Craig Keener on Miracles

Sunday, February 19, 2012

"It was Hume who first spoke of miracles as violations of nature. But Christians don't believe that the Legislator is subject to any of the laws of nature."

- Craig Keener, here.

4 comments :

Anonymous said...: I believe with all my hart that miracles are real and happen every day, I also believe that when God preforms a miracle,he does so to show his glory and love and to show us he is still on the thrown and in control and do not fear we are not alone.
You don't have to agree with it,it's just something that gives me comfort.; Monday, February 20, 2012 at 10:39:00 PM GMT
Anonymous said...: The only problem with Keeners claim is that if the Legislator is changing the laws willy nilly the world quickly becomes unintelligible and the knowledge of our God-given senses become untrustworthy to the point that we can no longer trust the witness of scripture or the Holy Spirit.

To reduce the Creator to some sort of deceitful trickster god who throws out all objectivity and suspends and changes the rules for the most trifling matters but not those of real concern makes me very uncomfortable and appears to me to border on heresy.; Friday, February 24, 2012 at 4:36:00 PM GMT
Stephen said...: Anon 2, I'm not sure this is what Keener is arguing. Is interrupting a law the same as changing it? Let's assume God raised Christ from the dead. Clearly he didn't change a law, or all the dead would rise, as that became the new law.; Friday, February 24, 2012 at 7:55:00 PM GMT
dgfisch said...: The second anonymous stated >> The only problem with Keeners claim is that if the Legislator is changing the laws willy nilly the world quickly becomes unintelligible and the knowledge of our God-given senses become untrustworthy ...

Interesting comment. I ask, "Does an airplane annul the laws of gravity?" Obviously not, since we have gone beyond the concept of gravity and discovered further forces of thrust, drag, lift that can counter the downward pull gravity offers. Our understanding of aerodynamics have to some extent modified our conception of what gravity can do to objects heavier than air. If we could bring to this time such scientists as da Vinci and George Cayley, who designed structures that could support flight centuries before, and Otto Lilienthal, whose glider designs in the 1870's influenced the Wright Brothers in the 1900's, wouldn't they still marvel at a first sight of an airplane they could only imagine? I would imagine such a sensation that I could match in seeing color television after living a short time of my life in the realm of black-and-white television. However, today color TV is such a granted notion that we can't imagine the times when such was not possible, other than what we may see in a retro television station.

If man is such adept at finding the "loopholes" in science, what is the difficulty in attributing this same quality to the Creator God who would lay down the elementary rudiments of science that we have just now discovered, and have such a control over the remainder that we have yet to comprehend?; Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 2:42:00 PM GMT