What is a miracle?
Many religions of the world claim that God does miracles to draw us to the religion he has revealed, the only right religion.
An example of a miracle is when a statue of the Virgin Mary comes to life and starts talking to people.
Religion says that miracles are acts of God in which he creates something out of nothing. For example, if God heals an AIDS patient he creates health where there was no health before in the patient. Religion adds that miracles cannot be explained by the ways of nature. God is said to be the only possible explanation for only God has the power to make things out of nothing.
Presumably, God created the sickness out of nothing and then just for show reversed this creation. He decided to un-create it. Not only is this against divine dignity, but one is as much of a miracle as the other so what did he need to do the miracle healing for? What would he need to animate statues for? Also we don't know if an act of creation has taken place at all. Just because blood comes out of a statue out of nowhere it doesn't mean it really came out of nowhere. Spiritualists speaks of apports. That is items that are transferred to earth from the spirit world. Miracles are sleight of hand if they are meant to be examples of God's creative power for they are not.
Natural or Supernatural?
Miracles are either against the laws of nature or they are not. It's that simple.
If God creates a law of nature and then
breaks it then God is going against himself and is far from being competent.
Then miracles would prove there is no God.
The nearest they would get to proving God would be proving the
existence of a clown with supernatural powers.
If miracles are not against the law of
nature then there is no need to bring in God as an explanation. Perhaps miracle created some kind of
invisible intelligent computer that is doing them. We can invent whatever possible explanation
we wish and nobody has any business saying, “God did this or that”. Also, if God makes a secret law of nature
that he can use to make a statue bleed then what happens to the law that
statues do not bleed? Then it is not a law.
If there is a law that 1 + 1 = 2 how can this be true if there is a
law that 1+1=3? To believe in miracles one must hold that God changes his
mind about the laws he created.
Miracles look like they break the law of
nature. If it looks like a man
committed murder we have to call him a murderer. Saying that the man could have been
possessed by evil spirits to kill so that it wasn’t him or that a demon or
alien did it while disguised as the man doesn’t help at all. How it looks is what we must go by. And so it is with miracles – assume they
break natural law.
Miracles then blaspheme God.
Every religion that uses miracles as evidence for its claim to be the truth has to teach the following (in italics):
1 Miracles
that happen in other religions must be hoaxes, no matter what the
evidence says about them.
Demons are
doing the miracles of other religions for demons like to do good to keep
people away from the truth.
COMMENT: Beliefs like that lead to unreasonable fear and fanatical bigotry. Remember the witch-burnings.
2 We will
ignore any miracle claim that doesn’t fit our ethos.
COMMENT: For
example, the Roman Catholic Church pays no attention to most of the miracle claims
that are made within the fold. It pays
none at all to those without. Yet it
says miracles show the claims of the Roman Catholic Church to be correct. That is blatant deceit and dishonesty not
to mention bigotry. It is just sifting
the evidence, its being biased and selective with the evidence, and not letting it speak for itself.
The significance of a miracle is more important than the factuality of the miracle. That is because the significance of the miracle can be determined more easily than determining if the miracle happened. And also because a miracle happening is not as important as the importance of the meaning of the miracle. If a miracle happening was what was important then we should concern ourselves with reports that apples came to life and started talking to people for a few seconds!
Jesus' miracles were not significant because he did small things like casting out demons and withering fig trees and claimed to rise from the dead leaving only apparitions to prove this. If the ghost of your father appeared to you saying it was not a ghost but his resurrected body you would be mad to pay any attention!
Catholics believe that God only uses miracles to bring people to the true faith, the Catholic faith. So they say he can't do any miracle in another religion that can be taken as indicating that the religion is true.
What if God does a miracle of healing in Islam when somebody prays to him for a cure? The suggestion that God is doing this to show that he is there not that Islam is true but to show that he exists fails. The suggestion that God is not saying to the Muslim that the Catholic faith is true but that their beliefs about God being there are right fails. Why would God change the normal order of nature just to show he is there? The Muslim already thinks he is there anyway. If he is doing miracles in other religions only to defend where that religion agrees with the Catholic Church then maybe he did the same with the resurrection of Jesus. Maybe he didn't raise Jesus to show that Jesus was saviour and son of God at all. Maybe he only did it to give us hope that we will rise again and Jesus, though not ideal, was the best hope of getting that message across?
A miracle of healing outside the one true Church doesn't tell the recipient to think anything other than that some being decided to heal him or her. The being could be the Devil. Such miracles have to be confined to the one true faith.
3 The Roman
Catholic Church teaches that we are obligated to believe in the Bible
miracles but not in the miracles approved by the Church since. The latter such as the apparitions of
COMMENT: This makes no sense. It is like saying you can believe the
doctor on Thursday but you don’t have to believe what he says on a Friday.
4 Miracles
call us to take our faith seriously.
COMMENT: Miracles lead to people taking the
religion they happen in too seriously. For example,
the persecution and intimidation of critics of Medjugorje,
Catholic ones and all, is well-documented. Believers end up unable to
understand how anybody could differ from them. Believers are often the ones trying to stop
gay rights and the right to divorce and the right of unbelievers to criticise
the religion and so on. Scientists do
not campaign for silencing of critics and religionists do.
5 Miracles
give us faith and faith complements reason.
COMMENT: Miracles draw people away from reason. If we didn’t have reason we wouldn’t be alive and it is the most important faculty we have. To insult reason is to insult people and take the side of misanthropism and put belief before people. Miracle reports try to encourage hatred.
A miracle cannot be understood. You cannot explain how it is done. If your bath is leaking you know the cause is a hole. But if you say the leak is a miracle you are saying there is no explanation. Yes there might be one but there might as well not be one for you will never learn how miracles happen.
A miracle cannot be made intelligible so to use miracles as explanations ultimately explains nothing. It is like saying that water + hole = leak is wrong and now it is water – hole = leak which is against mathematics and intelligibility. No decent God would do obvious miracles for we can only perceive them as nonsense we believe in. If he had to do them he would have to do them in secret unknown to anybody to spare us. He is doing them not for glory but for obfuscation and to place us in the depths of mystery and paradox. Miracles would be sick jokes. They would be calls to pretend they explain when they explain nothing. They are calls to self-deception and all the evil it brings. If miracles happen then the Zen Koan, “What is the Buddha?”, can really be answered by, “10 pounds of Flax”. Buddha could have been turned into flax while still looking like a person just like Catholics have the bread and wine of communion turning into Jesus literally without changing the way they look.
Why use the term miracle to distinguish the event from magic? There is no difference. When a witch turns water into blood it is magic. When God does it, it is not magic but miracle. The Church says magic is impossible for it breaks the laws of nature and then it turns around and proclaims magical events such as miracles to be true! What sense does it make? Miracle believers say they don’t believe in magic. They say they don’t believe in magic and then they believe in it and call it something different. They condemn those who don’t believe in miracles and accuse them of prejudice while they do what is no better themselves. They condemn belief in magic while believing in it themselves. If miracles encourage religion, that nastiness is what they are encouraging.
What is so damn great about any particular religious faith that a god has to do miracles to promote it? Humanists get fulfilment by faith too. They have faith in their cautious optimism and their belief that death is no worse than falling asleep. It is scandalous to teach that miracles promote the true faith even if nobody in that faith is good or holy. Miracles should be promoting the best humanitarian aid instead. Clearly the message is that belief comes before good works. Miracles that promote religious belief or a particular religion, if they happen, are abhorrent. If a miracle happens, it is better to let somebody die through lack of funds to save their life to spend the money on authenticating the miracle. The miracle fans accentuate the underlying lack of charity that ripples beneath the surface of the religion that reports them.
6 The
unbelievers say that most people stay dead so it is unreasonable to
believe that Jesus rose even if it did happen. We say they are refusing
to believe in miracles without considering them. They deceitfully argue,
“We know that dead people stay dead.
Jesus is said to have risen from the dead. Miracles may happen but can we believe
in them for it is improbable that Jesus really rose when we know the
rest of the dead stay dead? When
billions die and stay dead is it likely that Jesus really rose? We cannot be blamed for disbelieving
even if it did happen.” We reject
this because it is assuming that miracles are not believable. It is the same as saying that it was
too unlikely for Jesus to have really risen for everybody stays dead.
COMMENT: Just because something happened doesn’t mean it should be believed in. That depends on probability and evidence. The evidence you need must be in proportion to the likelihood of the claim. You wouldn’t believe that the local couch potato won a marathon even though it is possible without a miracle. You would demand very good and serious evidence first. The more serious and harder to believe the claim is the higher the standard of evidence you need. You need perfect and even better evidence for supernatural claims and the believers cannot provide that. Their reason for rejecting our commonsense is pure deception. If evidence points to a man who cannot see at all as a serial killer who has been going out at night shooting people dead then the evidence is wrong because the probability of such a man being able to kill is too low. Probability is more important than evidence and evidence depends on it for validity. There has to be a point at which even evidence should not be listened to. Miracle believers are trying to take that principle away from us. Yet they have the nerve to use it when it suits them. They complain that we say miracles are too unlikely to be believable and they say we don’t know what is likely. They believe we do know what is likely. If they didn’t think their cars were likely to get them to work would they have them? They try to intimidate and they dishonestly and falsely accuse us of irrationality.
Having the perfect hand in cards means you will win before the game begins. It is very unlikely for it to happen. But if somebody reliable tells you that he had such a hand would it be wrong to disbelieve him just because it is very improbable? Christians say it would be wrong to especially if he is a friend. Christians say then, with sceptics, that the resurrection of Jesus for example should be a very improbable event for if it were not, it would not be a real miracle. Miracles are necessarily improbable and amazing events. Christians compare miracles to the perfect hand of cards as something that should be believed in or at least as something that cannot be dismissed just because they are very improbable.
They deliberately overlook four things.
One, the perfect hand is not a serious matter. It is no big deal if we believe it. A man rising again is. An investigation is necessary if we decide to try to believe and a very big in depth one at that.
Two, perfect hands are naturally possible. Nobody can prove that dead men coming back to life is possible. If we could prove it was possible and explain it, it wouldn’t be a miracle.
Three, why should we accept or investigate the resurrection as if it should be given prime consideration? There are millions of rival miracles. Why should we single out Christianity’s most focused on miracle for our undivided attention?
Four, it is possible to believe that a miracle may not have happened without dismissing it. It is possible to be sceptical and open to the idea that a miracle might have happened. Dismissing something is not the same as disbelieving in it. Belief and unbelief are not full certainty. Dismissing something would be rejecting it outright and saying it is an impossibility.
They say we don’t give miracles a chance. We say miracles are impossible or there can never be enough evidence for them or both. They say we reject miracles before we even take a look at the evidence for them. If the clock sits on the mantelpiece all day and levitates for one minute we are entitled to believe that this didn’t happen if we didn’t see it. Miracles do away with evidence and make life impractical. Imagine you believe in miracles . If you find the clock has split John’s head open and left him dead during a levitation you cannot blame Sarah even if she was in the room at the time. You would never know if she did it or not. Miracle reports are evil.
Believers say it is ridiculous to say miracles don’t happen without looking at the evidence for them. It is not ridiculous. It’s another of the lies that belief in miracles leads to. We are not under obligation to investigate miracles. We are not silly if we don’t. If a woman wants to believe that relationships with men are dangerous let her even if she hasn’t investigated. Even if she is wrong it might be the best belief for her. We respect peoples belief that they should marry their chosen partner and we know they could be wrong so we leave them to it.
To believe a miracle report is probably false is our right and they condemn us for they say religious faith/belief is a virtue. It is a fact of human life that we cannot agree on what is probably true or probably best. It is why we are all so different. They say error - meaning disagreement with their dogmas and religious ideas - has no rights which says it all about them.
They say we are irrational in saying that no miracle report is believable and so we will not believe in it. Is it irrational to refuse to believe that Joan committed adultery when you know she was so devoted to Darby? They have to misrepresent us to hide the fact that they are deliberately wrong.
They say we hold that there is a natural explanation for miracle reports while they hold that there is a supernatural explanation. They are saying we are bad just for saying it is natural. But why can’t we say they are bad for saying they are supernatural? Why pick on those who say its natural? They are the irrational ones.
They complain that we say that miracles are not believable so we won’t believe. They condemn us for that. If you believe in miracles you have to side with them against us and condemn our view. But what is wrong with our view? Nothing. They accuse us of saying miracles are not believable just because we prejudge them. But we are not prejudging for it is pure commonsense that miracles are so strange that any evidence for them would need to be very very good and no evidence is good enough. Are you prejudging the evidence when the person who know best in the world as a good person is accused of murder by some reliable witnesses and you won't believe it? Of course not!
Miracles encourage the slander against us.
The believers clearly want us to say, like them, that no matter how implausible certain miracles seem to be, we will believe in them as they do. Such people cannot be trusted when they claim to verify miracles have happened.
What the unbelievers argue is obvious commonsense and the religionists still disparage it. Belief in miracles requires you to be a bigot and a slanderer – albeit expert ones. Miracle reports are dangerous. No matter how sweet and adorable a miracle seems to be, it is actually a wolf in the clothing of a lamb.
7 The
unbelievers say that it is too unlikely for the evidence to be right
that Jesus rose again for most people stay dead so they cannot be
expected to believe. We say they
don’t know what is unlikely or not.
The world could be turned by God into a blueberry in a moment’s
time or all the dead could be back with us tomorrow. It is as easy for God to do that as to
turn a dead man like Jesus into a living one. They will answer that we cannot go
through life believing we don’t know what is likely. We say so
what? Believe Jesus rose.
COMMENT: Miracles do nothing to save you from blind faith or faith that ignores facts. They are pointless. You can’t need signs such as miracles for blind faith for it is “faith” that has no regard for evidence. And it is true that we cannot go through life denying that anything is likely or unlikely as far as we know. They know that and they believe that. They would wreck our lives to get us to believe in miracles. Miracle reports are a force for evil.
If you cannot say a miracle wasn’t believable on the basis that it was unlikely then it follows that you should seriously consider any kind of miracle story to be true or say it might have been true. Credulity then would be the order of the day.
8 The
unbelievers say that miracles are impossible or not credible if they do
happen. They won’t give miracles
a chance. They let a prejudice
dictate to them what to think.
The unbelievers are so evil they say we believers are as bad
except that we are believing in miracles but
refusing to consider them fictitious.
They assume miracles don’t happen and they dismiss or ignore the
evidence for miracles for the sake of this assumption. They complain that we assume miracles
do happen and that we dismiss or ignore the evidence against our
position that miracles are genuine..
COMMENT: We can assume, one, that the evidence says miracles happen or, two, we can ignore it or dismiss it.
Which assumption is the most reasonable and easiest to make?
We can’t go through life believing all the evidence we get. We have to dismiss and ignore some evidence and there will be times when evidence appears to conflict. You cannot be expected to go changing your mind even about who Jack the Ripper was with every new Ripper book. What is the most sensible approach? If you are going to choose evidence choose what directs you to the solution that is the most natural and the simple.
Which assumption is the most reasonable and easiest to make? The answer is obvious but let us go on.
Keep life simple so assume the second. Reason will be useless to us if we complicate things too much. And see how they condemn us while they assume too. And we deny that we assume. We will believe in miracles if the evidence is good enough.
9 Critics say
that the laws of nature are fixed and that miracles cannot happen for
they are a violation of nature.
This is just dogmatically dismissing the possibility of miracles
without even considering the evidence for them. Its an unfair
approach. It is passing sentence
on miracles before investigating them.
COMMENT: If people who are dead stay dead and we are asked to believe Jesus didn’t stay dead then we may be dealing with a violation. If religion can assume it’s not a contradiction of nature or a violation of nature but a supernatural event outside of nature then we can assume it’s a violation. When you can assume one why not the other? Why not give the preference to the most natural explanation? And especially when the believers are saying no violation of nature has taken place and then they define miracles as saying a miracle is supernatural and changes nature which is saying it IS a contradiction of nature.
Therefore the accusation that we are being dogmatic is slander for they are being dogmatic themselves. It follows then that miracles promote the immorality and arrogance of dogmatism. Since they are not signs from a loving God we are more entitled to believe they are violations and therefore impossible than supernatural events. A bad god wouldn’t waste time doing them.
They are saying we must look at the evidence for miracles before we can decide they are a violation and impossible. That is like saying, "Miracles are not a violation of nature because there is evidence for them". That is unfair for if the idea that if "miracles are a violation therefore they don’t happen" is right then the evidence is wrong. If violations are impossible and we are bound to look at the evidence as they say then why not argue, "It is impossible for there to be a God and no God at the same time. But we see the evidence for God in creation and evidence against God in the evil that happens therefore we are wrong to think this is impossible"? Miracles happening does not mean they are non-violations. Violations of nature are possible but they may not happen or have ever happened. The reason the believers want us to deny that miracles are a violation of nature is not because miracles being a violation means they are impossible. It does not. But they have to pretend it does because the real reason is that a God who violates the law he set up is a contradiction and incompetent and not a God. They are doing sleight of hand with facts and reason as they always do.
10 Critics say
that miracles are unrepeatable events and are very improbable. They say
that the evidence for repeatable events like winter coming at the end of
every year in
COMMENT: Evidence is based on the idea of repeatable. If unrepeatable events like miracles happen you cannot be sure of anything evidence says. Thus if you want to believe in the value of evidence you are only weakening that idea by taking on the notion of miracles. It is more reasonable to hold that miracles shouldn’t be believed in. The repeatable is more important than any miracle or unrepeatable supernatural event. It happens more. So the evidence is naturally going to be better for the repeatable. This is not dogmatically refusing to give miracles a chance. It is simply doing what we have to do.
Miracles blaspheme human intelligence. The religion of miracle is also the religion of bigotry, intolerance, unfairness and deceit. The best miracles can do is give people a “holiness” and piety that reposes on self-deceit and self-inflicted blindness.
CONCLUSION
We should not believe in miracles. When we hear a miracle report we should give the preference to assuming what is non-miraculous or assuming that there must be some natural explanation for the miracle. Even positing aliens with their super-science would do! Miracles, though interesting, are abhorrent for they serve religious rulers not God. It is not God but human interpretations of him and assumptions about him that get the service offered by religion. In other words, it is the men who are being served. The money you pay religion doesn’t do God any good. It doesn’t go into God’s bank account.
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