Yakow points out that, by definition, alleged suspensions of natural laws "'...cannot be scientifically repeated.'" (p. 199) David Hume's argument is that, in our experience, dead men never return to life whereas men often err or lie so it is always more probable that an alleged resurrection did not happen.
Yakow continues:
"'...if we could show that there was in fact a Jesus Christ who did in fact rise from his tomb, he may have been in a coma, not dead.'" (ibid.)
If a man lost consciousness after three hours of impalement, if his legs were not broken to cause suffocation, if he was not interred but placed in a tomb and if he was seen alive a few days later, then the most likely explanation is that he had not died. I used to think that this was a plausible explanation but now propose a different theory. See Evidence For The Resurrection.
Some blog readers will be uninterested in such issues. However, I follow Poul Anderson's texts - provided that I am interested in the issues raised, which I usually am.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Needless to say, I don't agree with those who either denied Christ actually died on the cross or literally rose from the dead. So I don't agree with Hume, because he makes no exception for Christ or (apparently) at least concede God could do miracles.
If God exists, I believe it logically follows He could do miracles. This is how Fr. John Hardon, SJ, briefly defines miracles, from page 262 of POCKET CATHOLIC DICTIONARY (Image/Doubleday: October 1985): a miracle is "A sensibly perceptible effect, surpassing at least the powers of visible nature, produced by God to witness to some truth or testify to someone's sanctity."
The site most famously associated with miracles with many people these days is Lourdes, where, after the Blessed Virgin appeared to Bernadette Soubirous in 1858, a shrine was built and hundreds of miracles have been reported, and over a hundred accepted by medical investigators as having no known scientific cause.
I wonder how Hume would have reacted to Lourdes? Ignore it? Blindly and contemptuously dismiss it? Or honestly investigate it?
And of course we see Poul Anderson seriously examining the possibility of miracles in his story "A Chapter of Revelation." The perspective he took in that story being "What if miracles are real?"
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Hume's argument does not deny the possibility of miracles, just concludes that they are always the least likely explanation of reported phenomena. We would have to ask him about Lourdes if he were here now.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Which is why the Catholic Church is so wary and cautious about accepting as true reports of alleged miracles and apparitions of the saints. And insists on lengthy and severe investigations of them before accepting any of them as true. Something Anderson also mentioned in "Chapter."
Ad astra! Sean
Post a Comment