Chapter XVI. General Objections To Miracles As Credentials Of A Revelation.While considering this subject, it will be necessary to keep steadily in view that miracles are not alleged in the New Testament to have been performed to prove the truth of doctrines, but that a particular person possesses a divine commission; or in attestation of particular facts, such as the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.The truth of a divine commission being established, it follows that the divinely-appointed messenger must have some message to communicate. We further infer that God will not intrust a message to any person whom He has not previously fully enlightened as to the subject which he has to communicate, and who would not truthfully communicate the message with which he is intrusted. A miracle is therefore not only an attestation to the divine commission of the person performing one, but also to the adequate information and veracity of the messenger. Although a miracle is not wrought to prove the truth of a particular doctrine, but that a particular person is intrusted with a divine commission, we accept a doctrinal statement as true, when made by a messenger thus attested, within the limits of the message with which he affirms himself to be intrusted, on the ground that such a messenger must both be truthful, and possess adequate knowledge.[pg 347]In other words, our belief in the doctrinal statement does not rest on the miracle, but on the veracity of God.This is the affirmation made in the New Testament respecting the most important class of the miracles which it records. As I have elsewhere observed, not a single instance occurs in it of a miracle wrought for the purpose of proving that a doctrine is true. Our Lord's distinct affirmation is,“The same works that I do, bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me.”(John v. 36.)“If I say the truth, why do ye not believe me?”(John viii. 46.) The miracles which are alleged to have been performed by the Apostles for directly evidential purposes, were wrought in proof of the Resurrection of Christ, and of their own divine commission, which directly depended on it.Let it also be observed that it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was performed exclusively for evidential purposes. This point I shall consider hereafter.If these principles are correct, they will at once dispose of two objections which are alleged against miracles: first, that they cannot prove a doctrine; and secondly, that they cannot prove a moral truth. I fully accept the statement that moral truths cannot be proved by the evidence of miracles, but must rest on their own inherent evidence; and that all positive duties rest on the command of God, to whom we feel, on other grounds, that all love, reverence, and adoration are due. The truth of doctrines also cannot be established by the performance of a miracle; but when we accept them on external authority, they rest on the testimony of God, and our full persuasion that He must be in possession of all truth. Although, therefore, I accept as correct these principles, on which the objection is founded, they have no bearing[pg 348]on the point at issue; for the New Testament nowhere affirms that its miracles were wrought to prove either doctrinal statements or moral truths, but facts.1. It is objected that the prevalence of supernatural beliefs renders the existence of miracles“so hackneyed as scarcely to attract the notice of the nation to whom the Christian revelation was in the first instance addressed.”(Supernatural Religion.)I reply that this objection contains two inaccuracies. First, it is not true that the miracles of Jesus scarcely attracted the notice of those among whom they were performed. The only authority on this point is the New Testament itself, and this assertion contradicts its express statements. Numerous passages in the Gospels directly affirm that the miracles of our Lord attracted very general attention, and produced a profound astonishment; and that those who had witnessed them considered that there was a wide distinction between them and the miraculous pretensions then current. His fame is represented as having been spread by them in regions beyond Palestine; and great multitudes are stated to have collected, both for the purpose of hearing Him and of being healed of their diseases. The fourth Gospel represents our Lord as rebuking the multitudes, for attending on Him for sordid purposes. It is quite true, that notwithstanding the miracles, the body of the Jewish nation ultimately rejected Christianity, though the epistles bear witness that the Jewish element which was attracted into the Christian Church was large. The assertion, therefore, is simply contrary to fact, that miracles were in those days so common and hackneyed as to attract little or no attention to him who professed to work them.Equally inaccurate is the assertion that the evidence of miracles as the attestation to a revelation was a[pg 349]“hackneyed”one. The Old Testament professed to rest on miraculous evidence. This being the case, the Jews were fully entitled to expect that if God made a further revelation of His will, it would be accompanied by a miraculous attestation. But Judaism was the only religion of the ancient world which professed to be founded on the evidence of miracles. A belief in a current supernaturalism was no doubt mixed up with the ancient religions, but its wonders were not alleged to have been wrought in attestation of the fact that they were revelations, nor even as attestations to their truth. The religion of the Greeks possessed both priests and prophets; but they performed no miracles in attestation of a divine commission. The only attestation of this kind which they claimed was the utterance of obscure or mendacious oracles. I am not aware that anyone who pretended to be a revealer of the divine will in ancient times ever professed to perform visible and palpable miracles in proof of his assertions. Similar is the position of the old religions which still exist in the modern world. Many of them abound in stories of the most fantastic manifestations of their gods in ancient times. Their votaries believe in the efficacy of magic, charms, and incantations. But none of these things have been affirmed to have been wrought in attestation of a divine commission. Mahometanism claims, in the strictest sense, to be a divine revelation; yet the Koran even offers apologies for the fact that its founder wrought no miracles in attestation of his claim to be a divine messenger. So far therefore is it from being the fact that miracles are so generally alleged by religions in vindication of their claim to be revelations, that Judaism and Christianity are absolutely unique in this respect. The idea of working a miracle in attestation of a divine commission is so far from[pg 350]being a“hackneyed”one, that it has the strongest claims to originality.2. It is urged by the same writer that“every marvel and every narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age. However much miracles are the exception to the order of nature, they have always been the rule in the history of ignorance. In fact the excess of belief in them throughout many centuries of darkness, is almost fatal to their claims to credence now. They have been limited to periods of ignorance and superstition, and are unknown to ages of enlightenment. The Christian miracles are rendered almost as suspicious from their place in a long series of similar occurrences, as they are by their being exceptions to the sequence of natural phenomena. It would be extraordinary if cycles of miracles occurring before and since those of the Gospels, and in connection with every religion, could be repudiated as fables, and these alone maintained as genuine.”The principles which I have laid down in a former chapter fully meet the chief points raised in these objections. A few additional observations on them, therefore, are all that will be necessary.First: the assertion that every marvel or narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age, is inaccurate. If they had been of habitual or constant occurrence, they would have ceased to be marvels at all. In such a case the trade of the impostor would have gone, for it would not have paid him. The entire plausibility of such reasonings arises from confounding under a common name phenomena wholly different in character. I ask emphatically, did the current supernaturalism of any age or nation accept as matters of course such[pg 351]events as the resurrection of Christ, or the cure of a blind man, or a man full of leprosy, by a word or a touch? Have not heathen writers pronounced actual resurrections from the dead to be impossibilities? Were such occurrences ever believed to be within the power of magic to effect? Belief in the possibility of such occurrences became current only under the influence of Christianity.2. It is not correct to assert that the belief in miracles has been confined to ages of ignorance. Will it be affirmed that the most flourishing period of Grecian literature was an age of ignorance? Yet a belief in a current supernaturalism prevailed in it. Was the Augustan age an age of ignorance? Both ages were ignorant of physical science: but during few periods has the human intellect been equally active. Each age contained men endowed with common sense sufficient to make them adequate judges whether the supernatural occurrences above referred to were possible or not.3. It is inaccurate to affirm that the Christian miracles are interposed between two similar series of supernatural occurrences. There is only one point in common between them; the claim to be supernatural. As I have proved, in every other respect they are strongly contrasted. It is, therefore, by no means extraordinary that a series of supernatural occurrences, which have the highest moral impress, and possess other distinguishing characteristics, should be true; and that the others, one of which took place before and the other after that in question, and which are stamped with the very opposite characteristics, should be false.The same author adduces the following objections, as lying at the root of miraculous testimony to a revelation:“Surely supernatural evidence of so common and prodigal a nature betrays great want of force[pg 352]and divine originality. How could that be considered as special evidence for a new revelation, which was already so well known to all the world, and which was scattered broadcast over so many centuries, as well as successfully simulated by Satan.”Again:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one epoch of history, and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find miracles represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries. The Gospel miracles are set in the midst of a series of similar wonders which commenced many centuries before the dawn of Christianity, and continued without interruption fifteen centuries after it. No divine originality characterized the evidence selected to accredit the divine revelation.”(P. 192.)I reply, First: It behoves those who except against the plan of attesting a divine revelation by miracles, to inform us in what other way it is possible that the truth of a divine commission can be attested. It is doubtless possible for God to make a special revelation of His will to each individual man; yet even this would involve supernatural agency of some kind; and it is very questionable whether to do so would be consistent with the plan of God's moral government which comes under our actual observation. But the Christian revelation is founded on the idea of making a divine manifestation additional to, and of a different order from, that which is made by the created universe; and not simply of imparting so much additional information to each individual. This manifestation professes to be made by the Incarnation. How, I ask, was such a manifestation to be made except by a supernatural action of some kind? It is clear, therefore, that every manifestation of God differing from that made by the ordinary forces of nature, or by the moral nature of[pg 353]man, must be supernatural. There can be no doubt as to the means which must be employed. The only question which can be raised is one which I have considered elsewhere, namely: whether it is the purpose of God to make such a manifestation of Himself.It will be objected that such a manifestation might have been made self-evident to the moral nature of man, and consequently it would have required no additional attestation. To this I reply that, on the supposition that it is God's purpose to make such an additional manifestation of Himself, He must be allowed to be the only adequate judge of the right mode of accomplishing it.But even if a revelation involved no such manifestation of God, but only a communication of truth to man, it is incumbent on those who object to its attestation by miracles, to find some other method by which the reality of a divine commission could be attested, and to show that this mode would be preferable to an attestation by miracles.But further: if we regard a miracle as a supernatural occurrence wrought in attestation of a divine commission, which is the unquestionable aspect of a considerable number of those recorded in the New Testament, the fact that there was a wide-spread belief in the existence of supernatural events is far from interfering with its efficacy. What did the current beliefs imply? That there existed beings, other than the blind forces of nature, who interfered in human affairs; and that they were in some way or other capable of communicating with man. What is the very conception implied by a revelation? That a God exists, who is the moral Governor of the universe, who cares for man, and is capable of holding communications with him. Both conceptions rest on a common ground—the existence of[pg 354]supernatural beings capable of manifesting themselves by outward indications. Why then should not the moral Governor of the universe, if it was His purpose to make a revelation, employ media, which were all but universally recognized? No inconsiderable number of the objections of unbelievers rest on the assumption, that if there be a God, it is derogatory to His character to suppose that He is capable of condescending to the weaknesses and imperfections of man. A God who neither will nor can do so may be a very grand conception; but one who is very ill adapted to the wants of human nature, and who is incapable of exciting human sympathies. The only thing that would be necessary, on the supposition that it was His purpose to make such a revelation, would be that His mode of manifesting His presence should be one clearly distinguishable from the events of current supernaturalism. What was requisite would have been to afford evidence that the manifestation in question was due to no other being than Himself; that is to say, that the miracles should bear the unquestionable impress of His own perfections. The subject of alleged demoniacal miracles I have considered elsewhere. The simple question before us is—Are the supernatural events recorded in the Gospels clearly distinguishable in their general character from the supernaturalism which was current previous to the Advent? I have already shown that it contains no doubtful indications as to who the agent must have been, if we suppose the facts to have been actual occurrences.But further: if the objection has any validity, it presupposes that God ought not to make a revelation in ages of superstition and ignorance; but must wait until knowledge has cleared away the mists of ignorance and error, and supplied us with the means of[pg 355]infallibly discriminating between true miracles and false ones; or, in other words, we must wait for the much-talked-of jury of scientific men, who can submit His alleged miracles to the whole range of scientific tests. Happily, however, God has gifted a considerable number of men with common sense, which is quite adequate to determine whether a certain class of events wrought under certain circumstances are miraculous operations, or mere natural occurrences, or due to imposture. If this be so, what is there, I ask, unworthy of God, in making a revelation at such times as man stands in special need of one?It is further objected that a miraculous attestation to a divine commission shows a want of force and divine originality. I ask, how? The fact is that with the exception of Judaism, no ancient religion professed to be so attested; and the Jew would naturally expect that any fresh revelation would be attested in a manner similar to that which he believed in as divine.The objection that because the belief in supernaturalism was so general, therefore miracles must be worthless as evidence, I have already shown to be fallacious.But it is also objected:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one particular period of history and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find them represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries.”This is the old objection of the Jews who demanded of our Lord a sign from Heaven. Both demand a particular class and order of miracle, viz.: something stupendous, or terrific. The value of each objection lies in conceiving of a miracle as a mere objective fact in external nature, stript of all its moral accompaniments. In one word, it contemplates the miracle in its most vulgar aspect, as a bare act of power,[pg 356]a portent, a prodigy. A great light everywhere appearing in the heavens might have appeared to vulgar minds a greater miracle, and have attracted more attention than the cure of a man full of leprosy by the utterance of a word. But it would not have presented stronger evidences of having been wrought by the power of God.But with respect to the general question, I ask, Is not the resurrection of Jesus Christ in every respect an exceptional event? Where are resurrections to be found in the history of current supernaturalism? Who ever pretended, before or since, to have a divine commission which was attested by his own resurrection from the dead? This miracle is at any rate absolutely unique; and it must never be forgotten that it is the only one recorded in the New Testament on the truth of which its writers stake the claim of Christianity to be regarded as a divine revelation. Although they refer to other miracles, wonders and signs which God wrought by Him, yet whenever they adduce the full and conclusive evidence of His divine mission, they always appeal to the fact that God had raised Him from the dead.But a further objection is urged as invalidating this kind of testimony:“At the very time when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of the reality of miracles, these wonders entirely ceased. This extraordinary cessation of miracles at a time when their evidence ought to have acquired value from an appeal to persons capable of appreciating them, is perfectly unintelligible, if they are viewed as the supernatural credentials of a divine revelation.”This passage contains several fallacies. One, to which I have repeatedly drawn attention, runs through it, viz., the classing together every kind of alleged[pg 357]supernatural occurrence, from the miracles of Jesus to the fantastic performances of the magician, as though they all stood on the same level. I need not further allude to the fallacy of such reasoning.2. It is affirmed that miracles entirely ceased when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of their reality. I conclude that by the word“miracles”in this passage, the author means ecclesiastical miracles, viz., those which have been alleged to be wrought in attestation of the established system of belief. If it is meant to be asserted that all belief in a current supernaturalism has now ceased, the affirmation is inaccurate, as the wide-spread belief in spiritualism abundantly testifies.But if the assertion is intended to be confined to ecclesiastical miracles, it involves an inaccuracy as to a matter of history. They had become thoroughly discredited long before the birth of modern physical science. The cure of blind and leprous persons by a touch, or the feeding of five thousand persons on seven loaves and a few fishes, require nothing else than sound common sense for the appreciation of their supernatural character, or the testing of their reality. The assertion, therefore, that miracles ceased precisely at the time when their evidence would have been most valuable, by their being able to be tested by those persons best capable of appreciating them, is entirely inaccurate.I fully admit that a belief in a current supernaturalism, as for instance in the absurdities of witchcraft, survived the Reformation. What the Reformation destroyed was a belief in a divine order of miracles wrought in support of an ecclesiastical system. The belief in this current supernaturalism has been gradually diminishing ever since, under the combined influence[pg 358]of the increase of the knowledge of physical science, and common sense. The objection raised is simply irrelevant to the point at issue.But there is another subject which demands consideration. Hitherto we have been dealing with the evidential character of miracles. But although all miracles have an evidential value, if they can be adequately attested, it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was intended to subserve this purpose alone. It was necessary not only that a revelation should be communicated, and receive an adequate attestation, but that it should be propagated among mankind. To render this possible, it was necessary that its messengers should be armed with some means of insuring that their message should be heard with attention. There was also another object to be effected; namely, the establishment in the world of that great institution, the Christian Church, which was intended so largely to influence its destinies.It will be quite clear to any person who carefully considers the various supernatural occurrences recorded in the New Testament that they are not all of equal evidential value. The highest class of them are directly affirmed to have been performed for the purpose of attesting the divine mission of Jesus Christ, and as a portion of His supernatural manifestation. To this class belong the miracles wrought by Himself, and several of those performed by the Apostles. But there is another class referred to in the Acts of the Apostles, of which the primary object seems to have been to awaken attention to the Apostolic message, though even these were not destitute of evidential value. There is also another order of manifestations frequently referred to in the Epistles, viz., the supernatural gifts of the Spirit, one of the declared purposes[pg 359]of which was to lay deep the foundations of the Christian Church. As divine interpositions, they were all to a certain extent evidential; but it will be important to observe that there is an order of supernatural manifestations mentioned in the New Testament, whose apparent primary intention was to subserve a different purpose.Let it be observed therefore, that at the introduction of Christianity, two distinct purposes had to be effected: first, to attest the truth of the revelation; secondly, to establish the Church.I will briefly draw attention to this latter portion of the subject, as far as it affects certain portions of the supernatural action affirmed in the New Testament. I allude to a certain class of miracles, such as the cure of the cripple at Lystra, those wrought by the passing of Peter's shadow, and by garments brought from Paul's person, and some others; also to the entire class of the supernatural gifts mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, and so frequently referred to in the Epistles.One of the greatest difficulties which beset the missionary is to obtain a hearing in the midst of the hostile elements by which he is surrounded. Yet to obtain this is the necessary condition of carrying on his work. In this respect, the modern missionary possesses great advantages compared with the primitive missionary of Christianity. He belongs to a superior civilization, and is therefore able to bring to bear the whole force of a higher on a lower one. This was exactly reversed in the case of the primitive missionaries. Instead of being able to bring to bear the prestige of a high civilization on those among whom they laboured, they belonged to a despised race; or if the missionary himself was a member of the race whom he addressed, he[pg 360]belonged to the lower sections of society. How was this enormous deficiency to be supplied? How was a man thus despised to obtain a hearing for the message with which he was charged? The New Testament affirms that the deficiency was supplied by imparting to the early Church a certain number of supernatural endowments, which, when once communicated, acted like our ordinary faculties; also that a supernatural gift of curing certain diseases was imparted to particular individuals, a gift which was exactly suited to obtain an attentive hearing for their message.Among the supernatural gifts which St. Paul affirms to have been communicated to the Church, there were two of which he asserts that the operation was distinct, but which are merged in the modern idea of miracles. These he designated by the expressions ἐνεργήματα δυναμέων, or the inworking of powers; and χαρίσματα ἰαμάτων, endowments of healing powers. The distinction in function between these powers is affirmed by him no less than three times; what it consisted in, we are only able to judge from the terms themselves, and the nature of the case. There is every probability that the distinction points to a higher and a lower exercise of supernatural power; the one being the evidential miracle properly so called, and the other a supernatural knowledge of how to effect cures—a gift which would be exactly suited to enable the missionary to obtain that attentive hearing of his message which he so urgently required. The Epistle of St. James furnishes us with a general idea of the nature of the gift, when he directs, that in case a person was sick, the elders of the Church were to be sent for, who were to pray over the sick man, and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord;“And the prayer of faith,”says he,“shall save the sick; and the Lord shall raise[pg 361]him up.”(James v. 15.) The whole description points to a cure which, although in a measure supernatural, was not instantaneous; the latter point being one which would be required to make a miracle in the proper sense of the word evidential. A power of effecting cures, however, whether by a knowledge of natural means supernaturally acquired, or by supernatural agency, would be one which would obtain for the despised Jewish missionary a hearing in Gentile cities, which otherwise he would be unable to obtain.To such a class of supernatural operations would belong such cures as those effected by the conveyance of handkerchiefs and aprons from St. Paul's body to the sick. These are only asserted to have taken place on one occasion, at Ephesus, a city greatly addicted to the arts of magic. They were adapted to the circumstances of the place, where the Apostle had to encounter a particular form of supernaturalism; and they would have been exactly suited to meet the difficulty in question. The historian tells us that the success was great, for many of those who had used magical arts came forward and confessed their deeds, collected together their magical books, which were worth a considerable sum of money, and publicly burned them. The same observations apply to Peter's shadow. Although the historian does not tell us that cures were wrought by it, yet the narrative presupposes that a large outburst of supernatural power took place in connection with Peter's person. Although the cure of the cripple at Lystra belongs to a class of miracles which is strictly evidential, yet the immediate occasion of its performance seems to have been with the view of arousing the attention of an ignorant heathen population.But not only had a revelation to be communicated[pg 362]and attested, not only had converts to be made and instructed, but it was also necessary that the foundations of the Church, the visible kingdom of Christ, should be firmly laid, and that it should be established among the visible institutions of the earth. Sufficient attention has not been paid to this portion of the subject in considering the question of supernatural intervention. The establishment of the Church as a visible institution, which was intended gradually to leaven mankind with the great principles of His revelation, is again and again affirmed by Jesus Christ to have been one of the great purposes of His coming. A description of its character and functions forms the subject of no inconsiderable number of His parables, and it is the great end and purpose for which He gave the great final Apostolic commission to go and gather it together out of all the nations of the earth.The Church of Christ had therefore to be formed into a community out of the most heterogeneous elements. It was destined not for a momentary existence, but for a continuous growth, so as to leaven human nature with its influences. The creation of such a society was a conception so bold that it had never previously entered the head of either poet or philosopher. Those with whom I am reasoning will not deny that the attempt was a very arduous, and to all appearance a most chimerical one.Yet it is the most certain of facts that the Church of Christ is now in the nineteenth century of its existence. The boldness of the undertaking will be more fully estimated when we reflect that the Church was intended to be a society which, while existing in the world, should differ in its essential character from all the other societies on the earth. Its action was to be entirely spiritual and moral. Its founder intended[pg 363]it to be invested with no coercive powers. The appeal was to be, not to force, but to conscience.Those who offered to enroll themselves as the subjects of Christ's spiritual kingdom had to be formed into a social organization. Unless this could be effected, one of the great objects for which the revelation was given must have proved a failure. The elements of which it had to be composed were of the most unpromising description. The first converts consisted of no small number of Jews and proselytes, who were extensively leavened with the narrowest prejudices of Judaism. When the Gentiles began to join the new community, its members were chiefly derived from the lower ranks of society, including a considerable number of slaves. The infant Church embraced a great diversity of opinions and characters. When converts were made, the time for their instruction was short. Yet such an institution had to contend with mighty civilization, the habits and prejudices of existing society, the self-interest of a corrupt religion, and the opposition of a powerful government.Such were some of the difficulties which had to be surmounted before this new institution could be firmly planted among the existing societies of the world, and expand itself with the life which was peculiarly its own. If the primitive followers of Jesus were animated by the credulous superstition which unbelievers delight in attributing to them, none should be better qualified than they to form a judgment of the difficulties which must have beset their path. Yet these have been surmounted. To this fact the vigorous life of the Church during eighteen centuries testifies. It has not only held its ground, but it has succeeded in leavening all existing civilizations with its influences. How has this been accomplished? The Apostolic Epistles return[pg 364]an answer. They affirm that the early converts were endowed with a number of supernatural gifts, exactly fitted to qualify them for the various functions which they were called upon to discharge. I subjoin a list of them, as they are directly affirmed by St. Paul to be then existing in the Corinthian Church. They were nine in number, each of which is asserted by him to have had a distinct and separate function and subject-matter: the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, faith, working of miracles, endowments of healing powers, prophecy, discerning of spirits, tongues, and interpretation. It does not appear whether this last is meant to be exhaustive of the supernatural mental endowments which the members of the early churches supposed themselves to possess, or whether they were varied for the purpose of meeting particular exigences. Nor do I ask those with whom I am reasoning to accept this statement as a true account of an objective fact; but only that they were supposed to be so by the Apostle and those to whom he wrote. It is plain, however, that these supernatural endowments, if real, were precisely such as the Church was in urgent need of, as the instrumentality for welding together the discordant elements of which it was composed, and enabling it firmly to plant itself in the soil of human nature.These supernatural gifts of the Spirit, with two exceptions, produced no results on external nature. They constituted enlargements of the powers of the human mind. As such, they cannot with strict propriety be said to belong to the class of evidential miracles, although like all other supernatural operations of which God is the Author, they cannot fail to be indirectly evidential. It is important to observe that they belong to a separate class of supernatural phenomena, which were as necessary in reference to the Christian revelation,[pg 365]contemplating as it did the institution of a divine society, as the order of supernatural manifestations which directly attested the divine mission of Jesus Christ and His Apostles. If this was their end and purpose we can understand why they were withdrawn at a very early period, before they could be submitted to the tests of our modernsavants. They were given for a special purpose, and they were withdrawn when they had accomplished it. The Apostle who affirms their existence asserts that they were not intended permanently to continue in the Church.There is one more allegation which is occasionally urged against the miracles of the New Testament, and which I must briefly consider. It is alleged that pious frauds have been very general in all ages of Christian history; that many good men have not hesitated to participate in them; and that literary forgeries were very abundant in the first ages of Christianity, and were even common in the days of the Apostles. It is insinuated that this state of mind throws great suspicion on the alleged miracles of the apostolic age.As the charge of pious fraud is not made against Jesus himself or his immediate followers, it is difficult to meet so indefinite an objection. It seems to be put in to add force to others, rather than for its intrinsic value. Modern unbelievers express a nearly unanimous concurrence in endeavouring to account for the miracles of the New Testament, by assuming that the followers of Jesus were the victims of the most intense enthusiasm, superstition, and credulity. It is difficult to comprehend, on the assumption that the existence of the supernatural portions of the New Testament is due to these causes, how direct fraud could have anything to do with the concoction of these miraculous stories. Intense enthusiasm and fanaticism, and deliberate fraud,[pg 366]are usually opposite poles of character; and if we call in one to account for these miracles, we must exclude the other from exerting an influence on their origination. To make the charge of any avail against the narratives of the Gospel, it is necessary not to prove that pious frauds were common in the second, third, or fourth century, or even in the first, but to establish directly either that Jesus professed to work miracles while He knew that they were not such, or that His followers deliberately invented a number of miraculous stories and attributed them to Him, well knowing that He had performed none. The charge that the miracles of the New Testament originated in enthusiasm and credulity is a definite one, and can be definitely met. So is the one that they originated in deliberate fraud. So would be the charge that the innocent followers of Jesus were imposed upon by fraudulent impostors. But to combine the charge of intense enthusiasm and credulity with that of conscious fraud, is a mode of reasoning which contains the grounds of its own refutation.It is no doubt a fact, that the practice of literary forgery was not unknown to the early ages of Christianity. St. Paul seems to have thought that there were in the world impostors daring enough to attempt to forge a letter in his name, and to try to foist it on the churches which he had planted, as a genuine production. But the existence of such impostors has no bearing whatever on the question whether the miracles recorded in the New Testament are facts or fiction. Did not St. Paul himself assert that he had performed miracles? Was he an impostor? Did he not believe that Jesus Christ in veritable reality rose from the dead? What have such beliefs to do with the existence of a set of daring literary impostors? Happily, however, the whole of this class of ancient[pg 367]writers were utter bunglers in the art of fictitious composition. It is a universal characteristic of them, that they were entirely unable to throw themselves into the spirit of former times, or of the persons whose names they assumed. In their references to history, geography, manners, customs, and character, they lay themselves open at almost every point to certain detection. There is good reason for believing that no forger or writer of fiction in the ancient world has succeeded in his art. In investing fiction with apparent probability, the modern world has completely outstript the ancient. Still, however, even in the most perfect works, when the fictions are extended over a wide sphere of action, no amount of genius will protect a writer from leaving some weak point unguarded. It is probably not too much to say that neither in ancient nor modern times, has a fictitious work or a forgery been able to maintain its ground against the apparatus which can be brought to bear on it by a sound and rational criticism.Most of the other objections which are adduced against the miracles of the New Testament have been answered in principle under the foregoing heads. I must now adduce some of the most important considerations which prove them to have been historical facts.[pg 368]
Chapter XVI. General Objections To Miracles As Credentials Of A Revelation.While considering this subject, it will be necessary to keep steadily in view that miracles are not alleged in the New Testament to have been performed to prove the truth of doctrines, but that a particular person possesses a divine commission; or in attestation of particular facts, such as the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.The truth of a divine commission being established, it follows that the divinely-appointed messenger must have some message to communicate. We further infer that God will not intrust a message to any person whom He has not previously fully enlightened as to the subject which he has to communicate, and who would not truthfully communicate the message with which he is intrusted. A miracle is therefore not only an attestation to the divine commission of the person performing one, but also to the adequate information and veracity of the messenger. Although a miracle is not wrought to prove the truth of a particular doctrine, but that a particular person is intrusted with a divine commission, we accept a doctrinal statement as true, when made by a messenger thus attested, within the limits of the message with which he affirms himself to be intrusted, on the ground that such a messenger must both be truthful, and possess adequate knowledge.[pg 347]In other words, our belief in the doctrinal statement does not rest on the miracle, but on the veracity of God.This is the affirmation made in the New Testament respecting the most important class of the miracles which it records. As I have elsewhere observed, not a single instance occurs in it of a miracle wrought for the purpose of proving that a doctrine is true. Our Lord's distinct affirmation is,“The same works that I do, bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me.”(John v. 36.)“If I say the truth, why do ye not believe me?”(John viii. 46.) The miracles which are alleged to have been performed by the Apostles for directly evidential purposes, were wrought in proof of the Resurrection of Christ, and of their own divine commission, which directly depended on it.Let it also be observed that it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was performed exclusively for evidential purposes. This point I shall consider hereafter.If these principles are correct, they will at once dispose of two objections which are alleged against miracles: first, that they cannot prove a doctrine; and secondly, that they cannot prove a moral truth. I fully accept the statement that moral truths cannot be proved by the evidence of miracles, but must rest on their own inherent evidence; and that all positive duties rest on the command of God, to whom we feel, on other grounds, that all love, reverence, and adoration are due. The truth of doctrines also cannot be established by the performance of a miracle; but when we accept them on external authority, they rest on the testimony of God, and our full persuasion that He must be in possession of all truth. Although, therefore, I accept as correct these principles, on which the objection is founded, they have no bearing[pg 348]on the point at issue; for the New Testament nowhere affirms that its miracles were wrought to prove either doctrinal statements or moral truths, but facts.1. It is objected that the prevalence of supernatural beliefs renders the existence of miracles“so hackneyed as scarcely to attract the notice of the nation to whom the Christian revelation was in the first instance addressed.”(Supernatural Religion.)I reply that this objection contains two inaccuracies. First, it is not true that the miracles of Jesus scarcely attracted the notice of those among whom they were performed. The only authority on this point is the New Testament itself, and this assertion contradicts its express statements. Numerous passages in the Gospels directly affirm that the miracles of our Lord attracted very general attention, and produced a profound astonishment; and that those who had witnessed them considered that there was a wide distinction between them and the miraculous pretensions then current. His fame is represented as having been spread by them in regions beyond Palestine; and great multitudes are stated to have collected, both for the purpose of hearing Him and of being healed of their diseases. The fourth Gospel represents our Lord as rebuking the multitudes, for attending on Him for sordid purposes. It is quite true, that notwithstanding the miracles, the body of the Jewish nation ultimately rejected Christianity, though the epistles bear witness that the Jewish element which was attracted into the Christian Church was large. The assertion, therefore, is simply contrary to fact, that miracles were in those days so common and hackneyed as to attract little or no attention to him who professed to work them.Equally inaccurate is the assertion that the evidence of miracles as the attestation to a revelation was a[pg 349]“hackneyed”one. The Old Testament professed to rest on miraculous evidence. This being the case, the Jews were fully entitled to expect that if God made a further revelation of His will, it would be accompanied by a miraculous attestation. But Judaism was the only religion of the ancient world which professed to be founded on the evidence of miracles. A belief in a current supernaturalism was no doubt mixed up with the ancient religions, but its wonders were not alleged to have been wrought in attestation of the fact that they were revelations, nor even as attestations to their truth. The religion of the Greeks possessed both priests and prophets; but they performed no miracles in attestation of a divine commission. The only attestation of this kind which they claimed was the utterance of obscure or mendacious oracles. I am not aware that anyone who pretended to be a revealer of the divine will in ancient times ever professed to perform visible and palpable miracles in proof of his assertions. Similar is the position of the old religions which still exist in the modern world. Many of them abound in stories of the most fantastic manifestations of their gods in ancient times. Their votaries believe in the efficacy of magic, charms, and incantations. But none of these things have been affirmed to have been wrought in attestation of a divine commission. Mahometanism claims, in the strictest sense, to be a divine revelation; yet the Koran even offers apologies for the fact that its founder wrought no miracles in attestation of his claim to be a divine messenger. So far therefore is it from being the fact that miracles are so generally alleged by religions in vindication of their claim to be revelations, that Judaism and Christianity are absolutely unique in this respect. The idea of working a miracle in attestation of a divine commission is so far from[pg 350]being a“hackneyed”one, that it has the strongest claims to originality.2. It is urged by the same writer that“every marvel and every narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age. However much miracles are the exception to the order of nature, they have always been the rule in the history of ignorance. In fact the excess of belief in them throughout many centuries of darkness, is almost fatal to their claims to credence now. They have been limited to periods of ignorance and superstition, and are unknown to ages of enlightenment. The Christian miracles are rendered almost as suspicious from their place in a long series of similar occurrences, as they are by their being exceptions to the sequence of natural phenomena. It would be extraordinary if cycles of miracles occurring before and since those of the Gospels, and in connection with every religion, could be repudiated as fables, and these alone maintained as genuine.”The principles which I have laid down in a former chapter fully meet the chief points raised in these objections. A few additional observations on them, therefore, are all that will be necessary.First: the assertion that every marvel or narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age, is inaccurate. If they had been of habitual or constant occurrence, they would have ceased to be marvels at all. In such a case the trade of the impostor would have gone, for it would not have paid him. The entire plausibility of such reasonings arises from confounding under a common name phenomena wholly different in character. I ask emphatically, did the current supernaturalism of any age or nation accept as matters of course such[pg 351]events as the resurrection of Christ, or the cure of a blind man, or a man full of leprosy, by a word or a touch? Have not heathen writers pronounced actual resurrections from the dead to be impossibilities? Were such occurrences ever believed to be within the power of magic to effect? Belief in the possibility of such occurrences became current only under the influence of Christianity.2. It is not correct to assert that the belief in miracles has been confined to ages of ignorance. Will it be affirmed that the most flourishing period of Grecian literature was an age of ignorance? Yet a belief in a current supernaturalism prevailed in it. Was the Augustan age an age of ignorance? Both ages were ignorant of physical science: but during few periods has the human intellect been equally active. Each age contained men endowed with common sense sufficient to make them adequate judges whether the supernatural occurrences above referred to were possible or not.3. It is inaccurate to affirm that the Christian miracles are interposed between two similar series of supernatural occurrences. There is only one point in common between them; the claim to be supernatural. As I have proved, in every other respect they are strongly contrasted. It is, therefore, by no means extraordinary that a series of supernatural occurrences, which have the highest moral impress, and possess other distinguishing characteristics, should be true; and that the others, one of which took place before and the other after that in question, and which are stamped with the very opposite characteristics, should be false.The same author adduces the following objections, as lying at the root of miraculous testimony to a revelation:“Surely supernatural evidence of so common and prodigal a nature betrays great want of force[pg 352]and divine originality. How could that be considered as special evidence for a new revelation, which was already so well known to all the world, and which was scattered broadcast over so many centuries, as well as successfully simulated by Satan.”Again:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one epoch of history, and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find miracles represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries. The Gospel miracles are set in the midst of a series of similar wonders which commenced many centuries before the dawn of Christianity, and continued without interruption fifteen centuries after it. No divine originality characterized the evidence selected to accredit the divine revelation.”(P. 192.)I reply, First: It behoves those who except against the plan of attesting a divine revelation by miracles, to inform us in what other way it is possible that the truth of a divine commission can be attested. It is doubtless possible for God to make a special revelation of His will to each individual man; yet even this would involve supernatural agency of some kind; and it is very questionable whether to do so would be consistent with the plan of God's moral government which comes under our actual observation. But the Christian revelation is founded on the idea of making a divine manifestation additional to, and of a different order from, that which is made by the created universe; and not simply of imparting so much additional information to each individual. This manifestation professes to be made by the Incarnation. How, I ask, was such a manifestation to be made except by a supernatural action of some kind? It is clear, therefore, that every manifestation of God differing from that made by the ordinary forces of nature, or by the moral nature of[pg 353]man, must be supernatural. There can be no doubt as to the means which must be employed. The only question which can be raised is one which I have considered elsewhere, namely: whether it is the purpose of God to make such a manifestation of Himself.It will be objected that such a manifestation might have been made self-evident to the moral nature of man, and consequently it would have required no additional attestation. To this I reply that, on the supposition that it is God's purpose to make such an additional manifestation of Himself, He must be allowed to be the only adequate judge of the right mode of accomplishing it.But even if a revelation involved no such manifestation of God, but only a communication of truth to man, it is incumbent on those who object to its attestation by miracles, to find some other method by which the reality of a divine commission could be attested, and to show that this mode would be preferable to an attestation by miracles.But further: if we regard a miracle as a supernatural occurrence wrought in attestation of a divine commission, which is the unquestionable aspect of a considerable number of those recorded in the New Testament, the fact that there was a wide-spread belief in the existence of supernatural events is far from interfering with its efficacy. What did the current beliefs imply? That there existed beings, other than the blind forces of nature, who interfered in human affairs; and that they were in some way or other capable of communicating with man. What is the very conception implied by a revelation? That a God exists, who is the moral Governor of the universe, who cares for man, and is capable of holding communications with him. Both conceptions rest on a common ground—the existence of[pg 354]supernatural beings capable of manifesting themselves by outward indications. Why then should not the moral Governor of the universe, if it was His purpose to make a revelation, employ media, which were all but universally recognized? No inconsiderable number of the objections of unbelievers rest on the assumption, that if there be a God, it is derogatory to His character to suppose that He is capable of condescending to the weaknesses and imperfections of man. A God who neither will nor can do so may be a very grand conception; but one who is very ill adapted to the wants of human nature, and who is incapable of exciting human sympathies. The only thing that would be necessary, on the supposition that it was His purpose to make such a revelation, would be that His mode of manifesting His presence should be one clearly distinguishable from the events of current supernaturalism. What was requisite would have been to afford evidence that the manifestation in question was due to no other being than Himself; that is to say, that the miracles should bear the unquestionable impress of His own perfections. The subject of alleged demoniacal miracles I have considered elsewhere. The simple question before us is—Are the supernatural events recorded in the Gospels clearly distinguishable in their general character from the supernaturalism which was current previous to the Advent? I have already shown that it contains no doubtful indications as to who the agent must have been, if we suppose the facts to have been actual occurrences.But further: if the objection has any validity, it presupposes that God ought not to make a revelation in ages of superstition and ignorance; but must wait until knowledge has cleared away the mists of ignorance and error, and supplied us with the means of[pg 355]infallibly discriminating between true miracles and false ones; or, in other words, we must wait for the much-talked-of jury of scientific men, who can submit His alleged miracles to the whole range of scientific tests. Happily, however, God has gifted a considerable number of men with common sense, which is quite adequate to determine whether a certain class of events wrought under certain circumstances are miraculous operations, or mere natural occurrences, or due to imposture. If this be so, what is there, I ask, unworthy of God, in making a revelation at such times as man stands in special need of one?It is further objected that a miraculous attestation to a divine commission shows a want of force and divine originality. I ask, how? The fact is that with the exception of Judaism, no ancient religion professed to be so attested; and the Jew would naturally expect that any fresh revelation would be attested in a manner similar to that which he believed in as divine.The objection that because the belief in supernaturalism was so general, therefore miracles must be worthless as evidence, I have already shown to be fallacious.But it is also objected:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one particular period of history and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find them represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries.”This is the old objection of the Jews who demanded of our Lord a sign from Heaven. Both demand a particular class and order of miracle, viz.: something stupendous, or terrific. The value of each objection lies in conceiving of a miracle as a mere objective fact in external nature, stript of all its moral accompaniments. In one word, it contemplates the miracle in its most vulgar aspect, as a bare act of power,[pg 356]a portent, a prodigy. A great light everywhere appearing in the heavens might have appeared to vulgar minds a greater miracle, and have attracted more attention than the cure of a man full of leprosy by the utterance of a word. But it would not have presented stronger evidences of having been wrought by the power of God.But with respect to the general question, I ask, Is not the resurrection of Jesus Christ in every respect an exceptional event? Where are resurrections to be found in the history of current supernaturalism? Who ever pretended, before or since, to have a divine commission which was attested by his own resurrection from the dead? This miracle is at any rate absolutely unique; and it must never be forgotten that it is the only one recorded in the New Testament on the truth of which its writers stake the claim of Christianity to be regarded as a divine revelation. Although they refer to other miracles, wonders and signs which God wrought by Him, yet whenever they adduce the full and conclusive evidence of His divine mission, they always appeal to the fact that God had raised Him from the dead.But a further objection is urged as invalidating this kind of testimony:“At the very time when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of the reality of miracles, these wonders entirely ceased. This extraordinary cessation of miracles at a time when their evidence ought to have acquired value from an appeal to persons capable of appreciating them, is perfectly unintelligible, if they are viewed as the supernatural credentials of a divine revelation.”This passage contains several fallacies. One, to which I have repeatedly drawn attention, runs through it, viz., the classing together every kind of alleged[pg 357]supernatural occurrence, from the miracles of Jesus to the fantastic performances of the magician, as though they all stood on the same level. I need not further allude to the fallacy of such reasoning.2. It is affirmed that miracles entirely ceased when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of their reality. I conclude that by the word“miracles”in this passage, the author means ecclesiastical miracles, viz., those which have been alleged to be wrought in attestation of the established system of belief. If it is meant to be asserted that all belief in a current supernaturalism has now ceased, the affirmation is inaccurate, as the wide-spread belief in spiritualism abundantly testifies.But if the assertion is intended to be confined to ecclesiastical miracles, it involves an inaccuracy as to a matter of history. They had become thoroughly discredited long before the birth of modern physical science. The cure of blind and leprous persons by a touch, or the feeding of five thousand persons on seven loaves and a few fishes, require nothing else than sound common sense for the appreciation of their supernatural character, or the testing of their reality. The assertion, therefore, that miracles ceased precisely at the time when their evidence would have been most valuable, by their being able to be tested by those persons best capable of appreciating them, is entirely inaccurate.I fully admit that a belief in a current supernaturalism, as for instance in the absurdities of witchcraft, survived the Reformation. What the Reformation destroyed was a belief in a divine order of miracles wrought in support of an ecclesiastical system. The belief in this current supernaturalism has been gradually diminishing ever since, under the combined influence[pg 358]of the increase of the knowledge of physical science, and common sense. The objection raised is simply irrelevant to the point at issue.But there is another subject which demands consideration. Hitherto we have been dealing with the evidential character of miracles. But although all miracles have an evidential value, if they can be adequately attested, it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was intended to subserve this purpose alone. It was necessary not only that a revelation should be communicated, and receive an adequate attestation, but that it should be propagated among mankind. To render this possible, it was necessary that its messengers should be armed with some means of insuring that their message should be heard with attention. There was also another object to be effected; namely, the establishment in the world of that great institution, the Christian Church, which was intended so largely to influence its destinies.It will be quite clear to any person who carefully considers the various supernatural occurrences recorded in the New Testament that they are not all of equal evidential value. The highest class of them are directly affirmed to have been performed for the purpose of attesting the divine mission of Jesus Christ, and as a portion of His supernatural manifestation. To this class belong the miracles wrought by Himself, and several of those performed by the Apostles. But there is another class referred to in the Acts of the Apostles, of which the primary object seems to have been to awaken attention to the Apostolic message, though even these were not destitute of evidential value. There is also another order of manifestations frequently referred to in the Epistles, viz., the supernatural gifts of the Spirit, one of the declared purposes[pg 359]of which was to lay deep the foundations of the Christian Church. As divine interpositions, they were all to a certain extent evidential; but it will be important to observe that there is an order of supernatural manifestations mentioned in the New Testament, whose apparent primary intention was to subserve a different purpose.Let it be observed therefore, that at the introduction of Christianity, two distinct purposes had to be effected: first, to attest the truth of the revelation; secondly, to establish the Church.I will briefly draw attention to this latter portion of the subject, as far as it affects certain portions of the supernatural action affirmed in the New Testament. I allude to a certain class of miracles, such as the cure of the cripple at Lystra, those wrought by the passing of Peter's shadow, and by garments brought from Paul's person, and some others; also to the entire class of the supernatural gifts mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, and so frequently referred to in the Epistles.One of the greatest difficulties which beset the missionary is to obtain a hearing in the midst of the hostile elements by which he is surrounded. Yet to obtain this is the necessary condition of carrying on his work. In this respect, the modern missionary possesses great advantages compared with the primitive missionary of Christianity. He belongs to a superior civilization, and is therefore able to bring to bear the whole force of a higher on a lower one. This was exactly reversed in the case of the primitive missionaries. Instead of being able to bring to bear the prestige of a high civilization on those among whom they laboured, they belonged to a despised race; or if the missionary himself was a member of the race whom he addressed, he[pg 360]belonged to the lower sections of society. How was this enormous deficiency to be supplied? How was a man thus despised to obtain a hearing for the message with which he was charged? The New Testament affirms that the deficiency was supplied by imparting to the early Church a certain number of supernatural endowments, which, when once communicated, acted like our ordinary faculties; also that a supernatural gift of curing certain diseases was imparted to particular individuals, a gift which was exactly suited to obtain an attentive hearing for their message.Among the supernatural gifts which St. Paul affirms to have been communicated to the Church, there were two of which he asserts that the operation was distinct, but which are merged in the modern idea of miracles. These he designated by the expressions ἐνεργήματα δυναμέων, or the inworking of powers; and χαρίσματα ἰαμάτων, endowments of healing powers. The distinction in function between these powers is affirmed by him no less than three times; what it consisted in, we are only able to judge from the terms themselves, and the nature of the case. There is every probability that the distinction points to a higher and a lower exercise of supernatural power; the one being the evidential miracle properly so called, and the other a supernatural knowledge of how to effect cures—a gift which would be exactly suited to enable the missionary to obtain that attentive hearing of his message which he so urgently required. The Epistle of St. James furnishes us with a general idea of the nature of the gift, when he directs, that in case a person was sick, the elders of the Church were to be sent for, who were to pray over the sick man, and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord;“And the prayer of faith,”says he,“shall save the sick; and the Lord shall raise[pg 361]him up.”(James v. 15.) The whole description points to a cure which, although in a measure supernatural, was not instantaneous; the latter point being one which would be required to make a miracle in the proper sense of the word evidential. A power of effecting cures, however, whether by a knowledge of natural means supernaturally acquired, or by supernatural agency, would be one which would obtain for the despised Jewish missionary a hearing in Gentile cities, which otherwise he would be unable to obtain.To such a class of supernatural operations would belong such cures as those effected by the conveyance of handkerchiefs and aprons from St. Paul's body to the sick. These are only asserted to have taken place on one occasion, at Ephesus, a city greatly addicted to the arts of magic. They were adapted to the circumstances of the place, where the Apostle had to encounter a particular form of supernaturalism; and they would have been exactly suited to meet the difficulty in question. The historian tells us that the success was great, for many of those who had used magical arts came forward and confessed their deeds, collected together their magical books, which were worth a considerable sum of money, and publicly burned them. The same observations apply to Peter's shadow. Although the historian does not tell us that cures were wrought by it, yet the narrative presupposes that a large outburst of supernatural power took place in connection with Peter's person. Although the cure of the cripple at Lystra belongs to a class of miracles which is strictly evidential, yet the immediate occasion of its performance seems to have been with the view of arousing the attention of an ignorant heathen population.But not only had a revelation to be communicated[pg 362]and attested, not only had converts to be made and instructed, but it was also necessary that the foundations of the Church, the visible kingdom of Christ, should be firmly laid, and that it should be established among the visible institutions of the earth. Sufficient attention has not been paid to this portion of the subject in considering the question of supernatural intervention. The establishment of the Church as a visible institution, which was intended gradually to leaven mankind with the great principles of His revelation, is again and again affirmed by Jesus Christ to have been one of the great purposes of His coming. A description of its character and functions forms the subject of no inconsiderable number of His parables, and it is the great end and purpose for which He gave the great final Apostolic commission to go and gather it together out of all the nations of the earth.The Church of Christ had therefore to be formed into a community out of the most heterogeneous elements. It was destined not for a momentary existence, but for a continuous growth, so as to leaven human nature with its influences. The creation of such a society was a conception so bold that it had never previously entered the head of either poet or philosopher. Those with whom I am reasoning will not deny that the attempt was a very arduous, and to all appearance a most chimerical one.Yet it is the most certain of facts that the Church of Christ is now in the nineteenth century of its existence. The boldness of the undertaking will be more fully estimated when we reflect that the Church was intended to be a society which, while existing in the world, should differ in its essential character from all the other societies on the earth. Its action was to be entirely spiritual and moral. Its founder intended[pg 363]it to be invested with no coercive powers. The appeal was to be, not to force, but to conscience.Those who offered to enroll themselves as the subjects of Christ's spiritual kingdom had to be formed into a social organization. Unless this could be effected, one of the great objects for which the revelation was given must have proved a failure. The elements of which it had to be composed were of the most unpromising description. The first converts consisted of no small number of Jews and proselytes, who were extensively leavened with the narrowest prejudices of Judaism. When the Gentiles began to join the new community, its members were chiefly derived from the lower ranks of society, including a considerable number of slaves. The infant Church embraced a great diversity of opinions and characters. When converts were made, the time for their instruction was short. Yet such an institution had to contend with mighty civilization, the habits and prejudices of existing society, the self-interest of a corrupt religion, and the opposition of a powerful government.Such were some of the difficulties which had to be surmounted before this new institution could be firmly planted among the existing societies of the world, and expand itself with the life which was peculiarly its own. If the primitive followers of Jesus were animated by the credulous superstition which unbelievers delight in attributing to them, none should be better qualified than they to form a judgment of the difficulties which must have beset their path. Yet these have been surmounted. To this fact the vigorous life of the Church during eighteen centuries testifies. It has not only held its ground, but it has succeeded in leavening all existing civilizations with its influences. How has this been accomplished? The Apostolic Epistles return[pg 364]an answer. They affirm that the early converts were endowed with a number of supernatural gifts, exactly fitted to qualify them for the various functions which they were called upon to discharge. I subjoin a list of them, as they are directly affirmed by St. Paul to be then existing in the Corinthian Church. They were nine in number, each of which is asserted by him to have had a distinct and separate function and subject-matter: the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, faith, working of miracles, endowments of healing powers, prophecy, discerning of spirits, tongues, and interpretation. It does not appear whether this last is meant to be exhaustive of the supernatural mental endowments which the members of the early churches supposed themselves to possess, or whether they were varied for the purpose of meeting particular exigences. Nor do I ask those with whom I am reasoning to accept this statement as a true account of an objective fact; but only that they were supposed to be so by the Apostle and those to whom he wrote. It is plain, however, that these supernatural endowments, if real, were precisely such as the Church was in urgent need of, as the instrumentality for welding together the discordant elements of which it was composed, and enabling it firmly to plant itself in the soil of human nature.These supernatural gifts of the Spirit, with two exceptions, produced no results on external nature. They constituted enlargements of the powers of the human mind. As such, they cannot with strict propriety be said to belong to the class of evidential miracles, although like all other supernatural operations of which God is the Author, they cannot fail to be indirectly evidential. It is important to observe that they belong to a separate class of supernatural phenomena, which were as necessary in reference to the Christian revelation,[pg 365]contemplating as it did the institution of a divine society, as the order of supernatural manifestations which directly attested the divine mission of Jesus Christ and His Apostles. If this was their end and purpose we can understand why they were withdrawn at a very early period, before they could be submitted to the tests of our modernsavants. They were given for a special purpose, and they were withdrawn when they had accomplished it. The Apostle who affirms their existence asserts that they were not intended permanently to continue in the Church.There is one more allegation which is occasionally urged against the miracles of the New Testament, and which I must briefly consider. It is alleged that pious frauds have been very general in all ages of Christian history; that many good men have not hesitated to participate in them; and that literary forgeries were very abundant in the first ages of Christianity, and were even common in the days of the Apostles. It is insinuated that this state of mind throws great suspicion on the alleged miracles of the apostolic age.As the charge of pious fraud is not made against Jesus himself or his immediate followers, it is difficult to meet so indefinite an objection. It seems to be put in to add force to others, rather than for its intrinsic value. Modern unbelievers express a nearly unanimous concurrence in endeavouring to account for the miracles of the New Testament, by assuming that the followers of Jesus were the victims of the most intense enthusiasm, superstition, and credulity. It is difficult to comprehend, on the assumption that the existence of the supernatural portions of the New Testament is due to these causes, how direct fraud could have anything to do with the concoction of these miraculous stories. Intense enthusiasm and fanaticism, and deliberate fraud,[pg 366]are usually opposite poles of character; and if we call in one to account for these miracles, we must exclude the other from exerting an influence on their origination. To make the charge of any avail against the narratives of the Gospel, it is necessary not to prove that pious frauds were common in the second, third, or fourth century, or even in the first, but to establish directly either that Jesus professed to work miracles while He knew that they were not such, or that His followers deliberately invented a number of miraculous stories and attributed them to Him, well knowing that He had performed none. The charge that the miracles of the New Testament originated in enthusiasm and credulity is a definite one, and can be definitely met. So is the one that they originated in deliberate fraud. So would be the charge that the innocent followers of Jesus were imposed upon by fraudulent impostors. But to combine the charge of intense enthusiasm and credulity with that of conscious fraud, is a mode of reasoning which contains the grounds of its own refutation.It is no doubt a fact, that the practice of literary forgery was not unknown to the early ages of Christianity. St. Paul seems to have thought that there were in the world impostors daring enough to attempt to forge a letter in his name, and to try to foist it on the churches which he had planted, as a genuine production. But the existence of such impostors has no bearing whatever on the question whether the miracles recorded in the New Testament are facts or fiction. Did not St. Paul himself assert that he had performed miracles? Was he an impostor? Did he not believe that Jesus Christ in veritable reality rose from the dead? What have such beliefs to do with the existence of a set of daring literary impostors? Happily, however, the whole of this class of ancient[pg 367]writers were utter bunglers in the art of fictitious composition. It is a universal characteristic of them, that they were entirely unable to throw themselves into the spirit of former times, or of the persons whose names they assumed. In their references to history, geography, manners, customs, and character, they lay themselves open at almost every point to certain detection. There is good reason for believing that no forger or writer of fiction in the ancient world has succeeded in his art. In investing fiction with apparent probability, the modern world has completely outstript the ancient. Still, however, even in the most perfect works, when the fictions are extended over a wide sphere of action, no amount of genius will protect a writer from leaving some weak point unguarded. It is probably not too much to say that neither in ancient nor modern times, has a fictitious work or a forgery been able to maintain its ground against the apparatus which can be brought to bear on it by a sound and rational criticism.Most of the other objections which are adduced against the miracles of the New Testament have been answered in principle under the foregoing heads. I must now adduce some of the most important considerations which prove them to have been historical facts.[pg 368]
Chapter XVI. General Objections To Miracles As Credentials Of A Revelation.While considering this subject, it will be necessary to keep steadily in view that miracles are not alleged in the New Testament to have been performed to prove the truth of doctrines, but that a particular person possesses a divine commission; or in attestation of particular facts, such as the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.The truth of a divine commission being established, it follows that the divinely-appointed messenger must have some message to communicate. We further infer that God will not intrust a message to any person whom He has not previously fully enlightened as to the subject which he has to communicate, and who would not truthfully communicate the message with which he is intrusted. A miracle is therefore not only an attestation to the divine commission of the person performing one, but also to the adequate information and veracity of the messenger. Although a miracle is not wrought to prove the truth of a particular doctrine, but that a particular person is intrusted with a divine commission, we accept a doctrinal statement as true, when made by a messenger thus attested, within the limits of the message with which he affirms himself to be intrusted, on the ground that such a messenger must both be truthful, and possess adequate knowledge.[pg 347]In other words, our belief in the doctrinal statement does not rest on the miracle, but on the veracity of God.This is the affirmation made in the New Testament respecting the most important class of the miracles which it records. As I have elsewhere observed, not a single instance occurs in it of a miracle wrought for the purpose of proving that a doctrine is true. Our Lord's distinct affirmation is,“The same works that I do, bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me.”(John v. 36.)“If I say the truth, why do ye not believe me?”(John viii. 46.) The miracles which are alleged to have been performed by the Apostles for directly evidential purposes, were wrought in proof of the Resurrection of Christ, and of their own divine commission, which directly depended on it.Let it also be observed that it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was performed exclusively for evidential purposes. This point I shall consider hereafter.If these principles are correct, they will at once dispose of two objections which are alleged against miracles: first, that they cannot prove a doctrine; and secondly, that they cannot prove a moral truth. I fully accept the statement that moral truths cannot be proved by the evidence of miracles, but must rest on their own inherent evidence; and that all positive duties rest on the command of God, to whom we feel, on other grounds, that all love, reverence, and adoration are due. The truth of doctrines also cannot be established by the performance of a miracle; but when we accept them on external authority, they rest on the testimony of God, and our full persuasion that He must be in possession of all truth. Although, therefore, I accept as correct these principles, on which the objection is founded, they have no bearing[pg 348]on the point at issue; for the New Testament nowhere affirms that its miracles were wrought to prove either doctrinal statements or moral truths, but facts.1. It is objected that the prevalence of supernatural beliefs renders the existence of miracles“so hackneyed as scarcely to attract the notice of the nation to whom the Christian revelation was in the first instance addressed.”(Supernatural Religion.)I reply that this objection contains two inaccuracies. First, it is not true that the miracles of Jesus scarcely attracted the notice of those among whom they were performed. The only authority on this point is the New Testament itself, and this assertion contradicts its express statements. Numerous passages in the Gospels directly affirm that the miracles of our Lord attracted very general attention, and produced a profound astonishment; and that those who had witnessed them considered that there was a wide distinction between them and the miraculous pretensions then current. His fame is represented as having been spread by them in regions beyond Palestine; and great multitudes are stated to have collected, both for the purpose of hearing Him and of being healed of their diseases. The fourth Gospel represents our Lord as rebuking the multitudes, for attending on Him for sordid purposes. It is quite true, that notwithstanding the miracles, the body of the Jewish nation ultimately rejected Christianity, though the epistles bear witness that the Jewish element which was attracted into the Christian Church was large. The assertion, therefore, is simply contrary to fact, that miracles were in those days so common and hackneyed as to attract little or no attention to him who professed to work them.Equally inaccurate is the assertion that the evidence of miracles as the attestation to a revelation was a[pg 349]“hackneyed”one. The Old Testament professed to rest on miraculous evidence. This being the case, the Jews were fully entitled to expect that if God made a further revelation of His will, it would be accompanied by a miraculous attestation. But Judaism was the only religion of the ancient world which professed to be founded on the evidence of miracles. A belief in a current supernaturalism was no doubt mixed up with the ancient religions, but its wonders were not alleged to have been wrought in attestation of the fact that they were revelations, nor even as attestations to their truth. The religion of the Greeks possessed both priests and prophets; but they performed no miracles in attestation of a divine commission. The only attestation of this kind which they claimed was the utterance of obscure or mendacious oracles. I am not aware that anyone who pretended to be a revealer of the divine will in ancient times ever professed to perform visible and palpable miracles in proof of his assertions. Similar is the position of the old religions which still exist in the modern world. Many of them abound in stories of the most fantastic manifestations of their gods in ancient times. Their votaries believe in the efficacy of magic, charms, and incantations. But none of these things have been affirmed to have been wrought in attestation of a divine commission. Mahometanism claims, in the strictest sense, to be a divine revelation; yet the Koran even offers apologies for the fact that its founder wrought no miracles in attestation of his claim to be a divine messenger. So far therefore is it from being the fact that miracles are so generally alleged by religions in vindication of their claim to be revelations, that Judaism and Christianity are absolutely unique in this respect. The idea of working a miracle in attestation of a divine commission is so far from[pg 350]being a“hackneyed”one, that it has the strongest claims to originality.2. It is urged by the same writer that“every marvel and every narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age. However much miracles are the exception to the order of nature, they have always been the rule in the history of ignorance. In fact the excess of belief in them throughout many centuries of darkness, is almost fatal to their claims to credence now. They have been limited to periods of ignorance and superstition, and are unknown to ages of enlightenment. The Christian miracles are rendered almost as suspicious from their place in a long series of similar occurrences, as they are by their being exceptions to the sequence of natural phenomena. It would be extraordinary if cycles of miracles occurring before and since those of the Gospels, and in connection with every religion, could be repudiated as fables, and these alone maintained as genuine.”The principles which I have laid down in a former chapter fully meet the chief points raised in these objections. A few additional observations on them, therefore, are all that will be necessary.First: the assertion that every marvel or narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age, is inaccurate. If they had been of habitual or constant occurrence, they would have ceased to be marvels at all. In such a case the trade of the impostor would have gone, for it would not have paid him. The entire plausibility of such reasonings arises from confounding under a common name phenomena wholly different in character. I ask emphatically, did the current supernaturalism of any age or nation accept as matters of course such[pg 351]events as the resurrection of Christ, or the cure of a blind man, or a man full of leprosy, by a word or a touch? Have not heathen writers pronounced actual resurrections from the dead to be impossibilities? Were such occurrences ever believed to be within the power of magic to effect? Belief in the possibility of such occurrences became current only under the influence of Christianity.2. It is not correct to assert that the belief in miracles has been confined to ages of ignorance. Will it be affirmed that the most flourishing period of Grecian literature was an age of ignorance? Yet a belief in a current supernaturalism prevailed in it. Was the Augustan age an age of ignorance? Both ages were ignorant of physical science: but during few periods has the human intellect been equally active. Each age contained men endowed with common sense sufficient to make them adequate judges whether the supernatural occurrences above referred to were possible or not.3. It is inaccurate to affirm that the Christian miracles are interposed between two similar series of supernatural occurrences. There is only one point in common between them; the claim to be supernatural. As I have proved, in every other respect they are strongly contrasted. It is, therefore, by no means extraordinary that a series of supernatural occurrences, which have the highest moral impress, and possess other distinguishing characteristics, should be true; and that the others, one of which took place before and the other after that in question, and which are stamped with the very opposite characteristics, should be false.The same author adduces the following objections, as lying at the root of miraculous testimony to a revelation:“Surely supernatural evidence of so common and prodigal a nature betrays great want of force[pg 352]and divine originality. How could that be considered as special evidence for a new revelation, which was already so well known to all the world, and which was scattered broadcast over so many centuries, as well as successfully simulated by Satan.”Again:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one epoch of history, and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find miracles represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries. The Gospel miracles are set in the midst of a series of similar wonders which commenced many centuries before the dawn of Christianity, and continued without interruption fifteen centuries after it. No divine originality characterized the evidence selected to accredit the divine revelation.”(P. 192.)I reply, First: It behoves those who except against the plan of attesting a divine revelation by miracles, to inform us in what other way it is possible that the truth of a divine commission can be attested. It is doubtless possible for God to make a special revelation of His will to each individual man; yet even this would involve supernatural agency of some kind; and it is very questionable whether to do so would be consistent with the plan of God's moral government which comes under our actual observation. But the Christian revelation is founded on the idea of making a divine manifestation additional to, and of a different order from, that which is made by the created universe; and not simply of imparting so much additional information to each individual. This manifestation professes to be made by the Incarnation. How, I ask, was such a manifestation to be made except by a supernatural action of some kind? It is clear, therefore, that every manifestation of God differing from that made by the ordinary forces of nature, or by the moral nature of[pg 353]man, must be supernatural. There can be no doubt as to the means which must be employed. The only question which can be raised is one which I have considered elsewhere, namely: whether it is the purpose of God to make such a manifestation of Himself.It will be objected that such a manifestation might have been made self-evident to the moral nature of man, and consequently it would have required no additional attestation. To this I reply that, on the supposition that it is God's purpose to make such an additional manifestation of Himself, He must be allowed to be the only adequate judge of the right mode of accomplishing it.But even if a revelation involved no such manifestation of God, but only a communication of truth to man, it is incumbent on those who object to its attestation by miracles, to find some other method by which the reality of a divine commission could be attested, and to show that this mode would be preferable to an attestation by miracles.But further: if we regard a miracle as a supernatural occurrence wrought in attestation of a divine commission, which is the unquestionable aspect of a considerable number of those recorded in the New Testament, the fact that there was a wide-spread belief in the existence of supernatural events is far from interfering with its efficacy. What did the current beliefs imply? That there existed beings, other than the blind forces of nature, who interfered in human affairs; and that they were in some way or other capable of communicating with man. What is the very conception implied by a revelation? That a God exists, who is the moral Governor of the universe, who cares for man, and is capable of holding communications with him. Both conceptions rest on a common ground—the existence of[pg 354]supernatural beings capable of manifesting themselves by outward indications. Why then should not the moral Governor of the universe, if it was His purpose to make a revelation, employ media, which were all but universally recognized? No inconsiderable number of the objections of unbelievers rest on the assumption, that if there be a God, it is derogatory to His character to suppose that He is capable of condescending to the weaknesses and imperfections of man. A God who neither will nor can do so may be a very grand conception; but one who is very ill adapted to the wants of human nature, and who is incapable of exciting human sympathies. The only thing that would be necessary, on the supposition that it was His purpose to make such a revelation, would be that His mode of manifesting His presence should be one clearly distinguishable from the events of current supernaturalism. What was requisite would have been to afford evidence that the manifestation in question was due to no other being than Himself; that is to say, that the miracles should bear the unquestionable impress of His own perfections. The subject of alleged demoniacal miracles I have considered elsewhere. The simple question before us is—Are the supernatural events recorded in the Gospels clearly distinguishable in their general character from the supernaturalism which was current previous to the Advent? I have already shown that it contains no doubtful indications as to who the agent must have been, if we suppose the facts to have been actual occurrences.But further: if the objection has any validity, it presupposes that God ought not to make a revelation in ages of superstition and ignorance; but must wait until knowledge has cleared away the mists of ignorance and error, and supplied us with the means of[pg 355]infallibly discriminating between true miracles and false ones; or, in other words, we must wait for the much-talked-of jury of scientific men, who can submit His alleged miracles to the whole range of scientific tests. Happily, however, God has gifted a considerable number of men with common sense, which is quite adequate to determine whether a certain class of events wrought under certain circumstances are miraculous operations, or mere natural occurrences, or due to imposture. If this be so, what is there, I ask, unworthy of God, in making a revelation at such times as man stands in special need of one?It is further objected that a miraculous attestation to a divine commission shows a want of force and divine originality. I ask, how? The fact is that with the exception of Judaism, no ancient religion professed to be so attested; and the Jew would naturally expect that any fresh revelation would be attested in a manner similar to that which he believed in as divine.The objection that because the belief in supernaturalism was so general, therefore miracles must be worthless as evidence, I have already shown to be fallacious.But it is also objected:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one particular period of history and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find them represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries.”This is the old objection of the Jews who demanded of our Lord a sign from Heaven. Both demand a particular class and order of miracle, viz.: something stupendous, or terrific. The value of each objection lies in conceiving of a miracle as a mere objective fact in external nature, stript of all its moral accompaniments. In one word, it contemplates the miracle in its most vulgar aspect, as a bare act of power,[pg 356]a portent, a prodigy. A great light everywhere appearing in the heavens might have appeared to vulgar minds a greater miracle, and have attracted more attention than the cure of a man full of leprosy by the utterance of a word. But it would not have presented stronger evidences of having been wrought by the power of God.But with respect to the general question, I ask, Is not the resurrection of Jesus Christ in every respect an exceptional event? Where are resurrections to be found in the history of current supernaturalism? Who ever pretended, before or since, to have a divine commission which was attested by his own resurrection from the dead? This miracle is at any rate absolutely unique; and it must never be forgotten that it is the only one recorded in the New Testament on the truth of which its writers stake the claim of Christianity to be regarded as a divine revelation. Although they refer to other miracles, wonders and signs which God wrought by Him, yet whenever they adduce the full and conclusive evidence of His divine mission, they always appeal to the fact that God had raised Him from the dead.But a further objection is urged as invalidating this kind of testimony:“At the very time when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of the reality of miracles, these wonders entirely ceased. This extraordinary cessation of miracles at a time when their evidence ought to have acquired value from an appeal to persons capable of appreciating them, is perfectly unintelligible, if they are viewed as the supernatural credentials of a divine revelation.”This passage contains several fallacies. One, to which I have repeatedly drawn attention, runs through it, viz., the classing together every kind of alleged[pg 357]supernatural occurrence, from the miracles of Jesus to the fantastic performances of the magician, as though they all stood on the same level. I need not further allude to the fallacy of such reasoning.2. It is affirmed that miracles entirely ceased when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of their reality. I conclude that by the word“miracles”in this passage, the author means ecclesiastical miracles, viz., those which have been alleged to be wrought in attestation of the established system of belief. If it is meant to be asserted that all belief in a current supernaturalism has now ceased, the affirmation is inaccurate, as the wide-spread belief in spiritualism abundantly testifies.But if the assertion is intended to be confined to ecclesiastical miracles, it involves an inaccuracy as to a matter of history. They had become thoroughly discredited long before the birth of modern physical science. The cure of blind and leprous persons by a touch, or the feeding of five thousand persons on seven loaves and a few fishes, require nothing else than sound common sense for the appreciation of their supernatural character, or the testing of their reality. The assertion, therefore, that miracles ceased precisely at the time when their evidence would have been most valuable, by their being able to be tested by those persons best capable of appreciating them, is entirely inaccurate.I fully admit that a belief in a current supernaturalism, as for instance in the absurdities of witchcraft, survived the Reformation. What the Reformation destroyed was a belief in a divine order of miracles wrought in support of an ecclesiastical system. The belief in this current supernaturalism has been gradually diminishing ever since, under the combined influence[pg 358]of the increase of the knowledge of physical science, and common sense. The objection raised is simply irrelevant to the point at issue.But there is another subject which demands consideration. Hitherto we have been dealing with the evidential character of miracles. But although all miracles have an evidential value, if they can be adequately attested, it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was intended to subserve this purpose alone. It was necessary not only that a revelation should be communicated, and receive an adequate attestation, but that it should be propagated among mankind. To render this possible, it was necessary that its messengers should be armed with some means of insuring that their message should be heard with attention. There was also another object to be effected; namely, the establishment in the world of that great institution, the Christian Church, which was intended so largely to influence its destinies.It will be quite clear to any person who carefully considers the various supernatural occurrences recorded in the New Testament that they are not all of equal evidential value. The highest class of them are directly affirmed to have been performed for the purpose of attesting the divine mission of Jesus Christ, and as a portion of His supernatural manifestation. To this class belong the miracles wrought by Himself, and several of those performed by the Apostles. But there is another class referred to in the Acts of the Apostles, of which the primary object seems to have been to awaken attention to the Apostolic message, though even these were not destitute of evidential value. There is also another order of manifestations frequently referred to in the Epistles, viz., the supernatural gifts of the Spirit, one of the declared purposes[pg 359]of which was to lay deep the foundations of the Christian Church. As divine interpositions, they were all to a certain extent evidential; but it will be important to observe that there is an order of supernatural manifestations mentioned in the New Testament, whose apparent primary intention was to subserve a different purpose.Let it be observed therefore, that at the introduction of Christianity, two distinct purposes had to be effected: first, to attest the truth of the revelation; secondly, to establish the Church.I will briefly draw attention to this latter portion of the subject, as far as it affects certain portions of the supernatural action affirmed in the New Testament. I allude to a certain class of miracles, such as the cure of the cripple at Lystra, those wrought by the passing of Peter's shadow, and by garments brought from Paul's person, and some others; also to the entire class of the supernatural gifts mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, and so frequently referred to in the Epistles.One of the greatest difficulties which beset the missionary is to obtain a hearing in the midst of the hostile elements by which he is surrounded. Yet to obtain this is the necessary condition of carrying on his work. In this respect, the modern missionary possesses great advantages compared with the primitive missionary of Christianity. He belongs to a superior civilization, and is therefore able to bring to bear the whole force of a higher on a lower one. This was exactly reversed in the case of the primitive missionaries. Instead of being able to bring to bear the prestige of a high civilization on those among whom they laboured, they belonged to a despised race; or if the missionary himself was a member of the race whom he addressed, he[pg 360]belonged to the lower sections of society. How was this enormous deficiency to be supplied? How was a man thus despised to obtain a hearing for the message with which he was charged? The New Testament affirms that the deficiency was supplied by imparting to the early Church a certain number of supernatural endowments, which, when once communicated, acted like our ordinary faculties; also that a supernatural gift of curing certain diseases was imparted to particular individuals, a gift which was exactly suited to obtain an attentive hearing for their message.Among the supernatural gifts which St. Paul affirms to have been communicated to the Church, there were two of which he asserts that the operation was distinct, but which are merged in the modern idea of miracles. These he designated by the expressions ἐνεργήματα δυναμέων, or the inworking of powers; and χαρίσματα ἰαμάτων, endowments of healing powers. The distinction in function between these powers is affirmed by him no less than three times; what it consisted in, we are only able to judge from the terms themselves, and the nature of the case. There is every probability that the distinction points to a higher and a lower exercise of supernatural power; the one being the evidential miracle properly so called, and the other a supernatural knowledge of how to effect cures—a gift which would be exactly suited to enable the missionary to obtain that attentive hearing of his message which he so urgently required. The Epistle of St. James furnishes us with a general idea of the nature of the gift, when he directs, that in case a person was sick, the elders of the Church were to be sent for, who were to pray over the sick man, and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord;“And the prayer of faith,”says he,“shall save the sick; and the Lord shall raise[pg 361]him up.”(James v. 15.) The whole description points to a cure which, although in a measure supernatural, was not instantaneous; the latter point being one which would be required to make a miracle in the proper sense of the word evidential. A power of effecting cures, however, whether by a knowledge of natural means supernaturally acquired, or by supernatural agency, would be one which would obtain for the despised Jewish missionary a hearing in Gentile cities, which otherwise he would be unable to obtain.To such a class of supernatural operations would belong such cures as those effected by the conveyance of handkerchiefs and aprons from St. Paul's body to the sick. These are only asserted to have taken place on one occasion, at Ephesus, a city greatly addicted to the arts of magic. They were adapted to the circumstances of the place, where the Apostle had to encounter a particular form of supernaturalism; and they would have been exactly suited to meet the difficulty in question. The historian tells us that the success was great, for many of those who had used magical arts came forward and confessed their deeds, collected together their magical books, which were worth a considerable sum of money, and publicly burned them. The same observations apply to Peter's shadow. Although the historian does not tell us that cures were wrought by it, yet the narrative presupposes that a large outburst of supernatural power took place in connection with Peter's person. Although the cure of the cripple at Lystra belongs to a class of miracles which is strictly evidential, yet the immediate occasion of its performance seems to have been with the view of arousing the attention of an ignorant heathen population.But not only had a revelation to be communicated[pg 362]and attested, not only had converts to be made and instructed, but it was also necessary that the foundations of the Church, the visible kingdom of Christ, should be firmly laid, and that it should be established among the visible institutions of the earth. Sufficient attention has not been paid to this portion of the subject in considering the question of supernatural intervention. The establishment of the Church as a visible institution, which was intended gradually to leaven mankind with the great principles of His revelation, is again and again affirmed by Jesus Christ to have been one of the great purposes of His coming. A description of its character and functions forms the subject of no inconsiderable number of His parables, and it is the great end and purpose for which He gave the great final Apostolic commission to go and gather it together out of all the nations of the earth.The Church of Christ had therefore to be formed into a community out of the most heterogeneous elements. It was destined not for a momentary existence, but for a continuous growth, so as to leaven human nature with its influences. The creation of such a society was a conception so bold that it had never previously entered the head of either poet or philosopher. Those with whom I am reasoning will not deny that the attempt was a very arduous, and to all appearance a most chimerical one.Yet it is the most certain of facts that the Church of Christ is now in the nineteenth century of its existence. The boldness of the undertaking will be more fully estimated when we reflect that the Church was intended to be a society which, while existing in the world, should differ in its essential character from all the other societies on the earth. Its action was to be entirely spiritual and moral. Its founder intended[pg 363]it to be invested with no coercive powers. The appeal was to be, not to force, but to conscience.Those who offered to enroll themselves as the subjects of Christ's spiritual kingdom had to be formed into a social organization. Unless this could be effected, one of the great objects for which the revelation was given must have proved a failure. The elements of which it had to be composed were of the most unpromising description. The first converts consisted of no small number of Jews and proselytes, who were extensively leavened with the narrowest prejudices of Judaism. When the Gentiles began to join the new community, its members were chiefly derived from the lower ranks of society, including a considerable number of slaves. The infant Church embraced a great diversity of opinions and characters. When converts were made, the time for their instruction was short. Yet such an institution had to contend with mighty civilization, the habits and prejudices of existing society, the self-interest of a corrupt religion, and the opposition of a powerful government.Such were some of the difficulties which had to be surmounted before this new institution could be firmly planted among the existing societies of the world, and expand itself with the life which was peculiarly its own. If the primitive followers of Jesus were animated by the credulous superstition which unbelievers delight in attributing to them, none should be better qualified than they to form a judgment of the difficulties which must have beset their path. Yet these have been surmounted. To this fact the vigorous life of the Church during eighteen centuries testifies. It has not only held its ground, but it has succeeded in leavening all existing civilizations with its influences. How has this been accomplished? The Apostolic Epistles return[pg 364]an answer. They affirm that the early converts were endowed with a number of supernatural gifts, exactly fitted to qualify them for the various functions which they were called upon to discharge. I subjoin a list of them, as they are directly affirmed by St. Paul to be then existing in the Corinthian Church. They were nine in number, each of which is asserted by him to have had a distinct and separate function and subject-matter: the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, faith, working of miracles, endowments of healing powers, prophecy, discerning of spirits, tongues, and interpretation. It does not appear whether this last is meant to be exhaustive of the supernatural mental endowments which the members of the early churches supposed themselves to possess, or whether they were varied for the purpose of meeting particular exigences. Nor do I ask those with whom I am reasoning to accept this statement as a true account of an objective fact; but only that they were supposed to be so by the Apostle and those to whom he wrote. It is plain, however, that these supernatural endowments, if real, were precisely such as the Church was in urgent need of, as the instrumentality for welding together the discordant elements of which it was composed, and enabling it firmly to plant itself in the soil of human nature.These supernatural gifts of the Spirit, with two exceptions, produced no results on external nature. They constituted enlargements of the powers of the human mind. As such, they cannot with strict propriety be said to belong to the class of evidential miracles, although like all other supernatural operations of which God is the Author, they cannot fail to be indirectly evidential. It is important to observe that they belong to a separate class of supernatural phenomena, which were as necessary in reference to the Christian revelation,[pg 365]contemplating as it did the institution of a divine society, as the order of supernatural manifestations which directly attested the divine mission of Jesus Christ and His Apostles. If this was their end and purpose we can understand why they were withdrawn at a very early period, before they could be submitted to the tests of our modernsavants. They were given for a special purpose, and they were withdrawn when they had accomplished it. The Apostle who affirms their existence asserts that they were not intended permanently to continue in the Church.There is one more allegation which is occasionally urged against the miracles of the New Testament, and which I must briefly consider. It is alleged that pious frauds have been very general in all ages of Christian history; that many good men have not hesitated to participate in them; and that literary forgeries were very abundant in the first ages of Christianity, and were even common in the days of the Apostles. It is insinuated that this state of mind throws great suspicion on the alleged miracles of the apostolic age.As the charge of pious fraud is not made against Jesus himself or his immediate followers, it is difficult to meet so indefinite an objection. It seems to be put in to add force to others, rather than for its intrinsic value. Modern unbelievers express a nearly unanimous concurrence in endeavouring to account for the miracles of the New Testament, by assuming that the followers of Jesus were the victims of the most intense enthusiasm, superstition, and credulity. It is difficult to comprehend, on the assumption that the existence of the supernatural portions of the New Testament is due to these causes, how direct fraud could have anything to do with the concoction of these miraculous stories. Intense enthusiasm and fanaticism, and deliberate fraud,[pg 366]are usually opposite poles of character; and if we call in one to account for these miracles, we must exclude the other from exerting an influence on their origination. To make the charge of any avail against the narratives of the Gospel, it is necessary not to prove that pious frauds were common in the second, third, or fourth century, or even in the first, but to establish directly either that Jesus professed to work miracles while He knew that they were not such, or that His followers deliberately invented a number of miraculous stories and attributed them to Him, well knowing that He had performed none. The charge that the miracles of the New Testament originated in enthusiasm and credulity is a definite one, and can be definitely met. So is the one that they originated in deliberate fraud. So would be the charge that the innocent followers of Jesus were imposed upon by fraudulent impostors. But to combine the charge of intense enthusiasm and credulity with that of conscious fraud, is a mode of reasoning which contains the grounds of its own refutation.It is no doubt a fact, that the practice of literary forgery was not unknown to the early ages of Christianity. St. Paul seems to have thought that there were in the world impostors daring enough to attempt to forge a letter in his name, and to try to foist it on the churches which he had planted, as a genuine production. But the existence of such impostors has no bearing whatever on the question whether the miracles recorded in the New Testament are facts or fiction. Did not St. Paul himself assert that he had performed miracles? Was he an impostor? Did he not believe that Jesus Christ in veritable reality rose from the dead? What have such beliefs to do with the existence of a set of daring literary impostors? Happily, however, the whole of this class of ancient[pg 367]writers were utter bunglers in the art of fictitious composition. It is a universal characteristic of them, that they were entirely unable to throw themselves into the spirit of former times, or of the persons whose names they assumed. In their references to history, geography, manners, customs, and character, they lay themselves open at almost every point to certain detection. There is good reason for believing that no forger or writer of fiction in the ancient world has succeeded in his art. In investing fiction with apparent probability, the modern world has completely outstript the ancient. Still, however, even in the most perfect works, when the fictions are extended over a wide sphere of action, no amount of genius will protect a writer from leaving some weak point unguarded. It is probably not too much to say that neither in ancient nor modern times, has a fictitious work or a forgery been able to maintain its ground against the apparatus which can be brought to bear on it by a sound and rational criticism.Most of the other objections which are adduced against the miracles of the New Testament have been answered in principle under the foregoing heads. I must now adduce some of the most important considerations which prove them to have been historical facts.
While considering this subject, it will be necessary to keep steadily in view that miracles are not alleged in the New Testament to have been performed to prove the truth of doctrines, but that a particular person possesses a divine commission; or in attestation of particular facts, such as the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The truth of a divine commission being established, it follows that the divinely-appointed messenger must have some message to communicate. We further infer that God will not intrust a message to any person whom He has not previously fully enlightened as to the subject which he has to communicate, and who would not truthfully communicate the message with which he is intrusted. A miracle is therefore not only an attestation to the divine commission of the person performing one, but also to the adequate information and veracity of the messenger. Although a miracle is not wrought to prove the truth of a particular doctrine, but that a particular person is intrusted with a divine commission, we accept a doctrinal statement as true, when made by a messenger thus attested, within the limits of the message with which he affirms himself to be intrusted, on the ground that such a messenger must both be truthful, and possess adequate knowledge.[pg 347]In other words, our belief in the doctrinal statement does not rest on the miracle, but on the veracity of God.
This is the affirmation made in the New Testament respecting the most important class of the miracles which it records. As I have elsewhere observed, not a single instance occurs in it of a miracle wrought for the purpose of proving that a doctrine is true. Our Lord's distinct affirmation is,“The same works that I do, bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me.”(John v. 36.)“If I say the truth, why do ye not believe me?”(John viii. 46.) The miracles which are alleged to have been performed by the Apostles for directly evidential purposes, were wrought in proof of the Resurrection of Christ, and of their own divine commission, which directly depended on it.
Let it also be observed that it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was performed exclusively for evidential purposes. This point I shall consider hereafter.
If these principles are correct, they will at once dispose of two objections which are alleged against miracles: first, that they cannot prove a doctrine; and secondly, that they cannot prove a moral truth. I fully accept the statement that moral truths cannot be proved by the evidence of miracles, but must rest on their own inherent evidence; and that all positive duties rest on the command of God, to whom we feel, on other grounds, that all love, reverence, and adoration are due. The truth of doctrines also cannot be established by the performance of a miracle; but when we accept them on external authority, they rest on the testimony of God, and our full persuasion that He must be in possession of all truth. Although, therefore, I accept as correct these principles, on which the objection is founded, they have no bearing[pg 348]on the point at issue; for the New Testament nowhere affirms that its miracles were wrought to prove either doctrinal statements or moral truths, but facts.
1. It is objected that the prevalence of supernatural beliefs renders the existence of miracles“so hackneyed as scarcely to attract the notice of the nation to whom the Christian revelation was in the first instance addressed.”(Supernatural Religion.)
I reply that this objection contains two inaccuracies. First, it is not true that the miracles of Jesus scarcely attracted the notice of those among whom they were performed. The only authority on this point is the New Testament itself, and this assertion contradicts its express statements. Numerous passages in the Gospels directly affirm that the miracles of our Lord attracted very general attention, and produced a profound astonishment; and that those who had witnessed them considered that there was a wide distinction between them and the miraculous pretensions then current. His fame is represented as having been spread by them in regions beyond Palestine; and great multitudes are stated to have collected, both for the purpose of hearing Him and of being healed of their diseases. The fourth Gospel represents our Lord as rebuking the multitudes, for attending on Him for sordid purposes. It is quite true, that notwithstanding the miracles, the body of the Jewish nation ultimately rejected Christianity, though the epistles bear witness that the Jewish element which was attracted into the Christian Church was large. The assertion, therefore, is simply contrary to fact, that miracles were in those days so common and hackneyed as to attract little or no attention to him who professed to work them.
Equally inaccurate is the assertion that the evidence of miracles as the attestation to a revelation was a[pg 349]“hackneyed”one. The Old Testament professed to rest on miraculous evidence. This being the case, the Jews were fully entitled to expect that if God made a further revelation of His will, it would be accompanied by a miraculous attestation. But Judaism was the only religion of the ancient world which professed to be founded on the evidence of miracles. A belief in a current supernaturalism was no doubt mixed up with the ancient religions, but its wonders were not alleged to have been wrought in attestation of the fact that they were revelations, nor even as attestations to their truth. The religion of the Greeks possessed both priests and prophets; but they performed no miracles in attestation of a divine commission. The only attestation of this kind which they claimed was the utterance of obscure or mendacious oracles. I am not aware that anyone who pretended to be a revealer of the divine will in ancient times ever professed to perform visible and palpable miracles in proof of his assertions. Similar is the position of the old religions which still exist in the modern world. Many of them abound in stories of the most fantastic manifestations of their gods in ancient times. Their votaries believe in the efficacy of magic, charms, and incantations. But none of these things have been affirmed to have been wrought in attestation of a divine commission. Mahometanism claims, in the strictest sense, to be a divine revelation; yet the Koran even offers apologies for the fact that its founder wrought no miracles in attestation of his claim to be a divine messenger. So far therefore is it from being the fact that miracles are so generally alleged by religions in vindication of their claim to be revelations, that Judaism and Christianity are absolutely unique in this respect. The idea of working a miracle in attestation of a divine commission is so far from[pg 350]being a“hackneyed”one, that it has the strongest claims to originality.
2. It is urged by the same writer that“every marvel and every narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age. However much miracles are the exception to the order of nature, they have always been the rule in the history of ignorance. In fact the excess of belief in them throughout many centuries of darkness, is almost fatal to their claims to credence now. They have been limited to periods of ignorance and superstition, and are unknown to ages of enlightenment. The Christian miracles are rendered almost as suspicious from their place in a long series of similar occurrences, as they are by their being exceptions to the sequence of natural phenomena. It would be extraordinary if cycles of miracles occurring before and since those of the Gospels, and in connection with every religion, could be repudiated as fables, and these alone maintained as genuine.”
The principles which I have laid down in a former chapter fully meet the chief points raised in these objections. A few additional observations on them, therefore, are all that will be necessary.
First: the assertion that every marvel or narrative of supernatural interference seemed a matter of course to the superstitious credulity of the age, is inaccurate. If they had been of habitual or constant occurrence, they would have ceased to be marvels at all. In such a case the trade of the impostor would have gone, for it would not have paid him. The entire plausibility of such reasonings arises from confounding under a common name phenomena wholly different in character. I ask emphatically, did the current supernaturalism of any age or nation accept as matters of course such[pg 351]events as the resurrection of Christ, or the cure of a blind man, or a man full of leprosy, by a word or a touch? Have not heathen writers pronounced actual resurrections from the dead to be impossibilities? Were such occurrences ever believed to be within the power of magic to effect? Belief in the possibility of such occurrences became current only under the influence of Christianity.
2. It is not correct to assert that the belief in miracles has been confined to ages of ignorance. Will it be affirmed that the most flourishing period of Grecian literature was an age of ignorance? Yet a belief in a current supernaturalism prevailed in it. Was the Augustan age an age of ignorance? Both ages were ignorant of physical science: but during few periods has the human intellect been equally active. Each age contained men endowed with common sense sufficient to make them adequate judges whether the supernatural occurrences above referred to were possible or not.
3. It is inaccurate to affirm that the Christian miracles are interposed between two similar series of supernatural occurrences. There is only one point in common between them; the claim to be supernatural. As I have proved, in every other respect they are strongly contrasted. It is, therefore, by no means extraordinary that a series of supernatural occurrences, which have the highest moral impress, and possess other distinguishing characteristics, should be true; and that the others, one of which took place before and the other after that in question, and which are stamped with the very opposite characteristics, should be false.
The same author adduces the following objections, as lying at the root of miraculous testimony to a revelation:“Surely supernatural evidence of so common and prodigal a nature betrays great want of force[pg 352]and divine originality. How could that be considered as special evidence for a new revelation, which was already so well known to all the world, and which was scattered broadcast over so many centuries, as well as successfully simulated by Satan.”Again:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one epoch of history, and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find miracles represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries. The Gospel miracles are set in the midst of a series of similar wonders which commenced many centuries before the dawn of Christianity, and continued without interruption fifteen centuries after it. No divine originality characterized the evidence selected to accredit the divine revelation.”(P. 192.)
I reply, First: It behoves those who except against the plan of attesting a divine revelation by miracles, to inform us in what other way it is possible that the truth of a divine commission can be attested. It is doubtless possible for God to make a special revelation of His will to each individual man; yet even this would involve supernatural agency of some kind; and it is very questionable whether to do so would be consistent with the plan of God's moral government which comes under our actual observation. But the Christian revelation is founded on the idea of making a divine manifestation additional to, and of a different order from, that which is made by the created universe; and not simply of imparting so much additional information to each individual. This manifestation professes to be made by the Incarnation. How, I ask, was such a manifestation to be made except by a supernatural action of some kind? It is clear, therefore, that every manifestation of God differing from that made by the ordinary forces of nature, or by the moral nature of[pg 353]man, must be supernatural. There can be no doubt as to the means which must be employed. The only question which can be raised is one which I have considered elsewhere, namely: whether it is the purpose of God to make such a manifestation of Himself.
It will be objected that such a manifestation might have been made self-evident to the moral nature of man, and consequently it would have required no additional attestation. To this I reply that, on the supposition that it is God's purpose to make such an additional manifestation of Himself, He must be allowed to be the only adequate judge of the right mode of accomplishing it.
But even if a revelation involved no such manifestation of God, but only a communication of truth to man, it is incumbent on those who object to its attestation by miracles, to find some other method by which the reality of a divine commission could be attested, and to show that this mode would be preferable to an attestation by miracles.
But further: if we regard a miracle as a supernatural occurrence wrought in attestation of a divine commission, which is the unquestionable aspect of a considerable number of those recorded in the New Testament, the fact that there was a wide-spread belief in the existence of supernatural events is far from interfering with its efficacy. What did the current beliefs imply? That there existed beings, other than the blind forces of nature, who interfered in human affairs; and that they were in some way or other capable of communicating with man. What is the very conception implied by a revelation? That a God exists, who is the moral Governor of the universe, who cares for man, and is capable of holding communications with him. Both conceptions rest on a common ground—the existence of[pg 354]supernatural beings capable of manifesting themselves by outward indications. Why then should not the moral Governor of the universe, if it was His purpose to make a revelation, employ media, which were all but universally recognized? No inconsiderable number of the objections of unbelievers rest on the assumption, that if there be a God, it is derogatory to His character to suppose that He is capable of condescending to the weaknesses and imperfections of man. A God who neither will nor can do so may be a very grand conception; but one who is very ill adapted to the wants of human nature, and who is incapable of exciting human sympathies. The only thing that would be necessary, on the supposition that it was His purpose to make such a revelation, would be that His mode of manifesting His presence should be one clearly distinguishable from the events of current supernaturalism. What was requisite would have been to afford evidence that the manifestation in question was due to no other being than Himself; that is to say, that the miracles should bear the unquestionable impress of His own perfections. The subject of alleged demoniacal miracles I have considered elsewhere. The simple question before us is—Are the supernatural events recorded in the Gospels clearly distinguishable in their general character from the supernaturalism which was current previous to the Advent? I have already shown that it contains no doubtful indications as to who the agent must have been, if we suppose the facts to have been actual occurrences.
But further: if the objection has any validity, it presupposes that God ought not to make a revelation in ages of superstition and ignorance; but must wait until knowledge has cleared away the mists of ignorance and error, and supplied us with the means of[pg 355]infallibly discriminating between true miracles and false ones; or, in other words, we must wait for the much-talked-of jury of scientific men, who can submit His alleged miracles to the whole range of scientific tests. Happily, however, God has gifted a considerable number of men with common sense, which is quite adequate to determine whether a certain class of events wrought under certain circumstances are miraculous operations, or mere natural occurrences, or due to imposture. If this be so, what is there, I ask, unworthy of God, in making a revelation at such times as man stands in special need of one?
It is further objected that a miraculous attestation to a divine commission shows a want of force and divine originality. I ask, how? The fact is that with the exception of Judaism, no ancient religion professed to be so attested; and the Jew would naturally expect that any fresh revelation would be attested in a manner similar to that which he believed in as divine.
The objection that because the belief in supernaturalism was so general, therefore miracles must be worthless as evidence, I have already shown to be fallacious.
But it is also objected:“Instead of a few evidential miracles taking place at one particular period of history and filling the world with surprise at such novel and exceptional phenomena, we find them represented as taking place in all ages and in all countries.”
This is the old objection of the Jews who demanded of our Lord a sign from Heaven. Both demand a particular class and order of miracle, viz.: something stupendous, or terrific. The value of each objection lies in conceiving of a miracle as a mere objective fact in external nature, stript of all its moral accompaniments. In one word, it contemplates the miracle in its most vulgar aspect, as a bare act of power,[pg 356]a portent, a prodigy. A great light everywhere appearing in the heavens might have appeared to vulgar minds a greater miracle, and have attracted more attention than the cure of a man full of leprosy by the utterance of a word. But it would not have presented stronger evidences of having been wrought by the power of God.
But with respect to the general question, I ask, Is not the resurrection of Jesus Christ in every respect an exceptional event? Where are resurrections to be found in the history of current supernaturalism? Who ever pretended, before or since, to have a divine commission which was attested by his own resurrection from the dead? This miracle is at any rate absolutely unique; and it must never be forgotten that it is the only one recorded in the New Testament on the truth of which its writers stake the claim of Christianity to be regarded as a divine revelation. Although they refer to other miracles, wonders and signs which God wrought by Him, yet whenever they adduce the full and conclusive evidence of His divine mission, they always appeal to the fact that God had raised Him from the dead.
But a further objection is urged as invalidating this kind of testimony:“At the very time when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of the reality of miracles, these wonders entirely ceased. This extraordinary cessation of miracles at a time when their evidence ought to have acquired value from an appeal to persons capable of appreciating them, is perfectly unintelligible, if they are viewed as the supernatural credentials of a divine revelation.”
This passage contains several fallacies. One, to which I have repeatedly drawn attention, runs through it, viz., the classing together every kind of alleged[pg 357]supernatural occurrence, from the miracles of Jesus to the fantastic performances of the magician, as though they all stood on the same level. I need not further allude to the fallacy of such reasoning.
2. It is affirmed that miracles entirely ceased when the knowledge of the laws of nature began to render men capable of judging of their reality. I conclude that by the word“miracles”in this passage, the author means ecclesiastical miracles, viz., those which have been alleged to be wrought in attestation of the established system of belief. If it is meant to be asserted that all belief in a current supernaturalism has now ceased, the affirmation is inaccurate, as the wide-spread belief in spiritualism abundantly testifies.
But if the assertion is intended to be confined to ecclesiastical miracles, it involves an inaccuracy as to a matter of history. They had become thoroughly discredited long before the birth of modern physical science. The cure of blind and leprous persons by a touch, or the feeding of five thousand persons on seven loaves and a few fishes, require nothing else than sound common sense for the appreciation of their supernatural character, or the testing of their reality. The assertion, therefore, that miracles ceased precisely at the time when their evidence would have been most valuable, by their being able to be tested by those persons best capable of appreciating them, is entirely inaccurate.
I fully admit that a belief in a current supernaturalism, as for instance in the absurdities of witchcraft, survived the Reformation. What the Reformation destroyed was a belief in a divine order of miracles wrought in support of an ecclesiastical system. The belief in this current supernaturalism has been gradually diminishing ever since, under the combined influence[pg 358]of the increase of the knowledge of physical science, and common sense. The objection raised is simply irrelevant to the point at issue.
But there is another subject which demands consideration. Hitherto we have been dealing with the evidential character of miracles. But although all miracles have an evidential value, if they can be adequately attested, it by no means follows that every miracle recorded in the New Testament was intended to subserve this purpose alone. It was necessary not only that a revelation should be communicated, and receive an adequate attestation, but that it should be propagated among mankind. To render this possible, it was necessary that its messengers should be armed with some means of insuring that their message should be heard with attention. There was also another object to be effected; namely, the establishment in the world of that great institution, the Christian Church, which was intended so largely to influence its destinies.
It will be quite clear to any person who carefully considers the various supernatural occurrences recorded in the New Testament that they are not all of equal evidential value. The highest class of them are directly affirmed to have been performed for the purpose of attesting the divine mission of Jesus Christ, and as a portion of His supernatural manifestation. To this class belong the miracles wrought by Himself, and several of those performed by the Apostles. But there is another class referred to in the Acts of the Apostles, of which the primary object seems to have been to awaken attention to the Apostolic message, though even these were not destitute of evidential value. There is also another order of manifestations frequently referred to in the Epistles, viz., the supernatural gifts of the Spirit, one of the declared purposes[pg 359]of which was to lay deep the foundations of the Christian Church. As divine interpositions, they were all to a certain extent evidential; but it will be important to observe that there is an order of supernatural manifestations mentioned in the New Testament, whose apparent primary intention was to subserve a different purpose.
Let it be observed therefore, that at the introduction of Christianity, two distinct purposes had to be effected: first, to attest the truth of the revelation; secondly, to establish the Church.
I will briefly draw attention to this latter portion of the subject, as far as it affects certain portions of the supernatural action affirmed in the New Testament. I allude to a certain class of miracles, such as the cure of the cripple at Lystra, those wrought by the passing of Peter's shadow, and by garments brought from Paul's person, and some others; also to the entire class of the supernatural gifts mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, and so frequently referred to in the Epistles.
One of the greatest difficulties which beset the missionary is to obtain a hearing in the midst of the hostile elements by which he is surrounded. Yet to obtain this is the necessary condition of carrying on his work. In this respect, the modern missionary possesses great advantages compared with the primitive missionary of Christianity. He belongs to a superior civilization, and is therefore able to bring to bear the whole force of a higher on a lower one. This was exactly reversed in the case of the primitive missionaries. Instead of being able to bring to bear the prestige of a high civilization on those among whom they laboured, they belonged to a despised race; or if the missionary himself was a member of the race whom he addressed, he[pg 360]belonged to the lower sections of society. How was this enormous deficiency to be supplied? How was a man thus despised to obtain a hearing for the message with which he was charged? The New Testament affirms that the deficiency was supplied by imparting to the early Church a certain number of supernatural endowments, which, when once communicated, acted like our ordinary faculties; also that a supernatural gift of curing certain diseases was imparted to particular individuals, a gift which was exactly suited to obtain an attentive hearing for their message.
Among the supernatural gifts which St. Paul affirms to have been communicated to the Church, there were two of which he asserts that the operation was distinct, but which are merged in the modern idea of miracles. These he designated by the expressions ἐνεργήματα δυναμέων, or the inworking of powers; and χαρίσματα ἰαμάτων, endowments of healing powers. The distinction in function between these powers is affirmed by him no less than three times; what it consisted in, we are only able to judge from the terms themselves, and the nature of the case. There is every probability that the distinction points to a higher and a lower exercise of supernatural power; the one being the evidential miracle properly so called, and the other a supernatural knowledge of how to effect cures—a gift which would be exactly suited to enable the missionary to obtain that attentive hearing of his message which he so urgently required. The Epistle of St. James furnishes us with a general idea of the nature of the gift, when he directs, that in case a person was sick, the elders of the Church were to be sent for, who were to pray over the sick man, and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord;“And the prayer of faith,”says he,“shall save the sick; and the Lord shall raise[pg 361]him up.”(James v. 15.) The whole description points to a cure which, although in a measure supernatural, was not instantaneous; the latter point being one which would be required to make a miracle in the proper sense of the word evidential. A power of effecting cures, however, whether by a knowledge of natural means supernaturally acquired, or by supernatural agency, would be one which would obtain for the despised Jewish missionary a hearing in Gentile cities, which otherwise he would be unable to obtain.
To such a class of supernatural operations would belong such cures as those effected by the conveyance of handkerchiefs and aprons from St. Paul's body to the sick. These are only asserted to have taken place on one occasion, at Ephesus, a city greatly addicted to the arts of magic. They were adapted to the circumstances of the place, where the Apostle had to encounter a particular form of supernaturalism; and they would have been exactly suited to meet the difficulty in question. The historian tells us that the success was great, for many of those who had used magical arts came forward and confessed their deeds, collected together their magical books, which were worth a considerable sum of money, and publicly burned them. The same observations apply to Peter's shadow. Although the historian does not tell us that cures were wrought by it, yet the narrative presupposes that a large outburst of supernatural power took place in connection with Peter's person. Although the cure of the cripple at Lystra belongs to a class of miracles which is strictly evidential, yet the immediate occasion of its performance seems to have been with the view of arousing the attention of an ignorant heathen population.
But not only had a revelation to be communicated[pg 362]and attested, not only had converts to be made and instructed, but it was also necessary that the foundations of the Church, the visible kingdom of Christ, should be firmly laid, and that it should be established among the visible institutions of the earth. Sufficient attention has not been paid to this portion of the subject in considering the question of supernatural intervention. The establishment of the Church as a visible institution, which was intended gradually to leaven mankind with the great principles of His revelation, is again and again affirmed by Jesus Christ to have been one of the great purposes of His coming. A description of its character and functions forms the subject of no inconsiderable number of His parables, and it is the great end and purpose for which He gave the great final Apostolic commission to go and gather it together out of all the nations of the earth.
The Church of Christ had therefore to be formed into a community out of the most heterogeneous elements. It was destined not for a momentary existence, but for a continuous growth, so as to leaven human nature with its influences. The creation of such a society was a conception so bold that it had never previously entered the head of either poet or philosopher. Those with whom I am reasoning will not deny that the attempt was a very arduous, and to all appearance a most chimerical one.
Yet it is the most certain of facts that the Church of Christ is now in the nineteenth century of its existence. The boldness of the undertaking will be more fully estimated when we reflect that the Church was intended to be a society which, while existing in the world, should differ in its essential character from all the other societies on the earth. Its action was to be entirely spiritual and moral. Its founder intended[pg 363]it to be invested with no coercive powers. The appeal was to be, not to force, but to conscience.
Those who offered to enroll themselves as the subjects of Christ's spiritual kingdom had to be formed into a social organization. Unless this could be effected, one of the great objects for which the revelation was given must have proved a failure. The elements of which it had to be composed were of the most unpromising description. The first converts consisted of no small number of Jews and proselytes, who were extensively leavened with the narrowest prejudices of Judaism. When the Gentiles began to join the new community, its members were chiefly derived from the lower ranks of society, including a considerable number of slaves. The infant Church embraced a great diversity of opinions and characters. When converts were made, the time for their instruction was short. Yet such an institution had to contend with mighty civilization, the habits and prejudices of existing society, the self-interest of a corrupt religion, and the opposition of a powerful government.
Such were some of the difficulties which had to be surmounted before this new institution could be firmly planted among the existing societies of the world, and expand itself with the life which was peculiarly its own. If the primitive followers of Jesus were animated by the credulous superstition which unbelievers delight in attributing to them, none should be better qualified than they to form a judgment of the difficulties which must have beset their path. Yet these have been surmounted. To this fact the vigorous life of the Church during eighteen centuries testifies. It has not only held its ground, but it has succeeded in leavening all existing civilizations with its influences. How has this been accomplished? The Apostolic Epistles return[pg 364]an answer. They affirm that the early converts were endowed with a number of supernatural gifts, exactly fitted to qualify them for the various functions which they were called upon to discharge. I subjoin a list of them, as they are directly affirmed by St. Paul to be then existing in the Corinthian Church. They were nine in number, each of which is asserted by him to have had a distinct and separate function and subject-matter: the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, faith, working of miracles, endowments of healing powers, prophecy, discerning of spirits, tongues, and interpretation. It does not appear whether this last is meant to be exhaustive of the supernatural mental endowments which the members of the early churches supposed themselves to possess, or whether they were varied for the purpose of meeting particular exigences. Nor do I ask those with whom I am reasoning to accept this statement as a true account of an objective fact; but only that they were supposed to be so by the Apostle and those to whom he wrote. It is plain, however, that these supernatural endowments, if real, were precisely such as the Church was in urgent need of, as the instrumentality for welding together the discordant elements of which it was composed, and enabling it firmly to plant itself in the soil of human nature.
These supernatural gifts of the Spirit, with two exceptions, produced no results on external nature. They constituted enlargements of the powers of the human mind. As such, they cannot with strict propriety be said to belong to the class of evidential miracles, although like all other supernatural operations of which God is the Author, they cannot fail to be indirectly evidential. It is important to observe that they belong to a separate class of supernatural phenomena, which were as necessary in reference to the Christian revelation,[pg 365]contemplating as it did the institution of a divine society, as the order of supernatural manifestations which directly attested the divine mission of Jesus Christ and His Apostles. If this was their end and purpose we can understand why they were withdrawn at a very early period, before they could be submitted to the tests of our modernsavants. They were given for a special purpose, and they were withdrawn when they had accomplished it. The Apostle who affirms their existence asserts that they were not intended permanently to continue in the Church.
There is one more allegation which is occasionally urged against the miracles of the New Testament, and which I must briefly consider. It is alleged that pious frauds have been very general in all ages of Christian history; that many good men have not hesitated to participate in them; and that literary forgeries were very abundant in the first ages of Christianity, and were even common in the days of the Apostles. It is insinuated that this state of mind throws great suspicion on the alleged miracles of the apostolic age.
As the charge of pious fraud is not made against Jesus himself or his immediate followers, it is difficult to meet so indefinite an objection. It seems to be put in to add force to others, rather than for its intrinsic value. Modern unbelievers express a nearly unanimous concurrence in endeavouring to account for the miracles of the New Testament, by assuming that the followers of Jesus were the victims of the most intense enthusiasm, superstition, and credulity. It is difficult to comprehend, on the assumption that the existence of the supernatural portions of the New Testament is due to these causes, how direct fraud could have anything to do with the concoction of these miraculous stories. Intense enthusiasm and fanaticism, and deliberate fraud,[pg 366]are usually opposite poles of character; and if we call in one to account for these miracles, we must exclude the other from exerting an influence on their origination. To make the charge of any avail against the narratives of the Gospel, it is necessary not to prove that pious frauds were common in the second, third, or fourth century, or even in the first, but to establish directly either that Jesus professed to work miracles while He knew that they were not such, or that His followers deliberately invented a number of miraculous stories and attributed them to Him, well knowing that He had performed none. The charge that the miracles of the New Testament originated in enthusiasm and credulity is a definite one, and can be definitely met. So is the one that they originated in deliberate fraud. So would be the charge that the innocent followers of Jesus were imposed upon by fraudulent impostors. But to combine the charge of intense enthusiasm and credulity with that of conscious fraud, is a mode of reasoning which contains the grounds of its own refutation.
It is no doubt a fact, that the practice of literary forgery was not unknown to the early ages of Christianity. St. Paul seems to have thought that there were in the world impostors daring enough to attempt to forge a letter in his name, and to try to foist it on the churches which he had planted, as a genuine production. But the existence of such impostors has no bearing whatever on the question whether the miracles recorded in the New Testament are facts or fiction. Did not St. Paul himself assert that he had performed miracles? Was he an impostor? Did he not believe that Jesus Christ in veritable reality rose from the dead? What have such beliefs to do with the existence of a set of daring literary impostors? Happily, however, the whole of this class of ancient[pg 367]writers were utter bunglers in the art of fictitious composition. It is a universal characteristic of them, that they were entirely unable to throw themselves into the spirit of former times, or of the persons whose names they assumed. In their references to history, geography, manners, customs, and character, they lay themselves open at almost every point to certain detection. There is good reason for believing that no forger or writer of fiction in the ancient world has succeeded in his art. In investing fiction with apparent probability, the modern world has completely outstript the ancient. Still, however, even in the most perfect works, when the fictions are extended over a wide sphere of action, no amount of genius will protect a writer from leaving some weak point unguarded. It is probably not too much to say that neither in ancient nor modern times, has a fictitious work or a forgery been able to maintain its ground against the apparatus which can be brought to bear on it by a sound and rational criticism.
Most of the other objections which are adduced against the miracles of the New Testament have been answered in principle under the foregoing heads. I must now adduce some of the most important considerations which prove them to have been historical facts.