Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts

by Craig S. Keener

miracles makes them probable, the general a priori improbability previously assigned to miracles decreases accordingly. Again, were Hume to object that rare events were merely improbable but miracles are impossible, he would be back to restating his (ultimately theological) presuppositions without offering evidence.[326] If it is the possibility of a miracle-working God rather than the rareness of miracles to which he really objects, he is offering the wrong argument. That Hume would accept extranormal phenomena not involving religion suggests a serious element of bias;[327] as one scholar notes, “Hume’s attempt to distinguish the miraculous from the merely extraordinary is scarcely justified on his own principles.”[328] His argument formally depends on “what always happens” (the point under dispute), not “what necessarily happens,” that is, not a priori limitations of what is possible.[329] Therefore his conclusion does not follow.