“Some miracles, like reported appearances of the Virgin Mary, should be approached warily. But even more amazing miracles can be found and embraced every day.” Hype surrounding Virgin apparitions detailed. “The realm of the miraculous sometimes lies just across the border from the fanatical or the tacky. A revelation may go commercial and look like a snake farm beside the highway in North Florida.”
The Buddha disapproved of miracles. Once, by the bank of a river, he met an ascetic who claimed that after practicing austerity for 25 years, he was at last able to cross the river by walking on the water. The Buddha said he was sorry that the man had wasted so much time and effort: the ferryboat would take him across for one penny. “Still, the Buddha understood the theatrical possibilities. In his native city of Kapilavastu, the Buddha rose in the air, emitted flames and streams of water from his body, and walked in the sky. In order to convince his relatives of his spiritual powers, he cut his body into pieces, let his head and limbs fall to the ground, and then joined them all together again before the astonished audience.”
Cicero argued, “Nothing happens without a cause, and nothing happens unless it can happen. When that which can happen does in fact happen, it cannot be considered a miracle. Hence, there are no miracles.”
Elie Wiesel quotes a Hasidic rabbi’s prayer, “I have but one request; may I never use my reason against the truth.”
Christ performed at least 35 miracles.
“What is the use of traditional miracles now? Perhaps, as Elie Wiesel once suggested, people need reassurance that miracles are still possible, even for them: the dreariest fate may be reversed. The miracle is antidote to the despair that arises from sheer inevitability.”
Modern technological advances are a kind of secular miracle. Exceptional achievements in music, etc. , is called miraculous, as is creation itself. Love is the ultimate miracle.