"Miracles" and making sense of them.

[Grace Seeker]

Every religion seems to have its own set of "miracles" which speak to the faithful. There are usually two sets, those that are from the foundation of the religion and involve stories surrounding those who were key players in its past. Thus Islam cites miracles of Muhammad (pbuh) and Christianity cites miracles of Jesus (pbuh) in our respective scriptures, and other groups do the same. Then there are modern day "miracles". Some of these are tenuous at best, often little more than anomalies that catch our fancy, easily explain, but to which we attach some sort of spiritual significance. And some of these seem to defy explanation and might truly be classified as miraculous. The problem is, do they prove anything? Does the miracle of one religion have a cancelling out effect on the miracle of another? Or perhaps they should be interpreted in some other light altogether? That is rather than proving my faith as superior to yours (or vice versa), perhaps they are simply reminders to all of us that there is still something out their bigger than ourselves, something/someone to which we need to give our attention.

I'm providing a link to the "miracle" which got me thinking along these lines, but I don't post it as a "proof" of anything (and hope no one else tries to prove anything in this thread), only to get us to be in conversation about what we can learn when such miracles occur in our own lives.

Doctors At Loss To Describe Patient's Recovery

[Nσσя'υℓ Jαииαн]

I personally don't think it has anything to do with religion. G-d Wills whatever He wishes. And usually like that, it's a sign for a person to be thankful. I would think it that way. I'm referring to the video by the way lol. So bro, what do you really want to discuss? I'm kind of at a loss..

Peace :)

[GreatLoveJesus]

^

Very, very interesting case, though I think there is some doubt among Muslim scholars as to whether a "miracle" in and of itself is complete sign of a person's closeness to Allah, even when the person is a Muslim.

[strider]

Believing in the miracles attributed to the Prophets are a fundemental of a Muslims faith as it is one of the seven articles of faith needed to be called a Muslim. Amongst the miracles include the splitting of the sea and transforming staffs into snakes by Moses, Solomon controlling the winds, David having the ability to transform hard metals such as iron to wax, Jesus curing the leapers and Muhammed splitting the moon amongst other things. All are made mentioned of by Allah in the Quran.

Allah has the power over all things. He can say 'Be!' and it is.

Having said that, one doesn't have to base their faith entirely on believing in miracles. There was a recent thread that talked of how it says 'Allah' on the continent of Africa. Do we really need to base our faith on such things? The fact that we have life is a miracle in itself.

Hey there! Looks like you're enjoying the discussion, but you're not signed up for an account.

When you create an account, you can participate in the discussions and share your thoughts. You also get notifications, here and via email, whenever new posts are made. And you can like posts and make new friends.
Sign Up

[Malaikah]

Muslims believe 'miracles' can happen with people who are not prophets, but are very righteous good Muslims. These are called 'karama', and they are lesser miracles than those of the prophets.

An example is when Umar (ra) was the leader of the Muslim ummah, and he was delivering the sermon for Friday prayers. At the same time, a group of Muslim had been sent to fight a battle. In the middle of the sermon, God showed Umar the battle field, and he saw that the Muslim were open to attack from the back, so he shouted out to them something like 'Go up the mountain!', and the army actually heard him even though he was kilometres away in a mosque!

On the other hand, there are things which appear to be miracles, but they aren't miracles at all, they are just the work of the devil, which he uses to deceive people. These usually happen in two ways, the first is when the person is a bad person and he actually calls on the devil to help him, and the other is when the devil just goes to random people in the hope to trick them, and they aren't aware of devils presence.

And example of the first, is a person calling on a devil to help him fly or something. this act is a massive sin in Islam, in fact it is kufr, i.e. disbelief and the person become a non-Muslim for doing it.

As for the second type, an example would be, a person had a eye that kept twitching, so she went to buy a talisman or something of the kind (these are also considered a major sin in Islam, and they can either be of the kind that is just a massive sin though the person remains Muslim, or of the kind that makes a person a non-Muslim). Anyway, so when she wears the talisman, her eye stops twitching, and she believes it was the talisman that did it. But actually, what happened was that a devil used to come to her and poke her eye or something like that, causing it to twitch, and when she got the talisman, he stopped doing it to lead her into thinking that it was the talisman that made her get better.

The same goes for things like possessions by 'spirits'. A person might be possessed by a devil and then an excorsist comes to cure him, but using other than the name of God (he might call upon an idol). When the devil sees that they are trying to cure him via the name of an idol, he leaves the body, thus allowing the people to think that it was the name of the idol that lead to the cure.

[paarsurrey]

:sl:
Hi
It is necessary to understand as to what is a miracle. Mirza Tahir Ahmad has written a fascinating article on it, may be it helps to understand this:
Christianity: A Journey from Facts to Fiction

Miracles are not seen in Islam as unnatural occurrences, but as natural phenomena that are concealed from human knowledge at that period of time. Otherwise, there would be many questions raised against the wisdom of God. If God created the laws of nature Himself, He should have made some provisions whereby without breaking them, He could bring about desired solutions to a problem.
Not all laws are known to man. There are categories of laws working as if in different tiers and on separate plains. Sometimes they are known to man only on one plain and man’s sight is not able to penetrate beyond. As time goes on, man’s knowledge increases, so does the penetration and his capacity to observe such laws as hitherto remained unperceived. In another era of scientific progress, new discoveries throw more light on such laws which seem to work in groups. So, not only is their function better understood but also their interaction with other laws.
Those things that appeared to be miracles in the early ages are no longer considered so. Miracles are so, only in relation to man’s knowledge in a specific period of time. When a special exercise of God’s power is displayed, apparently a law is broken. But it is not so; it is a hidden law that was already there and came into operation through God’s command. The people of that time could not have understood that law nor had they any control over it. For example, the force of magnetism was not known to man a few thousand years ago. If somebody had accidentally discovered it and had contrived a device by which he could levitate things without any apparent cause discernible to the naked eye and to the wonderment of everyone, he could then exclaim, ‘Lo, a miracle, a miracle’. Today, such tricks are considered common place and trivial. The knowledge of man is limited whereas that of God is unlimited. If a law comes into operation that is beyond the scope of man’s knowledge, it looks like a miracle. But looking retrospectively at such instances with the hindsight of knowledge gained since, we can dismiss all such so-called breaches of the laws of nature as merely natural phenomena which were not fully comprehended by the man of that age.
Unquote
I think it is reasonable and helps understand as to what are miracles.

[Malaikah]

:sl:

^Umm.. sorry bro, but I don't think is exactly true... things like bring the dead back to life, splitting the moon without even going near it, parting the sea, turning a stick into a snake, authoring the Quran, etc are without doubt supernatural occurences...