Miracles

Question 1

Thomas aquinas and 3 types of miracles

Answer 1

1. God sustains activity as a cause in esse
2. Primary actions: flood, plagues, Jesus, miracles (temporal)
3. Secondary actions: god acting through humans eg acting through the Babylonians

Question 2

Different words for miracle in Greek

Answer 2

• semeian: sign
• teras: wonder
• dynamos: power
• miraculum: object of wonder

Question 3

Different understandings of a miracle

Answer 3

• break in natural law
• healing
• done by a divine power
• An intentional and purposeful action
• Intrusion into the natural law and world
• will of a deity
• intrusion by an invisible force
• an action created as God had a point
• a coincidence —> RF Holland
• fortuitous and untimely event that has to be God —> Brian Davies
• continues cause (cause in esse) Donald McKay

Question 4

Examples of miracles (historical)

Answer 4

• Moses parting Red Sea
• Noah’s ark and flood
• feeding 500
• Manna from heaven
• Daniel in lion den
• 37 Jesus miracles: water into wine, half of these miracles are for healing
• Jesus walking on water
• Buddhism: when you become enlightened you have mystical powers eg walking on water and clairvoyance

Question 5

Modern miracles

Answer 5

• milk miracle —> 1995: all statues of Ganesh drink milk for the same 24 hour period (Murtis, made God)
• Lourdes: st Bernadette, place of healing, Catholic

Question 6

Key definitions of a miracle

Answer 6

• ‘he is the author of it, and intends to achieve some special end by it’ - J Macquarrie
• ‘something distinct from the natural order as a whole intrudes into it’ JL Mackie
• ‘by a particular volition of the Deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent’ Hume

Question 7

Aquinas on miracles

Answer 7

• ‘called miraculous which are done by divine power apart from the order generally followed in things’
• acts that nature could do but not in the order God did it
• miracles did without forcing the rules of nature
• a miracle is primarily defined as an act of God that has beneficial consequences for the recipient and may include breaking natural law

Question 8

Swinburne and Miracles

Answer 8

• needs a ‘deep ultimate purpose’
• As laws of nature are predictable, if an impossible event happens then it if fair to call it a miracle
• a random break in the laws of nature is therefore not a miracle as it needs a specific intention

Question 9

RF Holland and Miracles

Answer 9

• believes that miracles are just coincidences taken to be miraculous
• therefore a break in a natural law is not needed for an action to be seen as miraculous if a sense of divine purpose is strong enough
• young boy on a railway being saved as driver had heart attack is NOT a miracle

Question 10

Miracles as fortuitous events - Davies

Answer 10

• ‘unexpected and fortuitous events…disposed to give thanks to God’
• interpreted as natural but people see them as miracles as they are so fortuitous
• eg. Someone serving a tsunami

Question 11

miracles of jesus in the New T

Answer 11

• miracles seen as God’s mighty power and as signs
• faith is required to understand them –> can see Gods love and power in the acts
• miracles of jesus help to understand his nature but only believers will see it like that
• MOJ were signs he was from God and that God’s kingdom was being established in the world
• he was reluctant, he wanted people to believe based on teachings not miracles ‘unless you people see miraculous signs and wonders you will never believe’
• signs telling people to respond and change their lives and believe

HOWEVER
- how did he choose who to heal

Question 12

fundamentalist vs reductionist approaches

Answer 12

• F: taking the miracles God did as literal
• r: Bultmann says miracles were expressions relevant to bigger q of existence
• NT is about individuals making a personal decision about their direction in life including God
• this interpretation makes the bible more credible to modern readers as if we demythologise the bible we can extract the meaning of what the writers were trying to say
• the bible is just great advice

Question 13

what is realism concerning miracles

Answer 13

we can have knowledge of an objective reality; miracles are objective and are mind independent (scientific)
- miracles are a real part of what happens in the world
- brought by God or someone empowered by God –> they are evidence of Gods existence and concern for the world (strengthen faith)
- these things are true even if we do not completely understand miracles

Question 14

three definitions of miracles for a realist

Answer 14

1. a violation of natural law
   - Hume
   - a result of the will of God, needs religious significance
   - however can natural laws be violated
2. an event brought about by the power of God or another spiritual power
   - catholic ‘congregation for the causes of saints’ to verify miracles
3. an extraordinary coincidence of a beneficial nature
   - limited: describes an event but does not link the involvement of a supernatural power

Question 15

problems of realism

Answer 15

1. can laws of nature be objective
2. can we be objective about breaks in the laws of nature

if we do not know all the laws of nature, we do not know if there is an actual break in nature/miracles

• evidence for the natural law outweighs the miracle that may cause it to be revised
• why does evil still exist if God intervenes in nature
• why only one instance of a miracle, not lots of evidence

Question 16

natural law as descriptive

Answer 16

• law of nature does not dictate what must happen (prescriptive) if summarises what we have already observed
• if we see something different than an established law the evidence could be faulty, there could be added factors or the law needs to be adapted to take into account this evidence
• scientific laws can only be revised not broken –> Hick: law expands to include exception
• violation miracles are impossible as we simply expand our understanding of nature
• God is used as an explanation for gaps in scientific understanding but will be made redundant when we make new scientific discoveries

Question 17

natural laws as probabilistic

Answer 17

• they show what is likely to happen

Question 18

realist scholars on miracles

Answer 18

• John hick
• ‘it is possible to define the term in either purely physical and non religious terms…as an unusual and striking event that evokes and mediates a vivid awareness of God’
• david hume
  ‘transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the deity’
• thomas aquinas
  ‘those things which are done by divine power apart from the order generally folllowed in things’

Question 19

what is antirealism

Answer 19

skeptical of human interpretation of reality; miracles are subjective and mind dependent
- question of whether miracles are real or not is beyond human understanding
- miracles are mental states/attitudes that are to be understood in terms of psychology and sociology

Question 20

Tillich on antirealist miracles

Answer 20

• God is being itself –> existence itself
• no commitment to God as an actual being who brings about miracles
• miracles are sign events that cannot be divorced from their religious context (think lang games)
• event has to be astonishing without breaking a law of nature
• must point to the mystery of being –> persons experience
• has to be a sign symbol within a rel experience
• others can experience the same events and not see them as miracles

Question 21

problems with anti realist views on miracles

Answer 21

1. You cannot prove that the miracle has happened
2. valid interpretation?
3. have we understood God’s intention
4. why is this event interpreted as a miracle and only this one?
5. are religious facts simply interpretation (eg the incarnation, the raising of Jesus from the dead), undermined

Question 22

antirealist scholars on miracles

Answer 22

• Tillich
  ‘an event which is astonishing, unusual, shaking…even that points to the mystery of being’

-Swinburne
miracles can be ‘apparently impossible’ –> interpretation

RF Holland
- miracle is nothing more than an extraordinary coincidence which is seen in a religious way