In Defense of Miracles: A Comprehensive Case for God's Action in History
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
Rumors of deception have surrounded claims of Jesus' resurrection ever since the soldiers appointed to guard his tomb made their report to the Jewish authorities. But no one has led the philosophic charge against miracles quite as influentially as David Hume with his 1748 essay "Of Miracles." Refined, revised, restated, his arguments still affect philosophic discussions of miracles today.
During the twentieth century, strong arguments have been raised by Antony Flew, now professor emeritus at Keele University in England. Flew has contributed a fresh statement of his objections to the idea of God's acting in history just for this volume, which also includes Hume's classic critique as a part of the case against miracles.
In response, Douglas Geivett and Gary Habermas have assembled a distinguished team of scholars to rebut the objections and set forth the positive case for God's action in history:
Richard Purtill clarifies the word miracle, while Norman Geisler critiques Hume's case against miracles. Francis Beckwith and Winfried Corduan assess how we would recognize miracles in the past and in the present. Ronald Nash examines naturalism's exclusion of miracles and shows its self-referential incoherence. J. P. Moreland discusses whether science properly rules out the possibility of miracles. God's existence and action in history are probed by David Beck and Stephen Davis, while Douglas Geivett argues that within a theistic framework it is reasonable to expect miracles as confirmation of claims to special revelation. David Clark examines miracles within the context of various world religions. Robert Newman, John Feinberg, William Lane Craig and Gary Habermas conclude by investigating fulfilled prophecy, the virgin birth and incarnation of Jesus, the empty tomb, and the resurrection appearances.
In Defense of Miracles is a comprehensive, up-to-date discussion that should not be overlooked by anyone concerned with the current debate over miracles.
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Top Highlights
“Worldviews contain at least five clusters of beliefs, namely, beliefs about God, ultimate reality, knowledge, morality and human nature.” (Page 116)
“Third, unless we have the idea of a way things ordinarily happen—the natural order of things, some idea of ‘laws of nature’—then the idea of a miracle cannot be made clear.” (Page 63)
“The central claim of metaphysical naturalism is that nothing exists outside the material, mechanical (that is, nonpurposeful), natural order.” (Page 119)
“Thirdly. It forms a strong presumption against all supernatural and miraculous relations, that they are observed chiefly to abound among ignorant and barbarous nations; or if a civilized people has ever given admission to any of them, that people will be found to have received them from ignorant and barbarous ancestors, who transmitted them with that inviolable sanction and authority, which always attend received opinions.” (Page 36)
“By definition, metaphysical naturalism excludes the possible existence of anything beyond nature, anything outside the box. But the process of reasoning requires something that exceeds the bounds of nature, namely, the laws of logical inference.” (Page 127)