Re: [asa] Miracle healing?

Iain Strachan said:

Or to take two of the examples I cited. I know that many sceptics,
such as James Randi are extremely suspicious of the "one leg shorter
than the other" type of miracle; but just let's suppose that what was
shown and described on the YouTube video actually happened to the
woman Frances Finn. That she sat down in a char in front of hundreds
of people; was prayed for and as a result the bones in her leg grew
about one and a half inches. Let's suppose that actually happened.
How could one describe such a thing as an "orchestration" of natural
causes? If it could be explained as a placebo effect; perhaps there
was nothing stopping her walking normally but it took intervention
from God via prayer to realise this, then one could see it as an
orchestration of natural causes. In the audio interview on the BBC
web page I gave, she is quite rational about it; acknowledging that
the power of positive mental attitudes can indeed make spectacular
things happen, but is left still pondering "what if God actually did
heal me?".

RC Metcalf responds:

In the case of Frances Finn, God could have orchestrated the growth of new
bone by stimulating osteoblastic activity at specific sites within the bone.
The miracle would only be supernatural to the extent that God's will is
accomplished when He so chooses. In other words, He provides the signal
that "turns on" the osteoblasts. He uses physical processes to accomplish
His will. And this brings me to my problem with Frances Finn. Osteoblasts
don't "naturally" work at such a rapid speed. Had she been prayed for, and
over the next two weeks noticed her leg slowly becoming normal, the
"miracle" would have made more sense to me, the scientist. An inch and a
half growth would require quite a lot of osteoblastic activity.

When we consider one of Jesus's miracles, such as the healing of the blind
man at Siloam, the healing seems to have happened relatively quickly, but
not immediately. Why not just touch the man's eyelids and have him open them
and be able to see? Jesus is at the temple grounds at the end of John 8, if
he met the blind man shortly after leaving there, the blind man, at most,
would have needed to walk 1/4 mile to the Pool of Siloam after Jesus
instructed him to go there. Neural tissue is normally very slow growing, but
we don't know what length of nerve was neccessary to reconnect the man's
optic "circuitry." A quarter mile walk may have been just the ticket for
natural processes to work after Jesus's instructions were given.

Bartimaeus was healed of the same affliction in Mark 10 and it happened
"immediately" according to the gospel writer. Few of the people healed by
Jesus were mentioned by name, so Bartimaeus must have been fairly well known
in Jericho. Perhaps he was well known prior to an injury having taken his
sight. Blindness due to a recent injury would have had the potential to heal
more quickly than in the previous example, where the man had been blind from
birth. The main reason neurons grow slowly is that when a nerve is cut, the
two ends regrow, but typically don't find one another readily... if at all.
If Jesus was able to guide the growth in the proper direction, healing of a
simple nerve injury could have been relatively rapid.

Of course, I have a harder time explaining, for instance, the healing of the
paralytic in Matthew 9, Mark 2 and Luke 5. He was able to get up and walk
after only a short conversation. The paralytic may only have needed minimal
motor neuron growth to stimulate his muscles, yet his muscles may have been
very weak (or partially atrophied) if he had been paralyzed for a long time.
I can only imagine that he was recently paralyzed, for I can't imagine the
Jews having a system of care to provide for someone who suffered such a
severe injury. I suspect that paralytics wouldn't have lived long in
ancient Jerusalem. Someone else on the list may be more familiar with this.

Hope my musings are of interest... :-)

RC

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Received on Sat May 24 10:56:19 2008