Untitled Essay, Research Paper
Discussion of the Feasibility of Miracles and the Grounds for Christianity existing
withoutMiracles. Kurt Erler
Philosophical Classics
11/11/96
In the following Discussion, I will point out the facts and ideas that
disagree with Hume’s ideas. The ideas are the ones on miracles in An Enquiry
Concerning Human Understanding involving Section ten Of Miracles. The idea of this is
using the circle philosophical argument. If one agrees that Christians believe in the
Bible, and that miracles have people understand the Bible as Hume points out, then
Christians must believe in miracles. If one takes away any of these things, the statement
does not hold. In this case, the removal of the Bible is used.
Hume confronts the ideas of religion directly by stating that without the splendor of
miracles, Christianity and other beliefs would not stand. He states that miracles are used
to make us believe the scriptures. This is not true, since from the starts of Christianity
there were not always scriptures. There were pieces of art work done for generations
before the texts were written and after that, they still had to be published. From there,
only the rich were well off enough to afford such a book. In fact, the Gospels were
written from 20-100 years after Christ died. The Acts were a collection of works made from
two hundred to three hundred years after the crucifixion, collected from different
accounts. And then there are the letters, which were written approximately four hundred
and fifty years after the fact. They were written by St. Paul, who was also a soldier for
the Roman army and killed hundreds of Christians, who believed and followed God, without
the scriptures that Hume talks about. From this, if you take away the scriptures,
God’s church carries on and if you take the people from the church, "God’s
church" still survives. The scriptures do not make people believe, they help people
understand. For this Hume is correct. He states that miracles help Christians understand
what they believe, but the belief and faith are deeper. Miracles and parables helped
people believe and understand what was to be our faith, but they are not what faith is
about. You can take any miracle, and faith will still exist.
Miracles are also becoming more understood. There is thought that as Hume presents, some
miracles are in themselves tricks of nature, such as the splitting of the Red Sea. At a
time of extreme low tide one can cross, and that the Egyptian army sank because of the mud
or their heavy armor they were laden with. There are bodies and armor found underneath the
Red Sea that is Roman and there exists evidence of this being the cause of it. Hume says
that miracles are the defiance or the breaking of the rules of nature. In his explanation,
the lifting of a house or mountain is just as big a miracle, as is the lifting of a
feather by the wind. As stated, in this Hume is possibly correct, that miracles are
phenomena of nature that can, with advances in science, be explained. This is what Hume
calls Transgressions of a law of nature. Hume defining non-natural events is led to
believe that they are miracles, but all the time miracles, through science, are seen to be
possible, so a miracle then is not a miracle as much know, yet the faith is not broken.
Hume is also trying to end in his mind, what he thinks is superstition. He thinks that
when we start to think clearly about religion, we will start to lose our belief in it.
Again he is using the argument that is stated in the above paragraph. Hume’s
criticisms are not aimed to tell you that your religious beliefs are false, instead he
does not agree with the evidence given to support their convictions. He says the only
advantage to holding onto your religious beliefs or being able to support them, is that
you could give an unbeliever reason to share your beliefs. If you think that there is
rational evidence for your beliefs, then you can go out and share them and get others to
believe the same. Again, Christianity holds without the miracles, for in the beginning,
there were no miracles that were talked about. Here is where a fideist is true. A fideist
is someone who is willing to stick to their religious beliefs without having to see proof
or miracles, so they just have faith. The advantage is that they are what people would be
without miracles and that they are what would carry the church if all the other proofs and
miracles didn’t occur anymore, for Jesus even said that "Blessed are they who
believe without seeing, for the kingdom of God is theirs."
Hume now goes on to say that we can never for certain know that miracles do exist. He says
that the closest thing we have to believe in miracles is the transgressions of a law of
nature (p. 77). Our beliefs in nature are the strongest. He says that otherwise, evidence
and witnesses can be wrong, and so the evidence found must be compelling enough that its
falsehood breaks laws of nature. For these reasons, we will never have enough or strong
enough evidence to prove that a miracle occurred. Again, since we depend on experience, as
Hume states, to know or explain what we see and what goes on, how can we know what a
miracle is or looks like, such as similar as the example that you have no reason to
believe that this world is incomplete and needs work, because you have never seen a
completed world.
This turns into his argument of knowing God through experience. Not
only can we not know God from experience of miracles, but he again uses the idea that
since we have never experienced God, we can not define him or what he is. This we can use
with the argument of mathematics. We have never experienced infinite, a line, a plane or
many other mathematical things, but we use them in many equations and in understanding
other things. Humans are capable of comprehending things that we do not entirely
understand.
Hume’s arguments do not hold, because of the strong beliefs and
ideas of humans before the knowing of miracles and the like. There is something innate
about humans that tell them that something is most likely there. The beginnings of the
universe, the creation of life, these things and others just do not appear from nowhere.
This is the same thing that makes people know what good and bad are. You can not believe
in God, but something still tells you that killing a baby is wrong and to help someone is
right. It is the feeling in the back of your head that does this to you. This is
Hume’s idea of morality. This is because of how we think one act would effect the
world. Therefore, when we see one person doing many good acts, we think of them as a good
person. We cannot infer that in another world a deity would change the small problems of
this world. Where ever we have beliefs based on experience we can go as far as experience
lets us go, but no further. This is Hume’s idea of understanding. Again, if one
points out the mathematical explanations, this does not hold. He says we cannot transcend
experience, so we have no idea of immortality. We get all idea from experience. Solid
beliefs come from observing constant occurrences of something. The only beliefs that will
stand up are beliefs that give you strong imperial evidence. Skepticism leads to
moderation in views and that is good.
The changing of these views leads us to still show that Hume is wrong in that faith,
infinite, and God still exists in human minds, even though we have never experienced him
fully. As shown, time did not always have miracles on text to show them the way. We had
faith and hope, and for many that is still all they have or need.Discussion of the Feasibility of Miracles and the Grounds for Christianity existing
withoutMiracles.
Kurt Erler
Philosophical Classics
11/11/96
In the following Discussion, I will point out the facts and ideas that
disagree with Hume’s ideas. The ideas are the ones on miracles in An Enquiry
Concerning Human Understanding involving Section ten Of Miracles. The idea of this is
using the circle philosophical argument. If one agrees that Christians believe in the
Bible, and that miracles have people understand the Bible as Hume points out, then
Christians must believe in miracles. If one takes away any of these things, the statement
does not hold. In this case, the removal of the Bible is used.
Hume confronts the ideas of religion directly by stating that without the splendor of
miracles, Christianity and other beliefs would not stand. He states that miracles are used
to make us believe the scriptures. This is not true, since from the starts of Christianity
there were not always scriptures. There were pieces of art work done for generations
before the texts were written and after that, they still had to be published. From there,
only the rich were well off enough to afford such a book. In fact, the Gospels were
written from 20-100 years after Christ died. The Acts were a collection of works made from
two hundred to three hundred years after the crucifixion, collected from different
accounts. And then there are the letters, which were written approximately four hundred
and fifty years after the fact. They were written by St. Paul, who was also a soldier for
the Roman army and killed hundreds of Christians, who believed and followed God, without
the scriptures that Hume talks about. From this, if you take away the scriptures,
God’s church carries on and if you take the people from the church, "God’s
church" still survives. The scriptures do not make people believe, they help people
understand. For this Hume is correct. He states that miracles help Christians understand
what they believe, but the belief and faith are deeper. Miracles and parables helped
people believe and understand what was to be our faith, but they are not what faith is
about. You can take any miracle, and faith will still exist.
Miracles are also becoming more understood. There is thought that as Hume presents, some
miracles are in themselves tricks of nature, such as the splitting of the Red Sea. At a
time of extreme low tide one can cross, and that the Egyptian army sank because of the mud
or their heavy armor they were laden with. There are bodies and armor found underneath the
Red Sea that is Roman and there exists evidence of this being the cause of it. Hume says
that miracles are the defiance or the breaking of the rules of nature. In his explanation,
the lifting of a house or mountain is just as big a miracle, as is the lifting of a
feather by the wind. As stated, in this Hume is possibly correct, that miracles are
phenomena of nature that can, with advances in science, be explained. This is what Hume
calls Transgressions of a law of nature. Hume defining non-natural events is led to
believe that they are miracles, but all the time miracles, through science, are seen to be
possible, so a miracle then is not a miracle as much know, yet the faith is not broken.
Hume is also trying to end in his mind, what he thinks is superstition. He thinks that
when we start to think clearly about religion, we will start to lose our belief in it.
Again he is using the argument that is stated in the above paragraph. Hume’s
criticisms are not aimed to tell you that your religious beliefs are false, instead he
does not agree with the evidence given to support their convictions. He says the only
advantage to holding onto your religious beliefs or being able to support them, is that
you could give an unbeliever reason to share your beliefs. If you think that there is
rational evidence for your beliefs, then you can go out and share them and get others to
believe the same. Again, Christianity holds without the miracles, for in the beginning,
there were no miracles that were talked about. Here is where a fideist is true. A fideist
is someone who is willing to stick to their religious beliefs without having to see proof
or miracles, so they just have faith. The advantage is that they are what people would be
without miracles and that they are what would carry the church if all the other proofs and
miracles didn’t occur anymore, for Jesus even said that "Blessed are they who
believe without seeing, for the kingdom of God is theirs."
Hume now goes on to say that we can never for certain know that miracles do exist. He says
that the closest thing we have to believe in miracles is the transgressions of a law of
nature (p. 77). Our beliefs in nature are the strongest. He says that otherwise, evidence
and witnesses can be wrong, and so the evidence found must be compelling enough that its
falsehood breaks laws of nature. For these reasons, we will never have enough or strong
enough evidence to prove that a miracle occurred. Again, since we depend on experience, as
Hume states, to know or explain what we see and what goes on, how can we know what a
miracle is or looks like, such as similar as the example that you have no reason to
believe that this world is incomplete and needs work, because you have never seen a
completed world.
This turns into his argument of knowing God through experience. Not
only can we not know God from experience of miracles, but he again uses the idea that
since we have never experienced God, we can not define him or what he is. This we can use
with the argument of mathematics. We have never experienced infinite, a line, a plane or
many other mathematical things, but we use them in many equations and in understanding
other things. Humans are capable of comprehending things that we do not entirely
understand.
Hume’s arguments do not hold, because of the strong beliefs and
ideas of humans before the knowing of miracles and the like. There is something innate
about humans that tell them that something is most likely there. The beginnings of the
universe, the creation of life, these things and others just do not appear from nowhere.
This is the same thing that makes people know what good and bad are. You can not believe
in God, but something still tells you that killing a baby is wrong and to help someone is
right. It is the feeling in the back of your head that does this to you. This is
Hume’s idea of morality. This is because of how we think one act would effect the
world. Therefore, when we see one person doing many good acts, we think of them as a good
person. We cannot infer that in another world a deity would change the small problems of
this world. Where ever we have beliefs based on experience we can go as far as experience
lets us go, but no further. This is Hume’s idea of understanding. Again, if one
points out the mathematical explanations, this does not hold. He says we cannot transcend
experience, so we have no idea of immortality. We get all idea from experience. Solid
beliefs come from observing constant occurrences of something. The only beliefs that will
stand up are beliefs that give you strong imperial evidence. Skepticism leads to
moderation in views and that is good.
The changing of these views leads us to still show that Hume is wrong in that faith,
infinite, and God still exists in human minds, even though we have never experienced him
fully. As shown, time did not always have miracles on text to show them the way. We had
faith and hope, and for many that is still all they have or need.