Why Yahweh? (Or Allah, or Zeus, etc.)

[John V]

First of all, the muslims have a counter-argument. http://darulfatwa.org.au/content/view/819/288/

Where? They agree that extraordinary miracles of healing are attributed to Jesus. They state that the greatest miracle of Muhammed is the writing of the Quran. They then list supposed miracles of Muhammed. These miracles are not found in the Quran. In the Quran, Muhammed expressly states that the doesn't have miraculous powers. These miracles came about in later tradition, which is what we would expect of a legend growing up around true but mundane events. Critics of Christianity recognize this principle and speculate that there must have been non-miraculous texts on which the gospels were built, but no such texts have been found.

Secondly, the miracles of the bible are not attributed to any of the authors.

Huh?!? Ever read Acts?

Jesus did not write any of the bible, so I do not see how miracle claims make the bible more valid. According to Islam, the very writing of the Qur'an was a miracle. (I think I've been spelling it wrong...) We know the Qur'an exists; is that proof of a miracle?

Do you find writing a book to be extraordinary? I don't. Remember, I started the line on miracles by noting the principle that extraordinary claims (such as a revelation from god) require extraordinary evidence (such as miracles). (Apparently Rhythm missed this.) Seems pretty circular to say that the revelation is evidence of itself.

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Try looking at it this way.

Suppose we found a text that appears older than the gospels. This text has the basic mundane elements of the gospels: Jesus traveling and teaching, parables, etc. But, it has no miraculous elements. In fact, people challenge Jesus to produce a miracle, and he admits he can't.

Wouldn't you say that this text undermines the position that Jesus performed miracles?

Well, we have that text for Islam - it's called the Quran.