How to define the term 'miracle'

[Bubbles]

In my short time here I have seen a number of post including statements about miracles. In reading them, have come to wonder how exactly we are defining the term. What is our working definition of a miracle?

My dictionary says "An extraordinary event manifesting divine intervention in human affairs" and "An extremely outstanding or unusual event, thing, or accomplishment".

First, I'm not sure how extraordinary an event has to be to qualify. Does spontaneous remission qualify? To say that it isn't a miracle because it is "spontanious remission" seems to me suffer from the same mythology of naming seen in much of the Bible.

That an event manifest divine intervention seems too subjective to me. One man's divine intervention is another man's dumb luck (not to deny that there is an objective truth, merely that we have no means of knowing it with certainty).

The second definition seems to be more a casual one than a technical one, so I don't think it will help.

Do we mean by the term 'miracle' when something happens that is impossible? In that case, I would think that, by definition there would be no miracles. The actual HAS to be possible, doesn't it? I then think that I should change the word possible to natural, but I think I'm either restating the earlier question or allowing anything unlikely o be a miracle. I don't think that fits.

So I'm not sure this leaves me with a good definition to work with. Clearly, if any discussion is to take place regarding claims of the miraculous, there has to be a definition upon which we all agree. So, I guess, what should that definition be?

If this discussion has taken place before and you are aware of it, I would very much like to be pointed at it. If the subject has been beaten to death before, I would like, you know, some tapes of the beating. If not, maybe we can all get out our night-sticks and have some fun.

Thank You

 

[Cinorjer]

A UU Minister once gave me the best definition of a miracle I've ever heard. He said "A miracle is something that happens when it needs to happen."

A miracle does not require the physical laws of the universe be broken. Take the famous case in the Bible of the Red Sea parting for Moses. People are always trying to find "scientific" reasons for the waters parting. It's as if a natural explaination somehow makes the even more believable. But even if it could be proved that something -- some natural force -- parted the waters, it still remains a miracle. Because the waters parted when Moses needed them to part. Well, according to the Bible story.

Jerry

 

[T'ai Chi]

The only miracles I've seen are mathematical, for example, fitting an object that is sqrt feet long or tall in the diagonal of a unit hypercube in R^n, for any n, and objects with infinite surface area but finite volume.

 

[Kopji]

Would a giant asteroid striking the earth be a miracle or just bad luck?

 

[Cinorjer]

I suppose an asteroid hitting the Earth can be a miracle, if some small furry animal is about to go extinct and desperately needs the dinosaurs to go away. But remember, a miracle is defined by who needs the event to happen. That's the problem with assigning meaning to a miracle, isn't it? Given the good and bad things that happen in life, once in a while the dice land on the numbers we need. And one person's miracle can be another person's disaster. A miracle is all a matter of coincidence, after all.

I read recently of yet another of those car wrecks, alcohol involved, where one of the kids survived. "It's a miracle," the mother said when interviewed. "God was watching out for her!" Yes, for that one girl, surviving was a miracle. But God was apparently not watching out for the other kids that died in the accident. In the case of the Bible story, having a series of plagues hit the innocent people of Egypt was a miracle for Moses and the Hebrews, but certainly not for the people of Egypt.

So yes, miracles happen. But they're all subjective, and have nothing to do with a divine power.

 

[Bubbles]

Must a miracle, by definition, be a good thing? I realize that no one ever says, "My daughter got hit by lightening! It's a miracle!" Of course, no one says, "The sun came up this morning! It's a miracle!" Maybe we should. I'm not sure.

One of the thoughts that I've had since the original post is that the idea of a miracle as a disruption in the natural order of things (if we mean miracle-claims such as Moses crossing the Sea of Reeds), it seems to be a very low concept of God. I can't help but feel that if I allow the existence of God, I should at least allow the possibility that the universe from day 1 was working towards producing, by its laws, the miracle. To assume that God's action must be last-minute, seems to me silly.

I really want their to be a good destinction between a miracle and dumb-luck, but I'm not sure I can have one.

As I think about it, I come back to the idea of a miracle being the activity of free mind (the source of the miracle) greater than the object of the action (the recipient of the miracle). Maybe the greater than is unnessecary. In that definition, I think one's dog could very rightly call getting fed a miracle. Of course, it returns to something unknown and unknowable, so I get back to the original problem.

I mean, what I'm wanting to see a good discussion of isn't whether miracles happen. That is a good question, but it isn't the one I'm interested in (not, of course, that you must discuss those questions, and only those questions, that interest me) at the moment.