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Many religiously minded people would testify to a belief in miracles and would probably claim that they have either witnessed a miracle in their own life or in another’s. ... ‘miracles’ would contravene the ‘fixed laws’ of nature). ... However, this objection presupposes certain theological presuppositions, which may not be accepted by the reader, and as such cannot be taken as the starting point for our discussion. ... However this account may be objected to in that miracles are not necessarily ‘transgressions of a law of nature’. ... However, he also describes miracles as, ‘…those events in which something is done by God which nature could never do’ or, ‘… events in which God does something which nature can do, but not in this order ’ or, ‘… when God does what is usually done by the working of nature, but without the operation of the principles of nature’ (Davis p. ... By doing this he allows for the possibility of miracles to be events that occur within the ‘system’ of ‘natural activity’. ... However, if miracles can happen within the system of ‘natural activities’ how are we to tell when a miracle has occurred? Consider the following example:
‘Suppose… that a crucial bolt on a airliner is about to fail, and that in response to prayer for the safekeeping of those on board God miraculously fuses the bolt. ... Are miracles to remain beyond human validation and merely speculated on as to when, or if, they have occurred? ... The miracle has validated Jesus’ claim (and right) to forgive sins (for more on this see Miracles in the Bible). However, if all miracles are signs pointing to God we still have the problem of the bolt on the plane for as far as anyone is concerned nothing unusual has occurred and there is no ‘sign’ to be seen. ... Not necessarily! However, in order for a miracle to be validated as such we are usually looking for that which is not of the ‘ordinary’. Thus it seems that in order for one to validate and ‘observe’ miracles as supra-natural phenomena they may need to be considered along the lines of the Humean definition as a ‘transgression of a law of nature’ (and we have already discussed issues associated with propagating the notion that there are immutable ‘laws of nature’).
Approximate Word count = 1894
Approximate Pages = 7.6
(250 words per page double spaced)
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