Miracles and Christian History
Dateline: April 19, 2000
"MIRACLES & CHRISTIAN HISTORY" > Page 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6
History vs. Archaeology
Which brings us back to Hume's observation. Let's take it one sentence at a time:
It is experience only, which gives authority to human testimony; and it is the same experience, which assures us of the laws of nature.
This is a summary statement of what I've been endeavoring to demonstrate. Indeed, our ability to trust human testimony is in direct proportion to which it accords with our experience of the laws of nature. It amounts then to simply a statement of obvious fact.
I need to amplify a point: We have to be able to trust human testimony if we are to have 'history' (as distinct from archaeology) at all.
Stable laws of nature give us the ability to dig up artifacts from the ground and infer, based on that consistency, not only how old the artifacts are (via such means as pollen and lake/river delta varves or dendrochronology, C14, common cultural/trade items with other already dated civilizations, a continuous record, or other dating methods which all rely one way or another on the consistency of the past with the present); but we an also determine what uses the artifacts may have had. Based on other artifacts we can then infer cultural spread, population growth, etc.
But if we are to have history, with names and events and stories/narratives, then we have to be able to rely on the written testimony of men from long ago. This applies to the Bible as well as to, say, Tacitus. Whatever else it is, it is the product of humans writing down some form of testimony. Ergo, we have to be able to believe the individuals whose testimony it is supposed to be.
Miracles vs. History
The next sentence is a bit more difficult to read:
When, therefore, these two kinds of experience are contrary, we have nothing to do but subtract the one from the other, and embrace an opinion, either on one side or the other, with that assurance which arises from the remainder.
When we have two contrary experiences, we have to ascertain which it is that is the more reliable and trustworthy of the two. Do rocks lie? Does water prevaricate? Does electricity inadvertently confabulate? Can a piece of wood misperceive a stimulus? Obviously not, which is the same as to say that the laws of nature are invariable.
Indeed, as we noted, they must be so if we are ever to be able to claim to know anything. And it is the consistency of human testimony with the laws of nature that gives human testimony whatever assurance of authority it has.
Let's return to history and Tacitus. Where Tacitus reports on political maneuverings in Rome, or battle tactics in Gaul, we have little reason to doubt him and often other testimony or physical evidence to support him. Where he reports that the spit of Emperor Trajan healed a blind man, we disregard that item since such an event is not supported by any experience of anyone, medical or otherwise. In fact, there is substantial reason to suppose that spit has no healing powers of any kind, let alone over any form of blindness - except, perhaps, hysterical blindness (but hysterical blindness does not produce cataracts that fall away).
Thus, so long as he is not reporting such miracles, and where we do have checks on his veracity, he is considered accurate and we tend to give his historical reporting a great deal of weight.
Next page > Paradox & Conclusion
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