There are numerous examples of well recorded amazing things that we do not understand. These include spontaneous healing, incredible visions, and so-called poltergeist activity.
One study in the British Medical Journal December 1983 on ‘inexplicable spontaneous healing’ found staggering examples of unexpected improvement or cure in patients suffering disease. Dr Rex Gardner conducted the research. He was then a consultant gynaecologist from Sunderland. The study was done by him following up a number of contemporary cases similar to those traditionally described as ‘healing miracles’. He exchanged letters with the physician concerned or he himself examined the patient.
Throughout English history many individuals have reported having visions. Visions generally have more clarity than dreams. As long ago as the year 731 for example the Venerable Bede told of a man, already dead, who returned to life, describing many noteworthy things he had seen. This was a straightforward account. It is typical of the consistent research findings in our own times of the ‘near death experience’ associated with a close brush with death.
There are numerous reports of witnesses testifying to anomalous noises, sudden wild movements, breakage of household items or other unaccountable movement of objects. All these through means other than physical force. Two British parapsychologists compiled a monumental collection of 500 ‘poltergeist’ cases. One of the authors was Alan Gauld who taught psychology at the University of Nottingham. There are even films of such phenomena.
Interpretation of amazing things
Some people see amazing events and experiences as having a perfectly natural explanation. They perceive a world empty of divinity and tend to view religious people as gullible and undiscriminating. So, they claim Jesus Christ did not really feed 5000 people with five loaves and two fishes: the boy took out his packed lunch and shamed everybody else to fetch out theirs, so that in the end, it was discovered that there was enough food for everybody.
However, whatever our beliefs, strange events, that we cannot understand, astonish us. Such unpredictable experiences stop us in our tracks. Might there be more to existence than we had ever suspected?
“There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.” (Albert Einstein)
The question is whether amazing things show a transcendent power behind the universe? Or do they have perfectly natural explanations?
Natural law
Television, the internet and space travel would have seemed miracles to a person living in the 19th-century. At any point in history, science cannot explain certain incredible phenomena. But does this have to mean such things violate the laws of nature?
I would ask why science as a whole (as opposed to an individual scientist) assumes that there is no higher wisdom underlying ordinary natural phenomena? I’m thinking of everyday things like bodily digestion, the sleep cycle, the seasons. Even what is ordinary can amaze many researchers. Normal things such as a child’s bodily growth, the arrangement and size of the universe of stars, the instinctive knowledge of animals and birds. Cannot such things be signs of an incredible energy, power and intelligence behind nature?
Actually, those who wish to scientifically prove or disprove a transcendent side to reality, cannot in fact do so. The instruments available to them are limited. Science is suited to only studying natural phenomena. Its methods are not up to the job of detecting a spiritual power that might, or might not, be behind the universe.
Boggle factor and amazing things
Ignorance, imagination, or trickery can cause belief in miracles. Alternatively, belief may result from a tendency to accept superficial evidence without thought or critical analysis.
In his Maurice Elliott Memorial lecture, Michael Perry pointed out that we need freedom to think what we want. An obvious miracle would compel religious conviction. However, he argues the Creator makes himself vulnerable to us by respecting our liberty. He wants our love and co-operation to be freely reciprocated. In other words, he doesn’t force himself on us. He does not coerce belief. As a consequence, we vary a lot in what we each are prepared to swallow. Our ‘boggle factor’ differs.
What touches one person as indicating something beyond oneself that is a power for good, may be different from what touches another.
Amazing things like beauty in art, music and nature can affect our deeper feelings. Social ideals, incredible loving service of people or awesome mystical experience can greatly inspire.
“Without the emotion of the beautiful, the sublime, the mysterious, there is no art, no religion, no literature.” (John Burroughs, American naturalist)
Nevertheless, I would say that, although our boggle factor varies, the Divine reveals itself to us all in some way. That is to say as long as we don’t set our minds against it.
Mysterious power within nature
Some individuals claim divinity reveals things to them when they experience a state of higher consciousness. One important example is 18th century visionary, Emanuel Swedenborg. For him nature has no intelligence of its own. It needs creative energy and design to inflow into the natural plane. However, he says this happens not by arbitrary acts of a capricious God.
His way of looking at this is to say that amazing events and experiences are not contrary to nature. For the mysterious power of divine spirit infills the natural world so that the two correspond. According to this view, the laws of science themselves are constant and immutable. If this were not the case, we would be living in a world of chaos.
Consequently, he says these laws are adaptable to varying circumstances and conditions. For example, the cold of winter alters the normal flow of sap in plants and trees and the warmth of spring releases them. Conditions of temperature, of pressure, of moisture, all greatly change the way physical laws operate. Likewise, the presence of a catalytic agent affects chemical reactions.
“Miracles are not contrary to nature, but only contrary to what we know about nature” (Augustine of Hippo, early Christian theologian)
So, conceivably, given the incomplete knowledge of science, the divine spirit, without violating the laws of nature, applies them in ways beyond our present understanding. The transcendent origin of love and wisdom naturally comes into our material world.
No wonder then we see amazing things around us and can – if we choose – accept they come from a higher reality.
Copyright 2019 Stephen Russell-Lacy
Author of Heart, Head & Hands Swedenborg’s perspective on emotional problems
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