. The whole message of the Bible is one of God's redemption of man (and eventually creation) from the devastating, corrupting, and crippling effects of the fall. Most of the miracles of the Bible are acts of God's power to heal, deliver, or restore men from these effects, at least temporarily so until the total elimination of all that hurts and destroys in the realized kingdom of God. The miracles of the Bible, then, "fit" its message, support it, and illustrate it. They are not just awesome wonders with no connection with this purpose.
5. They authenticate a messenger or message. The miracles of Moses, Christ, and the apostles bore witness o their mission as God's messengers. They also bore witness to the divine source of their message. Miracles may still bear witness of the truth of God, the gospel of Christ, but there is no further need for bearing witness of the divine mission of a particular messenger. Christ and the apostles are the only true preachers, because anyone else sent by God since their days is called only to echo and repeat their message, not some other of their own. Anyone who today who claims that the miracles he is doing authenticates him or his unique message is attracting attention to himself in an unScriptural way and should be rejected. And anyone who claims miracles but preaches a false message is to be rejected. The truth or falsehood of the message is much more important than whatever miracles are claimed. God does not authenticate a false message with miracles. Whether or not the miracles claimed are from God must be determined by whether or not the message is Scriptural.
Do miracles occur today? Those who insist they do not yet staunchly defend the miracles of the Bible seem inconsistent with themselves. How can one firmly maintain that God has the power to work miracles and in fact did so in the distant past and yet deny that He has any interest in doing such things today? If they do not and cannot occur today, how can we believe they ever have occurred? Would these people have believed in the miracles if they were among those living in that day? Probably not. They would have been Saducees. On the other hand, many Christians, notably Pentecostal/charismatics, are far too prone to believe almost any account of a miracle or miracle worker in our day. They are too prone to see apparent miracles as God's approval on a ministry despite the unScriptural teachings. And they are too prone to testify that something was a miracle when natural causes may very well have been the means. This is not to say we should not give God the glory for everything, since He can work through natural means and causes as well as supernatural. But we lose credibility when we call everything, even all answers to prayer, a miracle. We do not dishonor God by not calling everything He does for us a miracle. We may truly give Him the credit for everything without pronouncing it a miracle.
In conclusion, nothing or no one has ever successfully demonstrated that miracles are impossible or do not occur on either philosophical or scientific grounds. Most objections to miracles are based on the naturalistic assumption that everything in the universe is made up of and works by natural forces and principles alone and that this is the sum total of reality. But if we admit a personal God who created the universe and has a real objective existence apart from it, miracles are possible. Moreover, given the fall and its effects, one would expect redemptive and restorative miracles from time to time by a loving, caring God according to His will. As C. S. Lewis said in his book Miracles, A Preliminary Study, "If we admit God must we admit miracle? Indeed, indeed, you have no security against it."
Leon Stump, Pastor of Victory Christian Center
Background from Greenfield Graphics.