CONCERNING MIRACLES--PARTICULARLY THE MIRACLES WHICH ACCOMPANIED THE
DELIVERANCE OF THE ISRAELITES FROM BONDAGE IN EGYPT.
There has been so much false philosophy written concerning the subject
of miracles, that it is difficult for those conversant with the
speculations of writers upon this subject, to divest their minds
sufficiently of preformed biases, to examine candidly the simple and
natural principles upon which are based the evidence and necessity of
miraculous interposition.
The following statement is true beyond controversy: _Man cannot, in
the present constitution of his mind, have sufficient reason for
believing that religion has a Divine origin, unless it be accompanied
with miracles._ The natural inference of the mind is that, if an
Infinite Being act, his acts will be superhuman in their character;
because the effect, reason dictates, will be characterized by the
nature of its cause. Man has the same reason to expect that God will
perform acts above human power and knowledge, that he has to suppose
the inferior orders of animals will, in their actions, sink below the
power and wisdom which characterize human nature. For, as it is
natural for man to perform acts superior to the power and knowledge of
the animals beneath him, so reason affirms that it is natural for God
to develop his power by means, and in ways, above the skill and
ability of mortals. Hence, if God manifest himself at all--unless, in
accommodation to the capacities of men, he should constrain his
manifestations within the compass of human ability--every act of God's
immediate power would, to human capacity, be a miracle. But, if God
were to constrain all his acts within the limits of human means and
agencies, it would be impossible for man to discriminate between the
acts of the Godhead and the acts of the manhood. And man, if he
considered acts to be of a Divine origin, which were plainly within
the compass of human ability, would violate his own reason.
Suppose, for illustration, that God desired to reveal a religion to
men, and wished them to recognise his character and his benevolence in
giving that revelation. Suppose, further, that God should give such a
revelation, and that every appearance and every act connected with its
introduction were characterized by nothing superior to human power;
could any rational mind on earth believe that such a system of
religion came from God? Impossible! A man could as easily be made to
believe that his own child, who possessed his own lineaments, and his
own nature, belonged to some other world, and some other order of the
creation. It would not be possible for God to convince men that a
religion was from heaven unless it was accompanied with the marks of
Divine Power.
Suppose, again, that some individual were to appear either in the
heathen or Christian world--he claimed to be a teacher sent from God,
yet aspired to the performance of no miracles. He assumed to do
nothing superior to the wisdom and ability of other men. Such an
individual, although he might in gaining proselytes to some particular
view of a religion already believed, yet could never make men believe
that he had a special commission from God to establish a new religion,
for the simple reason that he had no grounds more than his fellows to
support his claims as an agent of the Almighty. But if he could
convince a single individual that he had wrought a miracle, or that he
had power to do so, that moment his claims would be established, in
that mind, as a commissioned agent from heaven: so certainly, and so
intuitively, do the minds of men revere and expect miracles as the
credentials of the Divine presence.
This demand of the mind for miracles, as testimony of the Divine
presence and power, is intuitive with all men; and those very
individuals who have doubted the existence or necessity of miracles,
should they examine their own convictions on this subject, would see
that, by an absolute necessity, if they desired to give the world a
system of religion, whether truth or imposture, in order to make men
receive it as of Divine authority, they must work miracles to attest
its truth, or make men believe that they did so. Men can produce doubt
of a revelation in no way until they have destroyed the evidence of
its miracles; nor can faith be produced in the Divine origin of a
religion until the evidence of miracles is supplied.
The conviction that miracles are the true attestation of immediate
Divine agency, is so constitutional (allow the expression) with the
reason, that so soon as men persuade themselves they are the special
agents of God, in propagating some particular truth in the world, they
adopt likewise the belief that they have ability to work miracles.
There have been many sincere enthusiasts, who believed that they were
special agents of Heaven, and, in such cases, the conviction of their
own miraculous powers arises as a necessary concomitant of the other
opinion. Among such, in modern times, may be instanced Emanuel
Swedenborg. Impostors also, perceiving that miracles were necessary in
order that the human mind should receive a religion as Divine, have
invariably claimed miraculous powers. Such instances recur constantly,
from the days of Elymas down to the Mormon, Joseph Smith.
All the multitude of false religions that have been believed since the
world began have been introduced by the power of this principle.
_Miracles believed_, lie at the foundation of all religions which men
have ever received as of Divine origin. No matter how degrading or
repulsive to reason in other respects, the fact of its establishment
and propagation grows out of the belief of men that supernatural
agency lies at the bottom.[5] This belief will give currency to any
system, however absurd: and without it, no system can be established
in the minds of men, however high and holy may be its origin and its
design.
[5] Mohammedanism is no exception: as the wonders reported by the
false prophet, though unseen, were _believed_. 'The Koran,' he
said, 'is itself a miracle!'
Such, then, is the constitution which the Maker has given to the
mind. Whether the conviction be an intuition or an induction of the
reason, God is the primary cause of its existence; and its existence
puts it out of the power of man to accept a revelation from God
himself, unless accompanied by miracle. If, therefore, God ever gave a
revelation to man, it was necessarily accompanied with miracles, and
with miracles of such a nature as would clearly distinguish the Divine
character and the Divine authority of the dispensation.
The whole fulness and force of these deductions apply to the case of
the Israelites. The laws of their mind not only demanded miracles as
an attestation of Divine interposition; but at that time, the belief
existed in their minds that miracles were constantly performed.
Although they remembered the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, yet
they likewise, as subsequent facts clearly attested, believed that the
idols of Egypt possessed the attributes of Divinity. The belief in a
plurality of gods was then common to all nations. And although this
error was corrected, and perhaps entirely removed, by succeeding
providences and instructions, from the minds of the Jews; yet, before
the miracles in Egypt, while the God of Abraham was, perhaps, in most
cases acknowledged as their God, the idols of Egypt were acknowledged
as the gods of the Egyptians, and probably worshipped as the
divinities who had power to dispense good and evil to all the
inhabitants of that land. And in common with all Egypt, they, no
doubt, believed that the acts of jugglery, in which the magicians, or
priests of Egypt, had made astonishing proficiency, were actual
miracles, exhibiting the power of their idols, and the authority of
the priests to act in their name.
In view, therefore, of existing circumstances, two things were
necessary, on the part of God,[6] in order to establish belief in any
revelation to the Israelites:--First, that he should manifest himself
by miracles; and, Secondly, that those miracles should be of such a
character, as evidently to distinguish them from the jugglery of the
magicians, and to convince all observers of the existence and
omnipotence of the true God, in contradistinction from the objects of
idolatrous worship. Unless these two things were done, it would have
been impossible for the Israelites to have recognised JEHOVAH as the
_only living_ and _true GOD_.
[6] When we speak of a thing as necessary on the part of God, it
is said, not in reference to God's attributes, but to man's nature
and circumstances.
It follows, then, that by the miracles which God wrought by the hand
of Moses, he pursued the only way that was possible to authenticate a
revelation in which his presence and power would be recognised. The
only point of inquiry remaining is, Were the miracles of such a
character, and performed in such a manner, as to remove false views
from the minds of the Israelites, and introduce right views concerning
the true God, and the non-existence of factitious objects of worship?
With this point in view, the design in the management and character of
the miracles in Egypt is interesting and obvious. Notice, first, the
whole strength of the magicians' skill was brought out and measured
with that of the miraculous power exerted through Moses. If this had
not been done, the idea would have remained in the minds of the people
that, although Moses wielded a mighty miraculous power, it might be
derived from the Egyptian gods, or if it were not thus derived, they
might have supposed that if the priests of those idols were summoned,
they would contravene or arrest the power vested in Moses by Jehovah.
But now, the magicians appearing in the name of their gods, the power
of Moses was seen to be not only superior to their sorceries, but
hostile to them and their idolatrous worship.
Notice, secondly, the design and adaptedness of the miracles, not only
to distinguish the power of the true God, but to destroy the
confidence placed in the protection and power of the idols.
The first miracle, while it authenticated the mission of Moses,
destroyed the serpents which, among the Egyptians, were objects of
worship; thus evincing, in the outset, that their gods could neither
help the people nor save themselves.
The second miracle was directed against the river Nile, another object
which they regarded with religious reverence. This river they held
sacred, as the Hindoos do the Ganges; and even the fish in its waters
they revered as objects of worship. They drank the water with
reverence and delight; and supposed that a Divine efficacy dwelt in
its waves to heal diseases of the body. The water of this, their
cherished object of idolatrous homage, was transmuted to blood; and
its finny idols became a mass of putridity.
The third miracle was directed to the accomplishment of the same
end--the destruction of faith in the river as an object of worship.
The waters of the Nile were caused to send forth legions of frogs,
which infested the whole land, and became a nuisance and a torment to
the people. Thus their idol, by the power of the true God, was
polluted, and turned into a source of pollution to its worshippers.
By the fourth miracle of a series constantly increasing in power and
severity, lice came upon man and beast throughout the land. 'Now, if
it be remembered,' says Gleig, 'that no one could approach the altars
of Egypt upon whom so impure an insect harboured, and that the
priests, to guard against the slightest risk of contamination, wore
only linen garments, and shaved their heads and bodies every day,[7]
the severity of this miracle as a judgment upon Egyptian idolatry may
be imagined. Whilst it lasted no act of worship could be performed;
and so keenly was this felt, that the very magicians exclaimed--"This
is the finger of God!"'
[7] Every third day, according to Herodotus.
The fifth miracle was designed to destroy the trust of the people in
Beelzebub, or the Fly-god, who was reverenced as their protector from
visitations of swarms of ravenous flies which infested the land,
generally about the time of the dog-days, and removed only, as they
supposed, at the will of this idol. The miracle now wrought by Moses
evinced the impotence of Beelzebub, and caused the people to look
elsewhere for relief from the fearful visitation under which they were
suffering.
The sixth miracle, which destroyed the cattle, excepting those of the
Israelites, was aimed at the destruction of the entire system of brute
worship. This system, degrading and bestial as it was, had become a
monster of many heads in Egypt. They had their sacred bull, and ram,
and heifer, and goat, and many others, all of which were destroyed by
the agency of the God of Moses. Thus by one act of power Jehovah
manifested his own supremacy, and destroyed the very existence of
their brute idols.
Of the peculiar fitness of the sixth plague (the seventh miracle),
says the writer before quoted, the reader will receive a better
impression, when he is reminded that in Egypt there were several
altars upon which human sacrifices were occasionally offered when they
desired to propitiate Typhon, or the Evil Principle. These victims
being burned alive, their ashes were gathered together by the
officiating priests, and thrown up into the air, in order that evil
might be averted from every place to which an atom of the ashes was
wafted. By the direction of Jehovah, Moses took a handful of ashes
from the furnace (which, very probably, the Egyptians at this time had
frequently used to turn aside the plagues with which they were
smitten), and he cast it into the air, as they were accustomed to do;
and instead of averting evil, boils and blains fell upon all the
people of the land. Neither king, nor priest, nor people escaped. Thus
the bloody rites of Typhon became a curse to the idolaters; the
supremacy of Jehovah was affirmed, and the deliverance of the
Israelites insisted upon.
The ninth miracle was directed against the worship of Serapis, whose
peculiar office was supposed to be to protect the country from
locusts. At periods these destructive insects came in clouds upon the
land, and, like an overshadowing curse, they blighted the fruits of
the field and the verdure of the forest. At the command of Moses
these terrible insects came--and they retired only at his bidding.
Thus was the impotence of Serapis made manifest, and the idolaters
taught the folly of trusting in any other protection than that of
Jehovah the God of Israel.
The eighth and tenth miracles were directed against the worship of
Isis and Osiris, to whom and the river Nile they awarded the first
place[8] in the long catalogue of their idolatry. These idols were
originally the representatives of the sun and moon; they were believed
to control the light and the elements, and their worship prevailed in
some form among all the early nations. The miracles directed against
the worship of Isis and Osiris must have made a deep impression on the
minds both of the Israelites and the Egyptians. In a country where
rain seldom falls--where the atmosphere is always calm, and the light
of the heavenly bodies always continued, what was the horror pervading
all minds during the elemental war described in the Hebrew
record--during the long period of three days and three nights, while
the gloom of thick darkness settled, like the out-spread pall of
death, over the whole land! Jehovah of hosts summoned Nature to
proclaim him the true God--the God of Israel asserted his supremacy,
and exerted his power to degrade the idols, destroy idolatry, and
liberate the descendants of Abraham from the land of their bondage.
[8] Against the worship of the Nile, two miracles were directed,
and two likewise against Isis and Osiris, because they were
supposed to be the supreme gods. Many placed the Nile first, as
they said it had power to water Egypt independently of the action
of the elements.
The Almighty having thus revealed himself as the true God, by
miraculous agency, and pursued those measures, in the exercise of his
power, which were directly adapted to destroy the various forms of
idolatry which existed in Egypt, the eleventh and last miracle was a
judgment, in order to manifest to all minds that Jehovah was the God
who executed judgment in the earth.
The Egyptians had, for a long time, cruelly oppressed the Israelites,
and to put the finishing horror to their atrocities, they had finally
slain, at their birth, the offspring of their victims; and now God, in
the exercise of infinite justice, visited them with righteous
retribution. In the mid-watches of the night, the 'angel of the
pestilence' was sent to the dwellings of Egypt, and he 'breathed in
the face' of all the first-born in the land. In the morning, the hope
of every family, from the palace to the cottage, was a corpse. What
mind can imagine the awful consternation of that scene, when an
agonizing wail rose from the stricken hearts of all the parents in the
nation? The cruel task-masters were taught, by means which entered
their souls, that the true God was a God not only of power but of
judgment, and as such, to be feared by evil-doers, and reverenced by
those that do well.
The demonstration, therefore, is conclusive, that in view of the
idolatrous state of the world, and especially of the character and
circumstances of the Israelites, the true God could have made a
revelation of himself in no other way than by the means, and in the
manner, of the miracles of Egypt; and none but the true God could have
revealed himself in this way.[9]
[9] In accordance with the foregoing are the intimations given in
the Bible of the design of the miracles of Egypt. By these
exhibitions of Divine power God said--'Ye,' the Israelites, 'and
Pharaoh shall know that I am Jehovah.'
Miracles, moreover, were the evidence that Pharaoh required.--Ex.
vii. 9, God said to Moses, that when he should present himself as
the Divine legate, and Pharaoh should require a miracle, he should
perform it accordingly.
In relation to the destruction of idolatry, the design of Jehovah
is expressly announced (Ex. xii. 12), 'Against all the Gods of
Egypt I will execute judgment: I am Jehovah.'
See also Ex. xviii. 11.