A brief break from this series ...

Regular readers will know that I am very fond of humor. With that in mind, this current series will take a short break so as not to run together with tomorrow's special announcements.

Why raise Jesus from the dead?

This continues the repost of a response to Michael Martin on Jesus' resurrection.

Mr. Martin's original article gives prominent place to one particular complaint: there is (he states) no plausible reason why the resurrection should have occurred. In the course of this response, I will discuss a number of the reasons for Jesus’ resurrection.

God's Purposes and Jesus' Resurrection

When discussing the resurrection and God’s purpose, Mr. Martin limits the discussion to theories of atonement. While I will also respond to Mr. Martin on the atonement, the discussion of God’s purpose will not be limited to atonement alone. We will also consider the resurrection in light of the view that a miracle may also be a sign which communicates a message.

In preparation, we will first recall some known facts -- our background knowledge for assessing the evidence for Jesus’ resurrection. The first thing to recall is that Jesus is among a very rare group of people in the history of the world: people who founded a major religion. While this is undisputed and very likely to be relevant, Mr. Martin does not consider it in his assessment. From a simple standpoint of logic, it can easily have a bearing on whether God has any purpose in resurrecting Jesus from the dead. Another thing to recall is that, in the Judaism of Jesus’ day, previous teaching on resurrection was not especially strong, with no explicit support for it in the Torah and no other officially-recognized scriptures besides the Torah. In that day, it was an acceptable Jewish belief that there was no resurrection from the dead, with the party of Sadducees holding that belief. If the teaching of a future resurrection of all people from the dead is true, it is among the most relevant and important teachings in the history of religion. To be sure, some people had taught as if a resurrection would come. But these had not gained full acceptance as of the time of Jesus.

Jesus’ resurrection is a sign that clarifies the answers to many questions:

1. It serves as a final answer as to whether there is life after death. As a sign, it clearly indicates that God raises the dead.
   
2. It serves as a sign validating Jesus' teachings on the resurrection. It indicates that among the various teachings of what happens after death, Jesus’ teaching on resurrection is true. This is a sign of the certainty of Jesus' teaching that there will be a general resurrection in the future.
   
3. It shows God’s faithfulness to his creation. From confirming Jesus' teaching of the future resurrection of all people, it follows that it is also a sign that God has not abandoned humanity to pain, meaninglessness, and death. It confirms Jesus' pledge to us that our own tombs will one day be empty, and we will rise to life again just as he rose. From this we can see the reason for the hope we have in us.
   
4. It foretells the promised renewal of creation to a state of goodness that is no longer subject to death and corruption. Restoring nature to what God intended is one connecting link between Jesus’ healing miracles and his resurrection. Jesus’ work restoring nature is affirmed as God’s own purpose by Jesus’ restoration to life. Together with the background of Jesus’ other miracles restoring the sick, the blind, and the crippled, it shows that any evil, disease, death, or destruction that may confront us still cannot defeat God’s purpose of restoring us and renewing all things.
   
5. The resurrection is a sign indicating the final practical resolution of the problem of evil. It is a sign showing the weak and temporary nature of suffering and death, and the truth of Jesus' promises regarding the world to come.
   
6. It is a vindication of the goodness of God. If suffering, death, and meaningless had in fact been the final result of our lives, it would be problematic to maintain the reality of God's love of mankind. Instead, the resurrection demonstrates death's inability to destroy us and to undo God's purposes for us. As the generation that saw Christ raised from the dead put it, "Death, where is your victory? Grave, where is your sting?" The resurrection, as a sign of the general resurrection to come, provides a clear indication that God does value mankind.
   
7. It confirms the uniqueness of Jesus of Nazareth in God's purposes in the world. Among that very, very small group of people in the history of the world who have founded major religions, Jesus is unique even within that group in rising from the dead. Jesus’ resurrection plainly shows which leader to follow. It renders foolish the argument that God has not made clear which religious leader to follow.

These are clear signs given by Jesus' resurrection that would provide a clear reason for God to have raised Jesus from the dead.

Miracles, Providence, and Natural Knowledge of God

This continues the repost of a response to Michael Martin on Jesus' resurrection.

Mr. Martin makes an interesting side-trip into one possibility: if most natural events were seen as signs from God, then the non-interventionists could claim that miracles should be seen as initially probable. Martin notes that this view -- that most natural events are signs from God -- trivializes the idea of miracles; he also asserts that this view is not held by most noninterventionists.

Here Martin continues to couple the idea of "signs" only with non-interventionist miracles, addressed previously. And while I would not want to over-labor the topic of which views are more typical of non-interventionists, I’d like to mention that Mr. Martin does not address the topic of providence. It is common for Christians to have an understanding of God’s providence in which nature and certain human events are arranged for our benefit and are signs of God’s good will towards humanity. The question becomes how to distinguish miracles from simple providence, or whether there is a need to distinguish. The possibility remains that "providence" simply gets called by the different name of "miracle" when the event in question is rare.

Mr. Martin also does not address the Christian view of the natural knowledge of God. This is a commonly held Christian doctrine about how nature and the laws of nature are themselves a sign of God’s existence and goodness. The common Christian views on providence and natural knowledge stand in disagreement with Mr. Martin’s assertion that most non-interventionists do not understand most events to be arranged by God.

Given how persistent Mr. Martin is in associating "signs" with non-interventionist miracles, it seems odd that his assessment of whether something is a miracle does not include any assessment of its value as a sign. That is to say, if even Mr. Martin agrees that miracles can have value as "signs", then something's value as a "sign" can be one of our criteria for deciding if it qualifies as a miracle. On both views of miracles (the interventionist and non-interventionist), it is not only the rareness of the event but also the sign-value of the event that helps us evaluate whether it is rightly seen as a miracle. The concept of providence – that God arranges certain things for our benefit – will be useful to recall when we discuss some of the reasons for the resurrection.

Summary of discussion on miracles in general (apart from the resurrection in particular)

At the end of discussion of miracles in general, I am in agreement with Mr. Martin on one point: that miracles in general are initially improbable. But in assessing his arguments, there are instances in which Mr. Martin has left aside important aspects of miracles, such as the theme of restoring nature and the sign value of miracles that involve God actively. These omissions of Martin’s greatly affect the upcoming discussion of Jesus’ resurrection in particular. I have also included background knowledge relative to the unique strength of Jesus’ miracle claims -- as Mr. Martin has agreed that background knowledge is required to make an accurate assessment of probability. Even though Martin acknowledges that our background knowledge is essential in a correct evaluation of the probability of miracle claims, he does not address the unique strength of Jesus’ prior miracle claims at any point in discussing background knowledge. These points of difference cause us to come to completely different assessments of Jesus’ resurrection.

Miracles, Signs, and God's Intervention

This continues the repost of a response to Michael Martin on Jesus' resurrection. This responds to Mr. Martin's arguments about types of miracles, and about God's motives for performing (or not performing) miracles.

Non-Interventionist miracles and Sign miracles
In his article, Martin mentions that there may be non-interventionist miracles where God may have set up the world from the beginning in such a way as to produce a certain effect at a certain time, noting as an example the wind that parted the Red Sea in the days of Moses. He notes that such an occurrence might serve as a message or sign.

I think Martin's treatment confuses two separate topics. Whether a miracle requires direct intervention and whether a miracle serves as a sign are two separate questions. A miracle in which God actively works in nature can serve as a sign just as easily as a miracle in which God may have set up the world so that certain events would occur without any (further) intervention. The fact that God is actively working in a miracle does not preclude its value as a sign.

Reasons to perform a miracle and reasons to abstain

Mr. Martin claims that God has good reasons never to perform miracles to achieve his purposes, asserting that miracles are "an impediment to a scientific understanding of the world." This seems an unlikely argument. Miracles are rare, and as such they are not likely to interfere with our understanding the world. In actual fact many of the great scientists of the world have believed in miracles, including Jesus’ resurrection, so the known facts are against the claim that miracles would hinder our scientific understanding of the world.

Particularly, consider that miracles could not be recognized as miracles unless people already had a clear idea of nature’s regular workings. That is to say, a miracle could only be recognized as a miracle if people already had a basic understanding of the natural order. If nobody had ever noticed the natural order, they could not possibly recognize anything as a variation from that order. So on the contrary, recognizing a miracle presumes an understanding of the normal workings of nature.

Martin also asserts that the "difficulties and controversies" in recognizing miracles constitute an argument that God should not perform miracles. That seems to say that God should not do a miracle because it affords argumentative people a chance to argue. But "difficulties" are such a normal part of human experience, and "controversies" such a normal part of human behavior that there does not seem to be a reason why God should exclude miracles in particular of all the things which can be the subject of argument. The difficulties and controversies surrounding miracles may indicate that people are careful and thorough in evaluating miracle claims.

Martin asserts that miracles "impede, mislead, and confuse", but this seems to be the opposite of actual the case. Consider this: one common view of a miracle is as a "sign" -- something that leads, guides, and explains. If a miracle has value as a sign, then by definition it communicates a message and gives understanding. When Mr. Martin acknowledges that a "sign" is a valid view of a miracle, and further argues that the reason or purpose of the resurrection is a factor in deciding whether to believe it occurred, he unintentionally acknowledges that miracles may in fact be significant and purposeful, the opposite of his claim that they impede, mislead, and confuse.

In contrast to Mr. Martin’s views that God has good reasons never to perform miracles to achieve his purposes, it is worth noting this: if God’s purposes include letting people know that there is something beyond the natural law, then he has near-compelling reasons to perform miracles, as the plainest way to show that there is something beyond the natural law. It is difficult to imagine how God would cause us to recognize the reality of something beyond natural law without showing us an example; this example would be seen as a miracle by definition. It is interesting to see the anti-religious claim that God never shows any clear reason to believe that he exists -- but then dismiss the possibility that miracles serve exactly that purpose.

Miracles and Nature

This continues the repost of a response to Michael Martin on Jesus' resurrection. It addresses the question whether miracles are rightly defined as a violation of the laws of nature. It goes beyond whether we want to let the anti-religious define religious terms for the conversation, and continues on to whether that is actually a fair-minded characterization of specifically the miracles of Jesus.

Martin begins his detailed discussion on the improbability of miracles with the assertion that a miracle is "traditionally" defined as a violation of a law of nature. This definition is possibly traditional among the anti-religious, but probably not among the religious and, more specifically, it is not exactly a traditional view among Christians. A fair review of the subject of miracles – especially in an article such as Martin's about Jesus’ resurrection – calls for a look at Christian views as well.

The clear majority of the recorded miracles of Jesus are miracles of healing. A miracle of this type is better classified not as a violation of nature but as a restoration of nature. When we consider blindness, deafness, lameness, or being crippled, these are not in fact the normal state of nature but a problem afflicting nature. When Jesus is recorded to have healed and made whole, the result was a return to the normal and healthy state of nature. Christian writers from Athanasius to C.S. Lewis have noted this.

Hume's Argument Against Miracles - An Irrational Stance?

This continues the repost of a response to Michael Martin on Jesus' resurrection. This section deals with Martin's treatment of David Hume's argument against miracles. The general question under consideration is, "Is it ever rational to believe in a miracle? Aren't alternative explanations always more likely?"

When discussing the probability of miracles, Hume’s argument against miracles is often mentioned. Michael Martin does not subscribe to Hume’s argument, but he does cover it in passing; I will do the same here. Martin mentions different ways of understanding Hume’s argument against miracles, and considers the right understanding of it to be this: for any possibly-miraculous event, some other explanation is always more likely than a miracle; so that while a miracle is not impossible, belief in a miracle is always irrational.

Looking at that view of miracles, is that view itself rational? To say that something is possible, but that belief that it happened is irrational -- that is a misclassification, a serious exercise in bad judgment. Such a view would necessarily result in the non-recognition of the possible whenever it occurs. It necessarily leads to a willful denial of evidence or distortion of facts when what is possible – a miracle – does in fact happen. Someone who cannot see this inconsistency does not have much credibility trying to instruct others on what is rational.

Please note that this comment is not directly about Mr. Martin, who mentions that he does not subscribe to that view himself and goes on to contrast his own view with Hume’s. I am referring only to this interpretation of Hume’s argument, and those who do not see the logical inconsistency -- the irrationality -- of affirming that a thing may happen but denying the rationality of ever believing that it has happened.

I would also disagree whether some other explanation is always more likely than a miracle. An exception would occur when no other explanation of the events is possible without resorting to the distortion of facts. As we noted above, distorting the facts is an inherent risk in this irrational anti-miracle view. If a proposed alternative explanation distorts the facts, it is lacking as an alternative explanation of those facts; it does not merit the same consideration as a view which accounts for the facts without distortion. The view that a miracle occurred is more reasonable than a distortion of the established facts; or, from the other side, when any alternative explanation requires distortion of established facts, that is the point at which it becomes increasingly rational to believe a miracle -- and increasingly irrational to disbelieve it.

How can we assess the likelihood of a miracle?

This is the first part of a response to Michael Martin's article, "Why the Resurrection is Initially Improbable," Philo, 1, no. 1 (Spring-Summer 1998): 63-73. At the time this response was written in the spring of 2005, Mr. Martin's article was being reprinted that spring in a book by Prometheus Press. I know that some people in both camps do not like to discuss miracles in terms of probability at all, considering them either as a "given" or as an "impossibility" but not as something to be studied or evaluated. For this series, both of those moves will be viewed as begging the question. Rather than sticking with the usual raw presuppositionalism of the two camps, we will ask, honestly, how we can assess if a miracle was likely.

In his introduction Mr. Martin outlines an argument which begins plausibly enough: that a miracle claim is initially improbable, and in light of this, miracle claims should be disbelieved unless the evidence is strong. I agree that miracles of the kind we're discussing are not events we see every day, and that miracle claims should be evaluated with a fair hearing given to skepticism. But are all miracles equally unlikely? Mr. Martin acknowledges that miracle claims should be assessed relative to our background knowledge and to the probability of alternative explanations. Let's look first at background knowledge.

Probability and Background Knowledge

How likely is it that I could perform a miracle? To stick with our method, we would assess the probability of a miracle claim in light of background knowledge. In my case, some important background knowledge is that I have never done a miracle, never claimed to have done a miracle, and have never had anyone say that anything I did was something supernatural. Everyone who knows me in person would agree with that. It is right to conclude that the probability that I would do a miracle is very, very small. Given the right background knowledge, the probability that I would do a miracle is negligible, really.

But what about another example, such as a leader at any of the various touring ministries that claim to do miracles? If our ideas about probability really have anything to do with our background knowledge -- rather than begging the question by presupposing the answer -- then the first thing we should do is look at that background knowledge. Who can say they actually saw a miracle? Where is their account of what happened, and are they willing to stand behind its truthfulness? If people were healed, then who knew those people beforehand, whether they were really sick or disabled in the first place? Where are they now, and have they really recovered? What are their names and where do they live? Were there any hostile witnesses, and what do they say? Were any of the miracles investigated? If past miracles done by a person could be solidly supported, this would increase the plausibility of the claim of a future miracle associated with the same person.

In the case of Jesus, some of his healings are recorded as taking place in crowd settings or while traveling, so that the people recording the miracles may not have known the exact identities of the people who were healed. But other miracles involved people who were known. One person raised from the dead was the twelve-year old daughter of Jairus the synagogue ruler. One blind man who received his sight was Bartimaeus from Jericho. One of the sick healed was Simon Peter’s mother-in-law. Another person raised from the dead was Lazarus from Bethany. Other healings either took place with hostile witnesses present or prompted an investigation from those hostile to Jesus. A man with a crippled hand was healed in a synagogue on the Sabbath in front of hostile witnesses. One of the blind men healed in Jerusalem was a well-known beggar; his healing on the Sabbath resulted in an investigation on the charge of Sabbath-breaking.

We know the view of those who followed Jesus; the New Testament records that for us. But what did Jesus’ enemies make of all this? The Talmud records that official charges against Jesus included practicing sorcery (Sanhedrin 43a) – that is to say, performing supernatural acts. Even his enemies were not able to dismiss the evidence that these supernatural things had actually occurred even with access to the people involved; yet because of their opposition to Jesus they construed these healings as somehow evil.

What happened to the people who had been healed? The early Christian writer Quadratus mentions their continuing witness value:

Our Savior’s works were always there to see, for they were true – the people who had been cured and those raised from the dead, who had not merely been seen at the moment when they were cured or raised, but were always there to see, not only when the Savior was among us, but for a long time after his departure; in fact some of them survived right up to my own time. (quote preserved in Eusebius’ History 4.3).

When we review the background knowledge for whether a future miracle claim is plausible, we find that Jesus is already surrounded by miracle claims that are far stronger than the average miracle claim. Unless claims of similar strength could be made for "miracles" which did not actually happen, we must consider at least the possibility that the reason for the unique strength of these claims is that they may in fact be true. I will comment more on the relationships between Jesus’ earlier miracle claims and the resurrection when specifically discussing Jesus' resurrection rather than miracles in general.

Some skeptics try to dismiss the issue of Jesus’ miracles by saying that the people belonged to such an unenlightened time and such a superstitious age that their reports simply cannot be believed. This type of move seeks to place miracles in the dustbin of history, and is meant to shut down an honest look at miracles rather than continue it. Yet no matter the ancient Roman world's lesser state of advancement, they still knew the difference between blind and sighted, crippled and whole, dead and alive. If someone blind from birth received sight without medical intervention, even in our modern age we would likely consider the possibility of a miracle; the state of advancement of society has not changed our evaluation of that.

It is also important to remember that there were people present in that day who were hostile to Jesus and who were motivated to dismiss any evidence which made Jesus appear unique. The opponents of Jesus who were his contemporaries did not manage to refute the miracle claims and ended by conceding that supernatural things had happened, reinterpreting the miracles as evil acts of sorcery (see Sanhedrin 43a); Jesus’ modern opponents lack comparative credibility in trying to claim that such things never happened when their predecessors who lived in Jesus’ day could not do the same.

One factor that causes miracles in general to be considered improbable is that solid claims are in fact so rare; on the other hand, a history of solid claims involving one person changes the probability for that person. If our knowledge of Jesus is part of the background knowledge used to check the probability of the resurrection, then the strength of evidence for Jesus’ earlier miracle claims would form a stronger background when we look at this final and ultimate claim, when we assess the probability of his resurrection. The previous miracle claims had such strength that when people came to see Jesus, they often came expecting a miracle.