Miracles and Anti-supernaturalism

[frankiej]

They're just trying to sneak the resurrection in the back door,

I hear that rectums are not good places to practice necromancy.

[Tonus]

"But can the modern man accept a "miracle" such as the resurrection? The answer is a surprising one: The resurrection has to be accepted by us just because we are modern men, men living in the Einstein relativistic age.

So it's true... Dionysus was resurrected!

[Godscreated]

No, the possibility of the resurrection has to be accepted, and I do accept that there is a number rapidly approaching but not equal to zero that represents the likelihood that a carpenter was raised from the dead 2000 years ago.

Still, that doesn't mean anything for my life, I would argue the possibility that a meteor hits me on the head as I type this is higher, and so far so good (*looks up*)

Well was he ever dead? what school did the doctor who pronounced him dead go to? was he having an off day?

If someone who you think is dead gets up. The chances are they weren't dead.

The Roman soldiers who crucified people were experts at their jobs, they would have never allowed Jesus off that cross if they did not know He was dead. It would have cost them their lives, it is told to us that when the spear was run through His side a mix of blood and water poured out, Jesus had bleed out and pouring out bodily fluids. Again the Romans were proficient at crucifying people, they would break the legs of those still alive after a certain amount of time so they would suffocate shortly after that. They did not do that to Jesus, as prophecy foretold, they knew He was dead.

[Baalzebutt]

The Roman soldiers who crucified people were experts at their jobs, they would have never allowed Jesus off that cross if they did not know He was dead. It would have cost them their lives, it is told to us that when the spear was run through His side a mix of blood and water poured out, Jesus had bleed out and pouring out bodily fluids. Again the Romans were proficient at crucifying people, they would break the legs of those still alive after a certain amount of time so they would suffocate shortly after that. They did not do that to Jesus, as prophecy foretold, they knew He was dead.

I asked this in another thread. Maybe slightly off-topic here but I would really like an answer:

Ok, please explain this to me. If I commit the ultimate sin of not believing in jesus, I will be cast into hell and tortured for eternity.

However, jesus, who took on the sins of all mankind, was crucified, dead for three days, then rose and now sits at the right hand of god. Never did ANY time at all in hell, didn't stay dead, and basks in the light of himself for all eternity.

So how does this work? I go to hell forever for my sins but my sins were forgiven by a guy who had a really bad hangover for a couple of days?

[Ryantology]

For those who do not believe in miracles, I proppse the following for discussion:
from Josh McDowell's book New Evidence that Demands a Verdict, p. 359-360
J.W.N. Sullivan says, "that since the publication of Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity and Planck's endeavors with "black-body radiation," scientists are faced with "the vicissitudes of so-called natural law in an uncharted and unobstructed universe."
James Moore says that "today scientists will admit that no one knows enough about 'natural law' to say that any event is necessarily a violation of it. They agree that an individual's non-statistical sample of time and space is hardly sufficient ground on which to base immutable generalizations concerning the nature of the entire universe. Today, what we commonly term 'natural law' is in fact only our inductive and statistical descriptions of natural phenomena."

Okay, so what you're saying is that there are no miracles, there are just things we don't understand and some people decide to term these events miracles in lieu of waiting to find out what really happened. Got it.

John Montgomery denotes that he anti-supernatural position is both "philosophically and scientifically irresponsible." First of all, philosophically: "because no one below the status of god could know the universe so well as to eliminate miracles a priori."

This is a weak position. Even though precisely zero alleged miracles have ever been confirmed outside of whatever belief dreamed them up, it is irresponsible to to suggest that miracles are impossible. What's even more irresponsible is treating the idea of miracles as if it is worthy of actual consideration when, as noted, we have yet to see even a single miracle which survives any kind of critical scrutiny.

Secondly, scientifically: "because in th age of Einsteinian physics (so different from the world of Newtonian absolutes in which Hume formulated his classic anti-miraculous argument) the universe has opened up to all possibilities, 'any attempt to state a "universal law of causation" must prove futile and only careful consideration of the empirical testimony for a miraculous event can determine whether in fact it has or has not occurred."

This, again, actually succeeds only in taking the supernatural element out of so-called miracles. They are just physical events we currently do not understand. This has, thus far, been the case with every single supernatural event which has been subjected to science: eventually, we learn that plagues are caused by microbes and hurricanes are caused by specific wind and moisture combinations. Neither of them is magic spun by an angry God. Science, so far, has a perfect track record when faced with the supernatural. Not one single alleged supernatural event has ever been tested, scrutinized, and verified to have certainly not had a natural cause.

"But can the modern man accept a "miracle" such as the resurrection? The answer is a surprising one: The resurrection has to be accepted by us just because we are modern men, men living in the Einstein relativistic age.

This is a complete non-sequitor. I don't have to accept a resurrection from 2,000 years ago even if resurrection was verified tomorrow; it does not follow that verifying the possibility of resurrection proves that Jesus was resurrected. Of course, we still have no resurrections on record, so the point seems to be moot at present.

For us, unlike the Newtonian epoch, the universe is not longer a tight safe predictable playing field in which we know all the rules. Since Einstein no modern has had the right to rule out the possibility of events because of prior knowledge of "natural." The only way we can know whether an event can occur is to see whether in fact it has occurred. The problem of "miracles", then. must be solved in the realm of historical investigation, not in the realm of philosophical speculation."

The problem of miracles is that a lot of people, even educated ones, understand that unlikely doesn't mean impossible when arguing against an atheist (unless you're Statler Waldorf, anyway), but then conveniently forget this when it is turned the other way and applied to events that are unlikely to occur in nature. They must have a supernatural cause, they say. No natural explanation we have today fits, they say.

Vincent Taylor warns against too great a dogmatism with regard to the miraculous: "It is far too late today to dismiss the question by saying that "miracles are impossible":; that stage of the discussion is definitely past. Science takes a much humbler and truer view of natural law that was characteristic of former times; we now know that eh "laws of Nature" are convenient summaries of existing knowledge. Nature is not a "closed system," and miracles are not "intrusions" in to an "established order." In the last fifty years we have been staggered too often by discoveries which at one time were pronounced impossible. ... This change of thought does not, of course, accredit the miraculous; but it does mean that, given the right conditions, miracles are not impossible; no scientific or philosophic dogma stand in the way.

Miracles, as defined by Christianity, would (in fact, must) necessarily be intrusions on the natural order. That is what a miracle is. If it is part of the natural order, even if that element of the natural order is not understood at present, it is not a miracle, nor is it supernatural. It's just a plain old natural event with causes currently beyond our abilities to explain. Just as earthquakes, weather, and disease were until as recently as 200 years ago.

[Godscreated]

The Roman soldiers who crucified people were experts at their jobs, they would have never allowed Jesus off that cross if they did not know He was dead. It would have cost them their lives, it is told to us that when the spear was run through His side a mix of blood and water poured out, Jesus had bleed out and pouring out bodily fluids. Again the Romans were proficient at crucifying people, they would break the legs of those still alive after a certain amount of time so they would suffocate shortly after that. They did not do that to Jesus, as prophecy foretold, they knew He was dead.

I asked this in another thread. Maybe slightly off-topic here but I would really like an answer:

Ok, please explain this to me. If I commit the ultimate sin of not believing in jesus, I will be cast into hell and tortured for eternity.

However, jesus, who took on the sins of all mankind, was crucified, dead for three days, then rose and now sits at the right hand of god.

So how does this work? I go to hell forever for my sins but my sins were forgiven by a guy who had a really bad hangover for a couple of days?

No you will not be tortured in hell, so you're wrong on that point, but yes hell will be your chosen eternal destination.
You are correct to say, Jesus took on your sins, yet they are not forgiven until you accept Christ as your Savior and Lord, no one's sin is forgiven until they accept Christ for who He is and what He did for them. There's nothing hard here to understand, it was made simple to understand.

Think it was just a bad hangover and I assume you know what a hangover is, try being crucified and let me know about half way through, oh you need to be beaten within a literal inch of your life before hand.

[Baalzebutt]

I asked this in another thread. Maybe slightly off-topic here but I would really like an answer:

Ok, please explain this to me. If I commit the ultimate sin of not believing in jesus, I will be cast into hell and tortured for eternity.

However, jesus, who took on the sins of all mankind, was crucified, dead for three days, then rose and now sits at the right hand of god.

So how does this work? I go to hell forever for my sins but my sins were forgiven by a guy who had a really bad hangover for a couple of days?

No you will not be tortured in hell, so you're wrong on that point, but yes hell will be your chosen eternal destination.
You are correct to say, Jesus took on your sins, yet they are not forgiven until you accept Christ as your Savior and Lord, no one's sin is forgiven until they accept Christ for who He is and what He did for them. There's nothing hard here to understand, it was made simple to understand.

Think it was just a bad hangover and I assume you know what a hangover is, try being crucified and let me know about half way through, oh you need to be beaten within a literal inch of your life before hand.

Well done. You completely avoided the question.

Want to try again and maybe actually answer the question this time?

[FallentoReason]

I asked this in another thread. Maybe slightly off-topic here but I would really like an answer:

Ok, please explain this to me. If I commit the ultimate sin of not believing in jesus, I will be cast into hell and tortured for eternity.

However, jesus, who took on the sins of all mankind, was crucified, dead for three days, then rose and now sits at the right hand of god.

So how does this work? I go to hell forever for my sins but my sins were forgiven by a guy who had a really bad hangover for a couple of days?

No you will not be tortured in hell, so you're wrong on that point, but yes hell will be your chosen eternal destination.
You are correct to say, Jesus took on your sins, yet they are not forgiven until you accept Christ as your Savior and Lord, no one's sin is forgiven until they accept Christ for who He is and what He did for them. There's nothing hard here to understand, it was made simple to understand.

Think it was just a bad hangover and I assume you know what a hangover is, try being crucified and let me know about half way through, oh you need to be beaten within a literal inch of your life before hand.

Sorry to interject... but this has been done to death in a couple of threads dedicated on the topic. There was no sacrifice because we're talking about an omnipotent and omniscient entity. What did he sacrifice if he didn't stay dead? How is it a sacrifice if he knows nothing will be lost in the long run? In short, any entity paying itself for something is by nature meaningless and void of any substance. It's just pure

[BettyG]

I hear a circular argument: If miracles are impossible, the report of any miraculous event must be false, and therefore, miracles are impossible.

I am defining miracles as special acts of God in the world. Since miracles are special acts of God, they can only exist where there is a God who can perform such acts. If one does not believe in God, then they cannot say miracles, as I define them, are impossible.
Hume's position was that miracles were violations of the laws of nature. He said nothing is esteemed a miracle if it happens in the common course of nature. It is no miracle that a man, seemingly healthy, should die suddenly. 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.
Instead of weighting the evidence in favor of miracles, Hume simply plays statistical games. He adds evidence against them. Since death occurs over and over again and resurrection occurs only on rare occasions at best, Hume simply adds up all the deaths against the very few alleged Resurrection and rejects the later....But this does not involve weighing the evidence to determine whether or not a given person, say Jesus of Nazareth... has been raised from the dead. It is simply adding up the evidence of all other occasions where people have died and have not been raised and using it to overwhelm any possible evidence that some person who died was brought back to life... Second, this argument equates quantity of evidence and probability. It says, in effect, that we should always believe what is most probable) in the sense of "enjoying the highest odds". But this is silly. On the these grounds a dice player should not believe the dice show three sides on the first roll, since the odds against it are 1,635,013,559,600 to 1. What Hume seems to overlook is that wise people base their beliefs on facts, not simply on odds. Sometimes the "odds' against an event are high (based on past observations), but the evidence for the event is otherwise very good. (based on current observation or reliable testimony.) Hume's argument confuses quantity of evidence with the quality of evidence. Evidence should be weighed, not added.

Moreover, Hume confuses the probability of historical events with the way in which scientists employ probability to formulate scientific law. In science, the more times an event is observed, under similar occurrences and similar conditions, the greater the probability that scientists think their formulation of a law is correct. But historical events including miracles are different; the events of history are unique and non-repeatable. Therefore, treating historical events including miracles with the same notion of probability the scientist uses in formulating his laws ignores a fundamental difference between the two subject matters.

C.S. Lewis answers Hume’s assertion that nothing is esteemed a miracle if it ever happens in the common course of nature.” Lewis says,” Now of course we must agree with Hume that if there is absolutely ‘uniform experience’ against miracles, if in other wor4ds they have never happened, why then they never have. Unfortunately, we know the experience against them to be uniform only if we know that all reports of them are false. And we can know all the reports of them to be false only if we know already that miracles have never occurred. In fact, we are arguing in a circle.”

[Baalzebutt]

Sorry to interject... but this has been done to death in a couple of threads dedicated on the topic. There was no sacrifice because we're talking about an omnipotent and omniscient entity. What did he sacrifice if he didn't stay dead? How is it a sacrifice if he knows nothing will be lost in the long run? In short, any entity paying itself for something is by nature meaningless and void of any substance. It's just pure

I couldn't agree more. I'm just curious how he is going to justify it.