Supernatural Religion (Discovering the Reality of Divine Revelation). Walter Richard Cassels

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СКАЧАТЬ grief in public. When he returned to his house, which already resounded with the wailing of his household, he cast over the body of his daughter her mantle which he had with him, and immediately she was restored to life.(1) Again, in the same city, the son of a certain man among us named Irenæus, a collector of taxes, became sick and died. As the dead body lay, and they were preparing with wailing and lamentation to bury it, one of his friends consoling him suggested that the body should be anointed with oil from the same martyr. This was done, and the child came to life again.(2) In the same way a man amongst us named Eleusinus, formerly a tribune, laid the body of his child, who had died from sickness, on a memorial of the martyr which is in his villa in the suburbs, and after he had prayed, with many tears, he took up the child living."(3)

      We shall meet with more of these miracles in considering the arguments of Dr. Mozley. In a note he says: "Augustine again, long after, alludes in his list of miracles (De Civ. Dei, xxii. 8,) to some cases in which persons had been raised to life again by prayer and the intercession of martyrs, whose relics were applied. But though Augustine relates with great particularity and length of detail some cases of recoveries from complaints in answer to prayer, his notices of the cases in which persons had been raised to life again, are so short, bare, and summary, that they evidently represent no more than mere report, and report of a very vague kind. Indeed, with the preface which he prefixes to his list, he cannot be said even to profess to guarantee the truth or accuracy of the different instances contained in it. 'Hæc autem, ubicunque fiunt, ibi sciuntur vix a tota ipsa civitate vel quocumque commanentium loco. Nam plerumque etiam ibi paucissimi sciunt, ignorantibus eseteris, maxime si magna sit civitas; et quando alibi aliisque narrantur, non tantum ea commendat auctoritas, ut sine difficultate vel dubitatione credantur, quamvis Christianis fidelibus a fidelibus indicentur.' He puts down the cases as he received them, then, without pledging himself to their authenticity. 'Eucharius presbyter … mortuus sic jacebat ut ei jam pol-lices ligarentur: opitulatione memorati martyris, cum de memoria ejus reportata fuisset et supra jacentis corpus missa ipsius presbyteri tunica, suscitatus est … Andurus nomen est &C.",(1) and then Dr. Mozley gives the passage already quoted by us. Before continuing, we must remark with regard to the passages just quoted, that, in the miracle of Eucharius, Dr. Mozley, without explanation, omits details. The whole passage is as follows: "Eucharius, a presbyter from Spain, resided at Calama, who had for a long time suffered from stone. By the relics of the same martyr, which the Bishop Possidius brought to him, he was made whole. The same presbyter, afterwards succumbing to another disease, lay dead, so that they were already binding his hands. Succour came from the relics of the martyr, for the tunic of the presbyter being brought back from the relics and placed upon his body he revived."(1) A writer who complains of the bareness of narratives, should certainly not curtail their statements. Dr. Mozley continues: "There are three other cases of the same kind, in which there is nothing to verify the death from which the return to life is said to take place, as being more than mere suspension of the vital powers; but the writer does not go into particulars of description or proof, but simply inserts them in his list as they have been reported to him."(3)

      Dr. Mozley is anxious to detract from the miracles described by Augustine, and we regret to be obliged to maintain that in order to do so he misrepresents, no doubt unintentionally, Augustine's statements, and, as we think, also unduly depreciates the comparative value of the evidence. We shall briefly refer to the two points in question. I. That "his notices of the cases in which persons had been raised to life again are so short, bare, and summary that they evidently represent no more than mere report, and report of a very vague kind." II. "That with the preface which Augustine prefixes to his list, he cannot be said even to profess to guarantee the truth or accuracy of the different instances contained in it."

      It is true that in several cases Augustine gives the account of miraculous cures at greater length than those of restoration to life. It seems to us that this is almost inevitable at all times, and that the reason is obvious. Where the miracle consists merely of the cure of disease, details are naturally given to show the nature and intensity of the sickness, and they are necessary not only for the comprehension of the cure but to show its importance. In the case of restoration to life, the mere statement of the death and assertion of the subsequent resurrection exclude all need of details. The pithy reddita est vitæ, or factum est et revixit is more striking than any more prolix narrative. In fact, the greater the miracle the more natural is conciseness and simplicity; and practically, we find that Augustine gives a more lengthy and verbose report of trifling cures, whilst he relates the more important with greater brevity and force. He narrates many of his cases of miraculous cure, however, as briefly as those in which the dead are raised. We have quoted the latter, and the reader must judge whether they are unduly curt. One thing may be affirmed, that nothing of importance is omitted, and in regard to essential details they are as explicit as the mass of other cases reported. In every instance names and addresses are stated, and it will have been observed that all these miracles occurred in, or close to, Hippo, and in his own diocese. It is very certain that in every case the fact of the miracle is asserted in the most direct and positive terms. There can be no mistake either as to the meaning or intention of the narrative, and there is no symptom whatever of a thought on the part of Augustine to avoid the responsibility of his statements, or to give them as mere vague report. If wo compare these accounts with those of the Gospels, we do not find them deficient in any essential detail common to the latter. There is in the synoptic Gospels only one case in which Jesus is said to have raised the dead. The raising of Jairus' daughter(1) has long been abandoned, as a case of restoration to life, by all critics and theologians, except the few who still persist in ignoring the distinct and positive declaration of Jesus, "The damsel is not dead but sleepeth." The only case, therefore, in the Synoptics is the account in the third Gospel of the raising of the widow's son,(3) of which, strange to say, the other Gospels know nothing. Now, although, as might have been expected, this narrative is much more highly coloured and picturesque, the difference is chiefly literary, and, indeed, there are really fewer important details given than in the account by Augustine, for instance, of the restoration to life of the daughter of Bassus the Syrian, which took place at Hippo, of which he was bishop, and where he actually resided. Augustine's object in giving his list of miracles did not require him to write picturesque narratives. He merely desired to state bare facts, whilst the authors of the Gospels composed the Life of their Master, in which interesting details were everything. For many reasons we refrain here from alluding to the artistic narrative of the raising of Lazarus, the greatest miracle ascribed to Jesus, yet so singularly unknown to the other three Evangelists, who, so readily repeating the accounts of trifling cures, would most certainly not have neglected this had they ever heard of it.

      Dr. Mozley complains of the absence of verification and proof of actual death in these cases, or that they were more than mere suspension of the vital powers. We cordially agree with him in the desire for such evidence, not only in these, but in all miracles. We would ask, however, what verification of the death have we in the case of the widow's son which we have not here? If we apply such a test to the miracles of the Gospels, we must reject them as certainly as those of St. Augustine. In neither case have we more than a mere statement that the subjects of these miracles were dead or diseased. So far are we from having any competent medical evidence of the reality of the death, or of the disease, or of the permanence of the supposed cures in the Gospels, that we have little more than the barest reports of these miracles by writers who, even if their identity were established, were not, and do not pretend to have been, eye-witnesses of the occurrences which they relate. Take, for instance, this very raising of the widow's son in the third Gospel, which is unknown to the other Evangelists, and the narrative of which is given only in a Gospel which is not attributed to a personal follower of Jesus.

      Now we turn to the second statement of Dr. Mozley, "that with the preface which Augustine prefixes to his list, he cannot be said even to profess to guarantee the truth or accuracy of the different instances contained in it." This extraordinary assertion is supported by a quotation given above, which Dr. Mozley has separated from what precedes and follows it, so that its real meaning is scarcely apparent. We shall as briefly as possible state what is actually the "preface" of St. Augustine to his list of miracles, and his avowed object for giving it. In the preceding chapter, Augustine has been arguing that the world believed СКАЧАТЬ