Miracles & Other Supernatural Thingamabobs in a Naturalistic Cosmos (1 of 3)

4 From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; but the people became impatient on the way. 5 The people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we detest this miserable food.” 6 Then the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. 7 The people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord to take away the serpents from us.” So Moses prayed for the people. 8 And the Lord said to Moses, “Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.” 9 So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.

Numbers 21:4-9 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

12 It is necessary to boast; nothing is to be gained by it, but I will go on to visions and revelations of the Lord. 2 I know a person in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows. 3 And I know that such a person—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows— 4 was caught up into Paradise and heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat. 5 On behalf of such a one I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses. 6 But if I wish to boast, I will not be a fool, for I will be speaking the truth. But I refrain from it, so that no one may think better of me than what is seen in me or heard from me, 7 even considering the exceptional character of the revelations. Therefore, to keep[a] me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated.[b] 8 Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, 9 but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power[c] is made perfect in weakness.” So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. 10 Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 12 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

1. Naturalism: The belief that nature is a closed, coherent, consistent system of phenomena that, at least in principle, can be wholly explained on its own terms. Probably the consensus view of the educated, western world.
2. Abrahamic (Judeo-Christian-Muslim) Supernaturalism: Creation (nature) is separate from God but comes from God and is the primary means through which God communicates ultimate meaning, value and purpose with humanity, often through extraordinary events variously translated in English as miracles, signs, wonders, awesome deeds, etc. God’s authority and power encompasses nature but is not bound by it.
3. New Testament Supernaturalism (Specifically that of the Gospel of Mark and the authentic writings of Paul): God’s authority and power ironically overcomes the power of death through being defeated by that power in the cross of God incarnate in Christ (2 Corinthians 12 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)). Jesus Christ’s death on a Roman cross subverted - though not undone - through the resurrection is the central prism through which all all claims of the supernatural and, in this case, miracles, are to be viewed.
4. The resurrection and life does not destroy or undo crucifixion and death but subverts them from within. God in Christ is the “wormhole” or focal point through which the supernatural is encountered in the natural. The Gospel of John teaches that reality or nature is created through God in Christ such that all that is can reflect the supernatural.
5. What do the extraordinary events we call miracles actually do in the natural world? Lightning does something in the natural world. An earthquake does something in the natural world. Does God do anything in the natural world? Does earnest prayer importune God to do things in the world? Or does God just cause people to see events in the natural world from a different perspective? And if the latter, is “God” anything more than shorthand for natural, human thought processes? Does anything real happen?
6. Use case: A Daughter’s Death: Consider a parent whose young daughter dies when their apartment collapses following an earthquake. The agonized parents asks, “Why did my daughter die?”
7. Job’s Technocratic “Comforters”: Imagine, in the role of “Job’s comforters,” a geologist, a civil engineer, a medical doctor and a theologian. The rule of the “game” is that the comforter can only answer from within the perspective of their professional discipline.
8. Explaining the death: The geologist explains the daughter’s death in terms of geological causality. The civil engineer explains the daughter’s death in terms of forces applied on a structure made of certain materials and designed and built in certain ways. The medical doctor explains the daughter’s death in terms of the injuries suffered in the building collapse. And the theologian explains the daughter’s death in terms of an event in which God mysteriously communicates the ultimate meaning, purpose and value behind all earthy events through a dramatic demonstration of God’s sovereignty over nature and history.
9. Which explanation is right? What if the theologian and the engineer disagree? “It was the will of God!” “No, it was poor design!” Can they actually argue with each other, given the constraint of the rule of the game - they must explain solely in the context of their professional discipline? This is the issue of incommensurability.
10. Could they all be right? Or all be wrong? I’d say they could all be right in their proper context: again, consistent with the rule of the game. On the other hand, any of them - or all of them - could be wrong within the rule of the game. Another civil engineer might challenge our civil engineer’s explanation on engineering grounds. Another theologian might challenge our theologian on biblical or doctrinal grounds. But it’s hard if not impossible to see how the civil engineer could argue with our theologian (or our doctor or, for that matter, a lawyer) without violating the game’s constraints and arguing outside their professional discipline.
11. The Sheldon Cooper Move: One way any of our comforters could respond to one or more of their pseudo-disputants is to question the validity or usefulness of their field of expertise as a whole.

[Howard Wolowitz is an engineer. Dr. Sheldon Cooper is a physicist. Dr. Leonard Hofstadter is an applied physicist. Sheldon needs Howard to introduce him to Dr. Stephen Hawking, with whom Howard is working, and Howard puts him through various trials, quests and tasks to punish him for all his insults.]

Howard Wolowitz: All right, Sheldon, there's only one thing left I want you to do. Don't worry, it's an easy one.

Sheldon Cooper: Okay.

Howard Wolowitz: Give me a compliment.

Sheldon Cooper: Fine. You have very tiny hands.

Howard Wolowitz: No. About my job. I want you to tell me I'm good at what I do.

Sheldon Cooper: You're obviously good at what you do.

Howard Wolowitz: Then why are you always ripping on me?

Sheldon Cooper: Ah, I understand the confusion. Uh, I have never said that you are not good at what you do. It's just that what you do is not worth doing.

Leonard Hofstadter: It's nicer than anything he's ever said to me; I'd take it and run.

From The Big Bang Theory

But is the Sheldon Cooper ‘Move’ (“it’s just that what you do is not worth doing”) within the constraints of the game?

Not really. Because one can only claim another field is “not worth doing” as a personal opinion, not a true, mind-independent, assertion of fact. There are no engineering grounds upon which an engineer could argue that theology (or medicine or law) is “not worth doing” and there are no solely theological grounds upon which one could argue that engineering is not worth doing. They may hold those beliefs as opinions but if they hold them as true assertions of fact then they are, in fact, making a “revelation” claim. That is, they are playing the theology game and the theologian has home field advantage on this one. But the theologian needs to play fair and admit that their claim (that engineering, for example, is "not worth doing") is true because God told them so…and not disguise the assertion as scientific assertion. In the same way that the engineer cannot validly make a theological claim (e.g. “God has no real world effects”) and cloak it as an engineering judgment.

Lesson learned from Part One: Just because you are speaking as an engineer, lawyers, doctor, theologian, physicist, etc., and using secular language, does not mean you are not, in fact, speaking theologically.

Revelation claims can be explicit - and I am trying to be - or implicit.

[to be continued]