Re: Naturalisim

In message <20050402.112911.-1774311.1.dfsiemensjr@juno.com>, D. F.
Siemens, Jr. <dfsiemensjr@juno.com> writes
>I doubt that I can spell this out clearly enough for you to understand,
>given your responses earlier. But I make one last try. I noted that the
>Egyptians had a technique for causing snakes to stiffen by grasping them
>near the HEAD. That's a trick. Moses was told to throw down a wooden
>staff and pick it up by the TAIL.

Staffs have tails , do they?

>That's not a trick. The Egyptians
>pulled a TRICK. Aaron and Moses demonstrated a MIRACLE. The trick has a
>naturalistic explanation, but the miracle does not. HOW DOES THIS RULE
>OUT MIRACLES?

CARR
Sadly the Bible never claims that the Egyptians staff was a stiff snake,
and that it was a trick. This is simply your presupposition. It says
clearly that they used a staff.

Incidentally, the trick has only been documented since the 16th century
AD, and it is not a convincing staff. The trick is that the snake is
'charmed', not that it looks like a staff.

How did the sorcerers turn all the water in the Nile into blood?

And why would God choose a commonplace magic trick, as a method of
persuading Pharoah that Moses was from God? That would be dumb.

-- 
Steven Carr