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Miracles
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 Miracles Moses crossing the Red Sea is perhaps the best known, the 'explanation' being that a strong wind on shallow waters can push the surface back. Without deeper waters to provide a counter-flow, this can 'heap up' waters at one end of a long lake. This is similar to a 'storm surge', well known along the Gulf Coast. This explanation is not only credible; it's supported by the story in Exodus itself. Ex. 14:21 = "Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land." Too many people know the Cecil B. de Mille scene of waterfalls either side, but not the text. Too many believers demand that a miracle has to be inexplicable, as proof of supernatural intervention. I think this is an over-reach, prompted by others who argue that having an explanation within the known laws of Physics means it is a 'natural' phenomenon, and therefore not a miracle at all. Both sides have got it wrong, because both sides are children of the Enlightenment. Both sides see 'scientific explanation' and 'religious significance' as having no overlap. They are reading their own assumptions back into the event. Look at the root texts themselves to dispel this error. The Old Testament tends to use the word 'wonders', meaning 'a very unusual event'. The New Testament (specially John) uses the word 'signs', leading the reader to ponder what is being signified. Even the English word 'miracle' comes from the Latin verb 'miror' = 'I marvel'. In the world-view of these pious ancients, EVERYTHING happened because of the will of God, the mundane and routine just as much as the most freakish. To them, it wasn't a matter of God doing some party trick to 'prove' he existed; it was God doing something unusual to signify that he was breaking with routine. So those trying to either prove or disprove any 'miracle' are both missing the point. 'Miracles' are not meant to prove anything, but to alert the observer that God is doing or about to do something unexpected. It follows from this that the 'miracle' itself is not the point of the exercise. These days we tend to have a literary style that could be described as 'scientific realism'. Dramatic events are typically recorded as if objectively, so we tend to think that if a camera or a microphone didn't record it, it's not 'real'. But this belief is just as much built on a myth. There is still the choice in the writer's mind (or in a film, the director's/editor's instructions) of what to include and what to cut. A dramatic historical scene might feature a ticking clock to signify urgency (even if there was no such clock in the real event), but not bother with one of the characters farting. Miracles were often introduced for this same purpose; to underline one specific point of significance. John's Gospel in particular makes this point openly; editorial comments such as "It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus KNEW that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end." before the Last Supper discourse. Mark has a similar but different approach. He tends to group events into pairs, each one intended to be an exercise in compare/contrast. For example, the story of the beheading of John the Baptiser (at a royal feast) is used to lead into the Feeding of the Five Thousand. Or the time Jesus is asked to heal the daughter of an influential man, but pauses on the way to waste time healing a woman who is ceremonially 'unclean'. So when you read of a 'miracle', don't focus on the miracle itself. Instead, ask 'What is this telling me?' |
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