Miracles: Myth or Fact

[Kriya Yogi]

Illusions. Unless you can say for yourself as his apprentice or whatever that it there was no trick and it was supernatural...

Criss Angel walked on water, levitated, materialized items, etc.

I wouldn't say they are or aren't illusions until we can prove whether they are real or not. You calling them illusions is just as presumptuous as myself calling them real. I have my reasons to believe God Realized beings exist and they can perform miracles. Some are fakes and some are real.

 

[Kriya Yogi]

Thanks for endorsing my reality-based perspective.

I think it's good to not believe everything you hear without evidence. I'm of the same mind. However I believe my Guru speaks the truth because he has proven to me to be truly God realized so I believe his every word. I'm not asking anyone else to believe, I'm just stating my stance on the subject at hand.

 

[Revoltingest]

Materialize anything you can think of.

I understand the claim that he's capable of this.
I was just wondering what you actually observed for yourself.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

But then we'd have to ask why would people make this stuff up?

It may not seem intuitive at first, but it's a question worth entertaining.

And if they made up the miracle stories, why are they reasonably consistent? That is, if 10 people from different geographic areas make up a set of miracle stories at about the same time, what is the likelihood that they will come up with relatively the same thing?

It's just a question.

If this approach is valid for ancient tales of miracles, then it's even more valid for modern tales of alien abductions where we have written and even video testimony from people who claim to be abductees that are consistent to a remarkable degree.

BTW - how do you know that those ancient miracle accounts are consistent? It seems to me that you may be making assumptions about the original source material. Even if 10 Christians from different areas have consistent accounts, 10 Muslims or 10 Zoroastrians could have accounts that are consistent within their faith but inconsistent with their Christian neighbours.

Depending on the process that brought the accounts to us today, there may be a bit of the Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy at play: random, generally inconsistent accounts would create clusters, so it'd be pretty easy to pick one cluster that agrees with one's beliefs, declare it significant, and dismiss the rest of the accounts as lies or delusions.

Yeah, I don't disagree about the miracle of Jesus (at least as he is remembered in the Gospels).

But ancient oral transmission worked a bit more reliable than modern transmission... in fact, some people refer to oral traditions as "oral texts."

These folks had much better training in memory and could retain and retell stories with much greater accuracy than us.

But I'm sure there would be different standards of oral transmission. I mean, even in an entirely oral culture, the story your neighbour tells you about what his goat did yesterday wouldn't get the same reverential treatment as an epic poem about the exploits of a god. There would still have to be some sort of process where an event or person would have to be recognized as special before the stories of it or him/her would get the treatment you describe, right?

You are completely missing what I am saying. I did not say that there is anything supernatural going on. I am not even calling these events miracles. I am saying that in some people's perspectives, there are miracles that happen.

But that doesn't mean that their perspective is correct. It's entirely possible for someone to be wrong when they call an event a miracle. Even if the person honestly believes that an event was a miracle, this doesn't mean that it was one; it could simply mean that the person was honestly mistaken.

 

[Kriya Yogi]

I understand the claim that he's capable of this.
I was just wondering what you actually observed for yourself.

Well I've never been lucky enough to meet him personally. I've never been out of America. I know of people that have and they say he materialized bangals and flowers that produced another flowers smell. He isn't the only one that can do these things though. He's always been widely known to produce these miracles all the time.

 

[fallingblood]

But that doesn't mean that their perspective is correct. It's entirely possible for someone to be wrong when they call an event a miracle. Even if the person honestly believes that an event was a miracle, this doesn't mean that it was one; it could simply mean that the person was honestly mistaken.

I completely agree. On the subject of miracles, I am a skeptic. However, I believe their perspective must be taken into consideration in these ancient accounts.

 

[fallingblood]

Well I've never been lucky enough to meet him personally. I've never been out of America. I know of people that have and they say he materialized bangals and flowers that produced another flowers smell. He isn't the only one that can do these things though. He's always been widely known to produce these miracles all the time.

He is only widely known to produce these miracles by the people who believe he has some special powers.

However, his claims are unproven. He had never submitted himself to actual testing, and I think there is good reason for that (as, if his powers are so real, he could easily be rewarded a million dollars by various skeptic societies). More so, if one watches various videos in which he is in, one can see he is doing nothing more than simple conjuring tricks.

This is actually something I have spent quite a bit of time researching. Being a magician/illusionist myself, I have become interested in the various fakirs, god-men, and the like in India. I think some of the tricks they perform are amazing, and have incorporated them in my own show, but they are nothing more than that.

My problem with these supposed holy men though is that they prey on innocent people.

 

[Kriya Yogi]

He is only widely known to produce these miracles by the people who believe he has some special powers.

However, his claims are unproven. He had never submitted himself to actual testing, and I think there is good reason for that (as, if his powers are so real, he could easily be rewarded a million dollars by various skeptic societies). More so, if one watches various videos in which he is in, one can see he is doing nothing more than simple conjuring tricks.

This is actually something I have spent quite a bit of time researching. Being a magician/illusionist myself, I have become interested in the various fakirs, god-men, and the like in India. I think some of the tricks they perform are amazing, and have incorporated them in my own show, but they are nothing more than that.

My problem with these supposed holy men though is that they prey on innocent people.

Yeah I actually doubt some of these "holy men's" powers as well. Most holy men of God don't flaunt their powers publicly. I'm not prepared to say that Satya Sai Baba or men like him are fake or real for that matter either, because we don't know for sure. I definitely believe, however that some saints in India are truly capable of performing miracles.

 

[Warren Clark]

I wouldn't say they are or aren't illusions until we can prove whether they are real or not. You calling them illusions is just as presumptuous as myself calling them real. I have my reasons to believe God Realized beings exist and they can perform miracles. Some are fakes and some are real.

No one can defy the law that mass cannot be created or destroyed. There is always an explanation even if we do not know it.

 

[fallingblood]

No one can defy the law that mass cannot be created or destroyed. There is always an explanation even if we do not know it.

And with many of these holy men, the explanation is not very difficult.

 

[outhouse]

look, we know ancient hebrews created much of the jesus persona and dogma using allegory, parables and metaphors.

look at the OT miracles created that we know historically and scientifically didnt happen at all, let alone there be confusion about how the trick was done.


I suspect we have the full gamet of what everyone so far has proposed. Its a combination of different viewpoints, but lets be clear beyond a trick there is no real magic at hand or we would still be seeing these things happen we cannot explain with todays science.

I guess what im trying to say is there is zero historicity with jesus and his miracles. No eye witnesses and obvious additions and forgerys to create a fufillment of OT prophecys is what I see and nothing more. This put the weight or burden of proof on those who believe said miracles.

 

[fallingblood]

look, we know ancient hebrews created much of the jesus persona and dogma using allegory, parables and metaphors.

look at the OT miracles created that we know historically and scientifically didnt happen at all, let alone there be confusion about how the trick was done.


I suspect we have the full gamet of what everyone so far has proposed. Its a combination of different viewpoints, but lets be clear beyond a trick there is no real magic at hand or we would still be seeing these things happen we cannot explain with todays science.

I guess what im trying to say is there is zero historicity with jesus and his miracles. No eye witnesses and obvious additions and forgerys to create a fufillment of OT prophecys is what I see and nothing more. This put the weight or burden of proof on those who believe said miracles.

Or, a more simple explanation is that Jesus did things that were seen as miracles in the same way that holy men from India do things that are seen as miracles.

 

[ellenjanuary]

If it happens once, it's a miracle; more than once, science.

But it is not so much from the mind that sees, is the miracle witnessed, but rather the heart that believes. Not to say one must be naive, either, more like, willing to accept a bit of uncertainty. And that is the way it occurs scientifically, that the mind of the observer must be willing to allow for a possibility before a probability can be formulated into theory.

But no, I don't personally credit "scriptural miracle" because it comes across (to me) as being mostly sensationalism.

 

[outhouse]

Or, a more simple explanation is that Jesus did things that were seen as miracles in the same way that holy men from India do things that are seen as miracles.

yes true,, but

So far we have been using a blanket to cover all of said miracles.

really each one can have a different explanation, I can understand your defense of possible fiction but I find a more realistic stance that one cannot rule it out.


I still dont think that jesus preformed tricks in front of people, he didnt have to as his words were his wisdom. Its my opinion he had nothing to prove to anybody and wasnt trying to fufill a prophecy. He was trying to get a message out and may have had some ancient medical knowledge, beyond that i'd have to look at each of said miracles to base judgement on.

 

[kepha31]

Christ's miracles were always used not for entertainment or personal profit but to confirm His claims, as when He cured the paralytic to demonstrate His power to forgive his sins, or cured the Centurion's servant to prove the power of Faith, or multiplied the loaves to teach about the Eucharist, or changed bread and wine into His body and blood to institute the Eucharist. In all, Christ's miracles certified His teachings, including His teachings about Himself.

To ask whether or not Jesus did miracles means to challenge who he said He is. His teachings and his miracles are two sides of the coin.

If Jesus performed no miracles then the onus is on the person making the claim to prove that Jesus was not who he claimed to be. Then I have to counter with the evidence of the Resurrection. Once it is adequately demonstrated with reason, and without recourse to the Bible or the Magisterium, the original claim becomes moot.
EXPLAINING AWAY JESUS’ RESURESCTION (This Rock: August 1991)


Scientific Evidence for Miracles page 1: examination of the Lourdes rules for miracel acceptence.
Scientific Evidence for Miracles page 2

To discredit the countless miracles that had been given in confirmation of the Catholic faith, the original Protestant Reformers utterly rejected the idea that miracles had continued beyond the apostolic age.

However, when the Pentecostal movement began in Protestantism in 1900, with its emphasis on miraculous healing and other charisms, the Pentecostals had to find ways to try to explain why such miracles had "vanished" for so long. The answer is that they never did, as the following quotes of the early Church Fathers show. Miracles have always been found in the Catholic Church, and the idea that they stopped with the death of the last apostle would have been foreign to the early Church Fathers.

Historian Ramsay MacMullen points out that contemporary miracles played a central role in Christian apologetics in the early centuries: "When careful assessment is made of passages in the ancient written evidence that clearly indicate [a] motive . . . leading a person to conversion, they show (so far as I can discover): first, the operation of a desire for blessings . . . second, and much more attested, a fear of physical pain . . . third, and most frequent, credence in miracles" (Christianizing the Roman Empire, 108 A.D.).

"Christian writers themselves . . . portray the learned and sophisticated as having been won over by sheer force of logic, and the unlearned, by a sort of stupefaction or terror before the greatness of God’s power" (ibid., 109).

Do Miracles Still Occur?

 

[outhouse]

1 Changing water into wine



2 Healing of the royal official's son



3 Healing of a man possessed by a demon in Capernaum



4 Healing of Simon Peter's mother-in-law



5 Healing the sick during the evening



6 Catching a large number of fish



7 Healing a leper



8 Healing a centurion's servant



9 Healing a paralyzed man



10 Healing a withered hand



11 Raising a widow's son



12 Calming the stormy sea



13 Healing the Gerasene demon-possessed man



14 Healing a woman with internal bleeding



15 Raising Jairus' daughter



16 Healing two blind men



17 Healing a mute man possessed by a demon



18 Healing a man who was crippled for 38 years



19 Feeding 5000 men and their families



20 Walking on water



21 Healing of many in Gennesaret



22 Healing a demon-possessed girl



23 Healing a deaf man with a speech impediment



24 Feeding the 4000 men and their families



25 Healing a blind man in Bethsaida



26 Healing a man born blind



27 Healing a boy possessed by a demon



28 Catching a fish with a coin in its mouth



29 Healing a blind and mute man who was possessed by a demon



30 Healing a woman with an 18 year infirmity



31 Healing a man with dropsy



32 Healing 10 men suffering from leprosy



33 Bringing Lazarus back to life



34 Healing Bartimaeus of blindness



35 The withering fig tree that produced no fruit



36 Restoring a severed ear



37 Catching of the 153 fish

 

[fallingblood]

yes true,, but

So far we have been using a blanket to cover all of said miracles.

really each one can have a different explanation, I can understand your defense of possible fiction but I find a more realistic stance that one cannot rule it out.


I still dont think that jesus preformed tricks in front of people, he didnt have to as his words were his wisdom. Its my opinion he had nothing to prove to anybody and wasnt trying to fufill a prophecy. He was trying to get a message out and may have had some ancient medical knowledge, beyond that i'd have to look at each of said miracles to base judgement on.

If one looks at the majority of the miracles that Jesus supposedly performed, one will see that most of them are either exorcisms or healings. These would have played directly into the message that he was preaching.

 

[outhouse]

If one looks at the majority of the miracles that Jesus supposedly performed, one will see that most of them are either exorcisms or healings. These would have played directly into the message that he was preaching.

I have no problems with those

other then I think they were all exaggerated since we have no reliable record of such events.

I good knowlegeable healer would have done things that seemed like miracles and I can see the path from event to oral tradition to exaggeration or even stories splitting into many fables. but from event to papyrus is understandable with no real miracle in sight.

 

[idav]

Do Miracles Still Occur?

Hard to say miracles still occur because there are always reasonable explanations. No longer is there anyone that can demonstrate miracles with any consistency which makes it pure coincidence when something seemingly unusual occurs. One example is the miracle Catholics attribute to the late pope when a womans parkinsons went away when praying to the late pope. Some doctors say the woman may have been wrongly diagnosed in the first place. Pretty inexplicable if legit as I'm not aware of Parkinsons just going away.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

"Miracles happen within the rules."

Just thought I'd jump back to this.

Since I'd define a miracle as something like "a special exception to the normal laws of nature caused by God", IMO, a miracle is necessarily outside "the rules".

In keeping with this, I also think that for us to claim a miracle, we also have to have a reasonable idea of what those "rules" are, otherwise, we wouldn't be able to say when they've been breached or not.

This is a big part of why I reject the entire idea of miracles. IMO, if an unexpected event happens, it's always more reasonable to chalk it up to our less-than-perfect understanding of the laws of nature (and try to revise our understanding to account for what happened) than it is to say that we know the laws of nature well enough to determine that the event did violate them.

... especially because the whole way that we deduce the laws of nature in the first place is by observing and measuring what happens and what doesn't. An unexpected event is just one more data point to add to the mix in figuring out how things work.