How Can I Believe in a Miracle If I’ve Never Seen One?
I’ve been working my way through a blog series in light of the recent release of my book, Surviving Religion 101: Letters to a Christian Student on Keeping the Faith in College (Crossway, 2021). This series includes 7 videos that tackle key intellectual questions about the Christian faith.
We now come to the seventh and final video, and this is a big one: “How Can I Believe in a Miracle If I’ve Never Seen One?”
Of course, skepticism over the supernatural is nothing new. Even when it seems a miracle just may have occurred, the knee-jerk reaction of most people is to prefer a naturalistic explanation: someone is lying, eyewitnesses … Continue reading...
Looking at Miracles Again: A Great New Book on David Hume
In my most recent post, “Are Miracles Improbable? Rethinking What Makes Something ‘Likely’ to Happen,” I analyzed (and critiqued) the main arguments against miracles. And, like any discussion of miracles, I felt required to mention the work of Scottish philosopher David Hume.
I can still remember walking by David Hume’s statue almost every day when I was studying at the University of Edinburgh years ago (see main photo). He always seemed to stare at me as I passed by. I could hear his hypothetical question in my head, “Why do you believe in miracles if you’ve never seen one?”
For those who want to dive deeper into Hume … Continue reading...
Are Miracles Improbable? Rethinking What Makes Something “Likely” to Happen
Our world’s skepticism over miracles is nothing new. Ever since David Hume, philosophers and scholars have been making the case against the possibility of miracles.
But, now things have shifted. Hume has been roundly (and decisively) rebutted and philosophers now realize that one cannot prove miracles are impossible. But, not to worry, now there’s a new argument. Now the argument is that miracles are simply improbable.
So improbable, in fact, that we should never prefer a miraculous explanation over a naturalistic one. Given how unlikely miracles are, it is always more likely that a miracle did not occur. Thus, it is argued, historians would have no reason to ever … Continue reading...
‘Hoist with His Own Petard’: Keener Turns the Tables on the Academic Elite
I recently wrote a review of Craig Keener’s wonderful (and lengthy!) new book, Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts (Eerdmans, 2011). Although the review will soon be available on the Themelios webpage, I thought I would mention one particular positive here. As one might expect, Keener devotes a substantial portion of the book refuting Hume’s well known argument against the possibility of miracles. The problem, as he so deftly points out, is that Hume’s argument is fallaciously circular.
Keener observes, “[Hume] argues, based on ‘experience,’ that miracles do not happen, yet dismisses credible eyewitness testimony for miracles (i.e., others’ experience) on his assumption that miracles do not happen” … Continue reading...