Two rival views of the basis for the
Christian religion
Christianity is based on reason.
Christianity is based on faith.
Theological Problems with 1
If we can be saved merely by the use of
reason, then the sacrifice on the cross was
unnecessary for salvation.
Theological Problems with 2
Since not everyone is a Christian, even
today, the cross has been of no effect in a
huge number of cases. This implies that
the sacrifice was never intended to redeem
all, but only some, arbitrarily selected for
redemption.
How Christianity is based on reason
i) Causal inference from design in nature as
an effect
(leads us to infer the existence of a very
wise, benevolent, and powerful
intelligent designer as cause)
But an intelligent, benevolent being would
be concerned to tell us important things that
we couldn’t know by unassisted reason
(e.g., about an afterlife)
So there must have been a revelation.
And there must have been signs given to
prove that the revelation is authentic.
So miracles must have occurred
How Christianity is based on reason, cont.’d
ii) Historical experience, communicated by
testimony
(shows that the authentic miracles were
performed to authenticate the revelation
of Christ)
So the Christian revelation must be the true
one.
And our faith in it can be based on reason
and not merely on grace.
Hume’s project in Enquiry XI and X
Attack the view that the Christian religion
(or any other) is based on reason.
(Apparently, in the name of
establishing that its proper and only
foundation is a gracious gift of faith)
In Enquiry X, the attack on rational belief in
miracles is made in Hume’s own voice
and is also presented as if it were
merely an attack on “superstitious
delusion of all kinds” (esp.
Catholocism)
leaving room for an
attenuated, deistic religion
based on reason and without
any particular revelation
In Enquiry XI, the attack on the design
argument is presented by way of reporting
on a discussion with a “friend” who reports
the views of “Epicurus”
the double framing establishes an
apparent distance from Hume’s own
commitments (and a real legal distance)
moreover, “Epicurus” only attacks
arguments for providence and an
afterlife, not arguments for the existence
of an intelligent creator
Hume presents himself as objecting to
the friend’s reasons for rejecting
providence.
But the response, though apparently
offered in defence of providence,
actually attacks the design argument as
a reason for believing in the existence of
God.
Hume’s thesis in the essay on miracles
A rational person (one who proportions
belief to the evidence),
could never believe that a miracle
has occurred
on the basis of human testimony.
Limitations
Irrational belief in miracles is not ruled out
(on the contrary, it is explicitly
allowed)
Rational belief in miracles on the basis of
divine testimony is explicitly allowed
(Hume twice remarked that when the
scriptures are taken as divine
testimony there can be no doubt of
the truth of their reports.)
(though he did not say how
one might go about
establishing that the testimony
is authentically divine)
Rational belief in miracles on the basis of
immediate personal experience is allowed.
In particular,
that a rational person should be able to
sincerely believe that the scripture is the
word of God,
despite having no evidence for that
belief
is instanced as a miracle
and one that the individual believer, elected
for grace, experiences within themselves
Marvel
An entirely unprecedented event, but one
not contrary to the established laws of
nature.
Miracle
An event that occurs contrary to what the
laws of nature say should happen
and that is supposed to have been
brought about by the will of an
unseen, intelligent being
Law of Nature
A regularity in the succession of events that
has never been known to be violated.
Hume’s argument
When reasoning from effect to cause, we
must proportion our belief to the evidence.
The more regular the succession,
the stronger the belief; the greater
the number of exceptions, the
weaker the belief
This applies to human testimony,
considered as an effect of the actual
occurrence of the events described.
Our experience tells us that not all
testimony is reliable.
But it also shows us that testimony is
accompanied by different
“circumstances”
In some of these circumstances it is
more reliable than in others
Circumstances shown by experience to
affect the reliability of testimony
The number of witnesses
Their “independence”
Their intelligence (are they easily duped?)
Their interests (do they have something to
gain or lose?)
Their reputation (have they lied in the past)
What they would stand to lose if shown to
have told a lie
How easy it would be to show that they told
a lie
A further factor affecting our judgments of
the reliability of testimony
The marvellousness or miraculousness of
the event reported.
Two ways in which this further factor
influences our judgments
Past experience has shown us that the
more marvellous or miraculous an event
report, the less likely it is to turn out to be
true.
Past experience has shown us that events
of that sort do not occur.
“Part i” of the essay on miracles entirely
discounts the first of these factors.
The thought experiment of Part i
Suppose we have the best possible
testimony to the occurrence of a miracle
(Set aside all influence of any past
experience of the unreliability of
marvellous or miraculous tales)
This means the testimony would have to
be of a type that has never been
observed to be false in any past
experience
So it is a law of nature that
testimony of that type is never
wrong
The degree of conviction produced by
that testimony cannot exceed proof.
But because the testimony is testimony to a
miracle, what it proves is the occurrence of
an event that all our past experience tells
us could not have occurred.
i.e., an event that violates another
law of nature.
So in this case there is one law of nature
(testimony of this sort cannot be false)
contradicting another law of nature (an
event of the sort testified to cannot occur)
Hume’s conclusion
The best that can happen in this case
in the mind of a wise person
(the minds of fools are another
matter)
is a “mutual destruction of evidence” (in
accord with the theory of probability laid out
in Treatise 1.3.11-12)
Result: we at best end up not knowing
what to believe
whether the testimony is true or
whether the event did not occur
An objection:
Why should a miracle have to be a violation
of a law of nature?
Ans. Nothing else will do the job of giving a
sign of the presence of God.
Another objection:
This argument is too strong, because it
rules out the possibility of scientific
progress by discovering events contrary to
what our current understanding of the laws
of nature would predict.
Ans. A miracle has to be a one time
violation of a law of nature as the
consequence of the will of an unseen
intelligent being.
If the event is something that will always
occur in similar circumstances, then it is not
a miracle.
But (supposing determinism) when we don’t
get the laws of nature right, the event
merely looks miraculous and is in fact the
sort of thing that always occurs in
circumstances of a certain sort.
So subsequent investigation ought to be
able to correct the laws and explain the
event.
So the argument does not make scientific
progress impossible; it merely describes
some of the conditions under which it
occurs.
When an apparently miraculous
event is reported by means of
excellent testimony …
… the wise ought to suspend all
belief either way
(this means suspending both the
belief that the testimony is true and
the belief that the event did not
occur)
Since this ignorance is intolerable we
naturally seek to resolve it through
further investigation of the case.
If we can discover a hidden
regularity in nature responsible for
the event (a new law of nature)
Then we have no more reason to
doubt the testimony.
But we also have no more reason to
think the event was a miracle.
As long as we fail to discover any
such regularity, we must continue to
suspend belief either way.
The argument of Part ii
In principle, no (human) testimony to the
occurrence of a miracle …
has ever been
or could ever be
of the sort that has been proven to be
perfectly reliable by past experience.
None has ever been good enough
because as a matter of fact the
witnesses have not been numerous
enough, smart enough, or disinterested
enough, nor have the opportunities for
independent assessment been
available.
None could ever be good enough because:
• the witnesses can never be
disinterested. Thre are are special
psychological factors that give people an
interest in reporting and wanting to
believe marvellous and miraculous
stories:
◦ the pleasure of surprise & wonder
◦ religious sentiment inspiring:
- enthusiasm
- dishonesty in the service of the
noble cause
- dishonesty in one’s own self
interest
• past experience shows us that the more
marvellous or miraculous the story, the
less likely it is to be true
• the miracle stories of different religious
traditions contradict one another
(and the best attested miracle stories
are better attested than those in the
New Testament, though they support
the false religions of French
Jansenist Catholicism and Roman
Paganism)
Concluding Remark on the “limitations” of
the argument
“… there may possibly be miracles, or
violations of the usual course of nature, of
such a kind as to admit of proof from
human testimony …”
This remark is illustrated with three
increasingly radical case stories:
• a story of 6 days of darkness
(it becomes clear that Hume does
not consider this to be a true case of
testimony to a “miracle” as strictly
defined:
“It is evident, that our present philosophers,
instead of doubting the fact, ought to receive
it as certain, and ought to search for the
causes whence it might be derived.”
To think it is a consequence of
discoverable natural causes is to
deny it is a miraculous occurrence.
So all we have here is a “violation of
the usual course of nature”
established by human testimony, not
a miracle so established.
• A story of the death and resurrection of
Queen Elizabeth
In this case, the strongest testimony
is inadequate to prove the
occurrence of the miraculous event
and we will never allow that the
death and resurrection was anything
other than a hoax.
What makes for the difference between the
cases is that the one is not as clearly a
violation of the laws of nature.
What makes for the identity of the cases is
that in both we look for some underlying law
to explain the strange event that was
reported.
some corruption in the normal
astronomical operations
some political motive for perpetrating
a hoax
• A story of death and resurrection taken
to serve as the basis for a religion
In this case sensible people will
reject the story without even
bothering to look for an underlying
law explaining the event
(because it is too obvious from past
experience that the only cause is the
religious motive to perpetrate a
hoax)
The upshot of this discussion of cases is
that there really are no limitations on the
argument.
The only way an extraordinary event can be
justly believed on the basis of human
testimony is if it is supposed to be not really
miraculous but rather than consequence of
hidden laws.