There's nothing much referred to, as the miracles and works of good and bad spirits in the bodies, and there is perhaps nothing that you do not have the most confused ideas and more false than the qualities of a true miracle and extent of the power of spirit over matter. Some people, who delight in the power of spirit and dell'intrepido, watching everything that is said of the power of evil angels, their appearances, the illusions that cause to our senses, obsessions and possessions of demons, which produce changes in the air, and many other things that are attributed to them, consider this as tales that serve to entertain the spirits weak, look with pity on those who they seem convinced. Others go the opposite extreme.
was persuaded by everything that is said about the power of demons, wizards and sorcerers. I simply believe all the miracles that are perceived or real tell them, and accept, without question, with all the stories you tell of the apparitions of spirits and possession of the body by demons. Others, finally, with a much more dangerous state of mind, take time to deny all the miracles and all that is said of demons, angels and spirits, on the pretext that there is a multitude of false miracles, and often is past, wonders, some effects that are natural but extraordinary only because the causes were unknown to those who were witnesses.
what Scripture tells us of the miracles wrought by the magicians of Pharaoh and the appearance of Samuel to Saul, the soul, forces us to examine, here, this matter more thoroughly and with more extension, and to lead an orderly We first begin to examine the nature, possibilities and qualities of a miracle, and then the power of angels, spirits and demons in the production of supernatural effects. The common idea that you, a true miracle, that is something that transcends the normal rules of nature.
That a man walk on water, now that the rods take the form of a snake here is what is called a miracle. A false miracle, by contrast, is an action that seems, but that is not truly beyond the ordinary laws of nature. For example, a fire that takes the hair of a person due to a combustible mood that can be seen of course - as he is told the story of Julius and a few other things - that the fire does not burn the hair to which was attacked, is not a miracle, how to see the fire of Spirit that does not consume a laundry that you take.
There are a hundred things similar in nature, which seem miraculous, but that does not seem that out of ignorance in which we are of the nature of things.
Augustine explains very well that all the miraculous things we see happening are at the same time, natural and supernatural. They are natural in what they are effects of God's will that produces them, as nature is nothing but the will of the Creator, and supernatural in what they are above the ordinary laws of nature and notes. They are, therefore, look to our supernatural because they are contrary to the laws della natura che ci sono note, ma non sono soprannaturali allo sguardo di Dio : “Nec enima ista cum fiunt, contra natura sunt, nisi nobis, quibus aliter naturae cursus innotuit ; non autem Deo, cui hoc est natura, quod fecerit”.
E, nel 21° Libro della “Città di Dio” : Come si può fare che ciò che accade per volontà di Dio sia contrario alla natura, poiché la volontà di un sì grande Maestro è la natura stessa delle cose ? I prodigi non sono dunque contro la natura, ma contro ciò che ci è noto della natura : “Quomodo est contra naturam quod Dei fit voluntate, cum voluntas tanti utique Conditoris, conditae cuiusque rei natura sit ? Portentum ergo fit non contra naturam, sed contra quam est known nature. " He understands that this principle of St. Augustine: "Let the will of God is the nature of things", should be extended to natural things, moral things because this is quite different. Although powerful in the moral as in physical, but the will of man does not obey passively to his grace, like matter, which has neither soul nor freedom, obeys the will of God When Spinoza (Treaty theological-political, ch. 6) to deny the possibility of miracles, he endeavors to prove that it is possible that the course of nature is never interrupted. Here's his great reasoning : The laws of nature are nothing more than the decrees of God Now the decrees of God can not change because God is unchangeable. The laws of nature, therefore, can not change. So miracles are impossible because a miracle is contrary to the known laws of nature and ordinary. This author assumes that God must always act in a way, absolute, general, invariable, and that the laws of nature and the effects that depend on them are so connected and dependent upon each other, we can not conceive of the slightest change or the least change without destroying the idea of \u200b\u200ba Being infinitely wise, immutable, always the same and confident in its operations. But this idea, it seems, at first sight.
So glorious God, and that seems to reject everything that he suffers from imperfection and change, this idea, after all, who does not tend to destroy the notion that one must have the right of a being infinitely free, infinitely wise and infinitely powerful, whose will, infinitely fertile, does not depend at all the events and is not related to the effects it produces, but on the contrary, considers these effects in a dependence on its decrees, always free, though still immutable in themselves. At all times, all events and all the circumstances, all the movements of free will are created in God He knows everything that has happened, everything what is happening and all that will happen. He shall, currently and effectively, to all the real effects that are produced, leaving the free agents, all their freedom and producing, in the bodies, all the movements that you notice. It does not form at all new decrees in time, as if it came some new knowledge or something unexpected, that I determined to take new decisions. All events, all the changes that we see in nature, are a follow of his eternal plans, q denotes that some diversity in its various works, there is no variety in the will of those who produce, "Opera mutatio, Consilia mutatio not. " Features of the creature, it uses the second his will, without changing its nature, because his will is the nature of everything. The chaining of secondary causes, their subordination to the general laws of motion and arrangement of parts of the universe, everything is so necessary in himself that depends on a principle and an intelligence that leads perfectly free, he runs, that preserves and the bodies and movements, and that even if it goes away by the laws and rules that we have taken the trouble to point out, running free and unchangeable decrees, and so, miracles come in, like everything else, in 'economy of God's plans and, consequently, in the order of nature. Spinoza was formed too narrow an idea of \u200b\u200bthe will of God, if he pretends to be so unalterable as to be freer, where he played sull'equivoco terms of these "Laws of Nature," as if these laws of nature were so different from the will of God or a miracle if you destroy these laws of nature.
We showed that the will of God to be the nature of things, that a miracle was a result of the will of God, but a free will and particular, that would produce a different effect than it produces, following the course of ordinary and known nature. Here's the idea we have of a true miracle. From
everything we have said, it is easy to conclude that the power to do miracles is reserved to God alone and thus, neither angels nor demons, neither the disembodied souls can never work miracles, though they may contribute to miraculous action, with their prayers, or as an instrumental cause. It 's so many miracles that God has done for the ministry of Angels and the Prophets under the Old Testament, and that, in the New, the Apostles and many of the saints, after them, did miracles, that they from God, through mediation and by their prayers or who made them, by the authority which God had overlaid. But, about demons, it is difficult to conceive how they could do miraculous actions. This can not be, by their own strength, and even less for their prayers. It seems, then, that it must be said that God wanted to use them as instruments of his revenge when, through them, has supernatural actions, or rather, that there is no miracle that has been made by demons and that all what are you giving such false miracles, illusions, and surprising actions, but purely natural. And 'what is necessary to consider here. Scripture tells us that the wizards of Pharaoh changed the rods, which they had, in snakes, which changed the water into blood, and they did almost all the miracles that Moses had made (and Es.5 s.). And Moses warns us against false prophets, miracles, so that seems to prove that he did not doubt that the devil could not do through them. "If he gets up, he says, among you, a prophet or a man who claims to have had prophetic dreams, and that predicts a miracle and a miracle, and that what he predicts will happen, and that, after this, say: We're going to serve other gods, do not listen to all the talk of this prophet because the Lord will try "(Deut. 13:1). Jesus Christ, having been accused by the Pharisees, to cast out demons in the name of Beelzebub, rather than destroy this charge, ruining the principle of the Pharisees, which assumed power in the devil to perform miracles, they're happy to see that the devil can not be against himself, nor act against its own interests, it was impossible that he wanted to obey Jesus Christ, not trying to destroy his kingdom (mt.9, 34, 12:24). It warns, in another place, to warn us by the wonders and miracles of the false prophets (Matt. 24.24).
St. Paul predicted signs and wonders that the Antichrist has to do, and teaches us that Satan is transformed into an angel of light (2 Thess. 2.9). Finally, several Fathers believed that the change of the rods of the magicians in snakes, it was true, what would seem to give the devil the power to work miracles, because you can not conceive that such a change could have become so natural. Origen ("Efficit similiter contrary virtus virgam serpentem, fecerat sicut virtus Dei, ..."), who obviously recognized the power of the devil about the rods of the magicians did the same thing about the power of God's rod of Moses, but that the devil could not put the rods in the first state that had changed into snakes, because his power may well be extended to do evil, but to do good or to cause changes that tend to the good: "Contrary evil quidem virtus aliquid facere potest, sed non potest integrum in return. " Theodoret, to refute those who dared to say that Moses did not do that through the wonders of magic secrets, found no reason that best evoke what the Pharaoh's magicians are forced to do: "That the finger of God if they meddle." Why, then, he said, if Moses just cheating the senses, with its prestige, the magicians were not the same and what to do to convince him as an impostor, with similar wonders. St. Augustine ("Deus solus verus true Creator east, here causas serpentem, fecerat sicut virtus Dei, etc.."), Having asked this question, knowing that if the rods of the magicians were called dragons, the sacred text, simply because they had the figure of this animal, without having reality, the change had been made, since it was not that fantastic and apparently, he replies that it seems that the ways of speaking of Scripture, being the same, we must therefore recognize, in the rods of the magicians, a similar change to what is known to Moses. But, having argued then, that we should, therefore, that the demons they created these snakes, a change so abrupt and sudden, a rod into a snake, not seeming neither possible nor natural, he says that there is, by nature, a universal principle, extended to all elements, which contains the seed of all things corporeal, which seem on the outside, virtually all of their principles. They are
operated by staff time and cost, but these agents can not and should not be called because the creators do not extract anything from nothing and that only determine the natural causes to produce their effects from the outside. Thus, the Angels have been bad, according to this Father, produce a moment of snakes, the material of the rods of the magicians, application, with a subtle virtue and surprising reasons that seem very far away from producing a sudden and extraordinary effect, but for as a creator, he does not grant that to God alone, who gave being to natural causes and spread in nature to that principle, which we have spoken. The same Holy supports the same opinion, and with the same evidence in his books of the Trinity. He tries, even in his books "City of God", that demons can not do anything, even the power that they are natural, that with special help of God, who can not produce any new creature, but only change species that God has created, so that, far from being able to change the nature of the soul, they can not even change a man's body, for example, that of a beast. Finally, in his Letter to Deogratias, argues that the operations of the demons that seem to have some resemblance to that of good angels, who do not have the truth, but the appearance, and that this is not a result of the wisdom of the bad spirits, but their scam. What he will not, apparently, to understand is that false miracles of paganism and not those which speak of the Holy Scriptures, are as real change and real miracles. St. Thomas thinks on the same principles of St. Augustine, and makes the same consequences. He argues that the devil can not create anything in nature, and that all changes are simply natural that he operates, giving certain movements or certain forms of a substance already created, and that if sometimes seems to do the wonders, above nature, these wonders are merely apparent and amazing.
Most commentators have embraced this view in which all the difficulty is whether the rods of the magicians are of a nature so as to be readily changed into snakes, with the simple application of natural active substances of matter. Toasted, which it did not seem possible, he believed that the devil, with a delicacy which are not very capable, put true and real snakes, instead of the rods, which he subtly and away without knowing it. Others like to say that this spirit better than artificial, having foreseen what was to be produced by Moses, with the declaration that they had done, before the people, prepared, even then, the wizards batons and ordered them, little by little, to receive the real change that he / she worked, reducing them to snakes. But, whichever way this has happened, nor the Fathers, nor the commentators recognize all the miracles here as such. See nothing but a metamorphosis, very strange, indeed, and very difficult, but that is neither above nor against the laws of nature. And 'certain that the Scripture that tells or foretells the signs that the false Christs, false prophets and the devil have done or should do, not stress that these miracles are real or that the devil makes them, with absolute power and independent. St. Paul calls, the miracles that will happen under the Antichrist, "Satan's operations, the operations of falsehood and injustice" (2 Thess. 2:9-10). If the Scripture tells us some miracles by the devil, it insinuates that it is always for God's permission, which can use the Angels to punish the bad bad guys, in a supernatural way. This also appears from the history of the plagues of Egypt. God allows the devil to change the rods of the magicians in snakes and convert the water of the Nile into blood, but does not allow them to produce fruit flies (eg 8.18, 9.10), and could not protect himself against plagues Moses gave rise to all other Egyptians. He limits their power, without the effects of their evil, shows that it is the Master. Sant 'Agostino recognizes that the demons they changed the rods of the magicians in snakes, but argues that they did not create anything again: "Do not nec fuerunt tamen creatores draconum magic Angels mali nec quibus illi ministris operabantur. The demons could well provide the opportunity and prepare the grounds for the production of some extraordinary effect, but only God can make and create new beings, as he alone has, in the natural agents, the virtue of producing something of out.
"Nec ideo putandum east istis transgressoribus Angels to serve mutum hanc rerum visibilium materiam, sed Deo alone." Although St. Thomas recognizes that changes made by magicians of Pharaoh is accurate and not fantastic, he asserts, however, that are not true miracles, since they are produced by a natural cause: "Not true miracle thus paving habent rationem, quae sunt virtute aliquarum naturalium causarum. St. Augustine and St. Thomas recognized, therefore, that there is only God who can do real miracles and that all the miracles that have been made by creatures that are not made deliberately and with the help of God Other Fathers are even less favorable to those who want the devil can do miracles, because they teach that the magicians of Pharaoh did not really change their rods into snakes and they did just an illusion in the eyes of the spectators, who thought they saw what was not . Philo makes no difficulty in saying that the magicians of Egypt did not take their art to try to destroy, with their charm, the impression that the true miracles of Moses were on the spirit of the assistants, but willing to cheat others, were fooled themselves, since God confused their art with the power of the miracle of the rod of Aaron, who devoured them, turned into snakes.
And although it seems to say that they would produce real snakes, adds that the rod of Moses, having devoured the serpents produced by the various wizards, and being returned in its original nature of the rod, God would have it, with this show so amazing, to convince the most talented more unjust and biased, that what had happened, by Moses, was not a result of a subtlety and address human wrong, but an operation of virtue God that all things are easy. From this implies that the rods of the magicians were not changed in snakes for a power quite naturally and with a simple effect of magic. Joseph is said to Pharaoh, Moses, that the miracle that is about to do in his presence, by changing the rod into a snake, it is not something that has the semblance of truth or prestige just to fool the simple and ignorant , as was done by magicians, but that is a miracle of virtue and power of God the author of the Orthodox issues, under the name of San Giustino, said that all the magicians they had done the work of devil, who were pure prestige, with which the cheated eyes of those present, representing them as snakes or frogs, which, in fact, was neither the one nor the other. Saint Justin (Dialogue with Trypho ") compares the miracles of these magicians of Egypt to fake the devil has worked wonders, among the Gentiles, that he looks at them as the illusions and false miracles. Tertullian is no doubt that the rods of the magicians were not of vain appearances, fooling the eyes of Pharaoh and the Egyptians, but, as he says, the truth of Moses devoured the lies of the Wizards: "Corpora videbantur et Pharaon Aegyptis magicarum virgarum dracones sed veritas mendacium devoravit Moses. " It seems that St. Jerome had before their eyes the words of Tertullian, when he said, speaking of the Antichrist: "Like the magicians withstood Moses with lies, and that the rod of Moses devoured their rods, so the truth of Jesus Christ will eat the lie antichrist. "
St. Gregory of Nyssa, San Prospero, the author of the Commentary on the Epistles of St. Paul, under the name of Ambrose, the Abbot Rupert, and several others have also believed that there was nothing real in exchange that the magicians had , their rods into snakes, and consequently, that all the miracle consisted in having cheated the senses of the audience, making them appear of the objects that were not actually present.
can make quite substantial objections against what we said because: 1 - Whether the devil had really changed into snakes, the rods of the magicians, and that has made their only change in shape, with a movement and a secret subtle operation, to have fascinated the eyes of those present, to make them believe that there there were real snakes, everything is above the known forces of nature in a spirit. 2nd - If you say that God has helped, by his will, the devil in these operations, and to many similar objects that are narrated in Scripture, it follows that God helps to sin and the devil helps in evil that he does to men, is trying the good, and punishing the bad guys. 3rd - If true miracle, we mean that it is above the known laws of nature and above the natural forces of the one who produces it, it can be concluded that most of the men, being unable to discern a true from a false miracle, proof of miracles, which seems more proportionate to the scope of the people's will become useless, because the discussion of the laws of nature will be impossible.
To meet the first difficulty, it should be noted that the nature and strength of the Angels, demons, and souls separate from matter, there are quite unknown, and so it is very difficult positive note, how far is their power over the bodies and to distinguish what is natural or supernatural in their sensitive operations. Some ancient people believed that angels, demons, and souls were physical and not, in truth, as our bodies, which are thick, heavy, palpable, gross, but they had thin bodies, thin and ethereal, like a ' Air imperceptible.
E 'on these very principles that they believed that demons loved the smoke of sacrifices, the melodies, the blood of the victims, the trade in women and that they were bound for a time, and some buildings in certain places. As the angels good, that they placed all the difference between them and the demons, and lay in wickedness nell'ostinazione demons in evil, but the nature and essence of these spirits was different between them. They did not differ as to the affected eye is different from the healthy eye, sound and hearing, by hearing failure. Finally, although they believed that souls were immortal and capable of supreme happiness, not considered for this purely spiritual. The thought that kept body and, after the death of the body, the figure of what they had inspired. Some ancients called this body the soul, separated from the coarse bodies, "like the stars" or "like lightning". They were the subject of her immortality, of what is often the soul appeared near the tombs, and that it retains the shape of the body that has animated and the inclinations that did appear during the life of this body. Supported these views on the history of rich and poor over that of Lazarus, and mainly about what St. Thomas says in the Gospel: "Unless I see the nail prints in his feet and in his hands, I do not believe" (Gv.20 , 25), because, says Origen, was convinced that the body of the soul of Jesus Christ might appear in the eyes of the Apostles, in much the same way that it had left the body. Today we have ideas and principles quite different, and should, consequently, reasoning in a completely different way, the operations of angels and spirits, on the bodies. It was not a bad idea, conceived in the old assumption that the subtle body of an angel or a demon, could make considerable changes in the organs of animals, air and the elements.
The great knowledge they have of the structures of our bodies and other secrets of nature, they can serve to shake up the springs and secondary causes to act, subtly and unknown, but nevertheless it is not impossible to conceive once that it is recognized that the agents of corporal shot and intelligent. You could say that their actions, which seemed extraordinary, however, were not miraculous since there is nothing contrary notice to the known laws of nature. A body can make the motion to another body, and a body of a subtlety of agility, an extraordinary penetration, can, of course, produce, and changes in other body movements that are very different from those produced by our bodies slow, clumsy and heavy soils, in other bodies of the same nature. But in our principles to reason quite differently. A spirit, entirely detached from matter, which did not conceive that the intelligence and will, can not, as it seems, cause, of course, no movement or make himself immediately and no impression on the subject, because it has no physical proportions with it. And so, whether it be said that the devil has used the natural disposition, which he found in the woods the rods of the magicians, to change these snakes, when previously there were none, in their presence, whether it did appear to outside, a ghost that represent snakes and all these effects are obviously incompatible with the nature of a substance merely clever. Here's what we discovered the reason for this topic. But if you resort to Revelation, we see a way to explain all these operations of the Angels, demons and spirits, without being obliged to have recourse to the miracle.
Scripture tells us a great number of facts, which we can not recognize the devil, by author, for example, the evils that hurts to Job, a large number of owned, in the Gospel, Jesus Christ himself, tempted by the devil, and led on a high mountain and then the pinnacle of the Temple.
will say that in these meetings, God has granted to the devil, the power of miracles and wonders that God has made us to meet the ill will of the devil? As if to say that God works miracles in favor of the devil, to deceive, to harm, to afflict men, what you can not say without swearing. We must therefore say that the devil has had in these meetings, with the permission of God, a power that is natural. This permission of God is well expressed in the history of disasters of Job and that of the man who was freed by Jesus Christ, by a legion of demons. As for the miraculous works that were attributed, in the Scriptures, the good angels and the apparitions of the souls separated from the body, you should not always look like something of a miracle. If you see them act on the bodies and make sudden changes in the field and extraordinary in the air, in the elements and our senses, everything can be done without a miracle from them. If there is the miracle and the supernatural is simply what God allows, rarely, these extraordinary and miraculous effects, because the effects of common and ordinary the power of angels and the devil on our bodies, our senses, our imagination and a hundred other things that surround us and to which, our dissipation makes it impossible to apply, no one makes use of the miracle to make it right. If our good angels guide us and lead us away from danger, fill the imagination of pious objects, if the devil, by contrast, inspires us bad feelings, to bring us to sin if we are able to mess things is our imagination; Because if, in ourselves, movements opposed to reason and decency, do not believe that, in this, something which is beyond his power and natural and known, however, to get it right, there is nothing less difficult, for a spirit, that what Scripture teaches us that God permitted the temptations, the devil, to do with Jesus Christ. All the difference is that the devil appeared to the Savior, so sensitive, rather than the way we normally try, that is more hidden, not acting less and that is why, on our senses, our moods, our bodies on our imagination, though we see them with bodily eyes.
But as a purely spiritual substance can act, so on a physical body? And 'you have to explain. We have established in principle that the will of God is the nature of things. There seems to a large number of facts, compared in Scripture, that angels and demons physically act on the bodies. But, as a spirit can attach itself to a body? What proportion are between two things so different? What is the relationship between the will of an intelligent being and the movement of matter? I reply that there is also between our soul and our body. Anyone who doubts that the soul imparts motion to the blood, the animal spirits, to all our members? And who does not see that the movements of the body, blood, moods and objects affecting the sensitive soul, causing the thoughts and feelings of joy, fear, grief, pleasure? However, what could be more incompatible and more disproportionate a spirit and matter, that the will of the soul and body movements? It 's more difficult for an angel or a demon, cause some movement in the air, in our eyes, in our imagination? It 's true that we are sure, for the experience that we have, that God has willed that there was a natural union and a mutual dependence between the movements and passions of our body and our soul, we do not have certainty about the Angels and demons. But we do not have this certainty of God's will, the mutual dependence of our bodies and our souls with this reasoning: our souls and our bodies can not, of course, abide in union which are each about the other, which for a particular effect of the will of God must, therefore, that this will be joined by all-powerful. And you can not do a very similar argument about angels and demons? Can not be applied to the material to cause movement, who by the will of God must, therefore, that there are applied, this will, supposedly acting on her.
We have shown that the angels and demons really act on the body, we must therefore recognize that God has willed that, at the will of a spirit, a body was put in motion, so that spirit as he'd like, or rather, God has pledged to give the matter, certain movements, at the will of a spirit. And that is what makes the nature of spirits, or rather this is God's will that makes the action of spirits on the body is sometimes a natural action and not always miraculous. As to the second difficulty, which can be made against our reasoning, that if God wishes to contribute, with the devil, the evil that hurts the good and the temptations that allows them to happen, it would follow that God is the author of evil or at least who favors and who contributes. We have already answered the first objection to this and it should not embarrass the devil too much, more than embarrass ourselves, it is certain that God helps so physical and natural environment, all the evils that we commit to the outside, criminal acts that are committed in the body and the body. It is recognized that God helps the evil, evil according to what has physical and material. Material contributes to a bad deed, gives movement to the subject, the occasion of the will of a villain, as the occasion of the will of a just, as a result of the union that has been established between our bodies and our souls, but it does not follow from this that contributes to bad, got his second to be formally in evil as evil. The third difficulty is more substantial. It 's true that most men are not able to discern between true and false miracle. But it does not follow that proof of this miracle is useless to the people. You just have to say this consequence, that the people should be more reserved in judging things supernatural and miraculous that it is not normal. It must be recognized that it is trying to despise and that sometimes it takes real miracle is that what is not in appearance. There are some facts that are so evidently miraculous, that it is impossible and that the wrong people, even though crude and ignorant as it is supposed to look like a normal wonders. When Moses separates, with a flick of the rod, the waters of the Red Sea and then, to his command, is to return to their original state, when water is drawn from a rock and brings up the earth to swallow the seditious, and when Jesus Christ resurrected Lazarus, dead for four days, and resurrecting himself. There is no one who does not conceive that they are real miracles.
not need to judge, nor to have recourse to philosophy or higher knowledge, or to a long examination, or in deep discussions. And if Moses and Jesus Christ have one indisputable miracle, commensurate with the extent of the simplest, and that is that the highbrow can not reasonably deny it, he concluded, with good reason, that all other miracles are less obvious and which are made to confirm the same doctrine and the truths are equally reliable and equally undeniable early. When a man uneducated and illiterate, could not, precisely to know, from where comes the power of angels, demons, wizards, and what a clever charlatan is capable of doing to fool the eyes of men, can not ignore that at least a natural agent, no matter what, can not, at a time, by its own virtues, resurrect itself, stop the sun, to stop a storm. When you do not know exactly where it comes from the power of the agents I talk to, I'm quite sure that does not reach there. To act the bodies on the subject, and to cause considerable changes, it is necessary for the preparation, it takes time, you must follow certain laws of motion. There is only the first cause, namely that the omnipotent agent can, at a time, produce such miraculous effects. It should clearly distinguish between these two sentences: Simple, and even the most skilled, do not know all the laws of nature or all the virtues of natural agents. And this one: The simple and the wise can not ignore something that is above the forces of nature. I know what I can not. But I do not know what I can or how far they can get my natural forces. Although I know of, for example, that I can not run as strong a shot crossbow, I do not know tell me how far I can run. In addition, when speaking of the impression that miracles have to do over the spirits, we must distinguish between different states and different levels of people. One man, for example, which is ignorant of the true religion, a pagan, the doctrine must believe that the aims and that you try with miracles, except that this doctrine is not contrary to natural light or miracles, he sees do not give him the right person for suspicion of illusion.
if they get a second miracle worker, which destroys the doctrine of the first and confirming its first review, with signs opposite to those of the first, the pay must suspend its review and examine his doctrine. But if a Christian is already trained, which is located between two workers of miracles, he must choose: 1 - what is approved by the Church, 2nd - what is the greatest miracles, 3rd - the one who preaches a doctrine more pure and healthy, and absolutely must reject that which is rejected by the Church, which preaches against Jesus Christ, announcing a false doctrine or a moral corrupt. But, I tell you, there is circular reasoning and begging the question in all this? I ask you a note, to distinguish between true and false miracles, and you say that true miracles are those that serve to confirm the sound doctrine. E I ask if the evidence of the doctrine of the two preachers, you tell me to stick to what works miracles, for if they do both, to relate to the Church. And I doubt if that is the true Church, you referred me to the miracles and teaching. One thing can not be used as proof in itself. We must not give, in principle, what is at issue. It says that here, the principle on which it is based around what we say is that God, as Truth itself can not lead to error or authorize the deception and lies, with his approval and with a retinue of miracles, which, having promised the infallibility of his Church, can not deny his promise. Here is the beginning of our reasoning; principle is undeniable and closed in the very idea that we all have of the Deity as a Being infinitely perfect. Therefore, when in doubt the truth of a miracle, or competition between two players of miracles, referring to the examination of doctrine or authority of the Church, I do not infallible consequence of the principle that you can not contest, that is God can not cheat and that the decision is the decision of his Church of the Holy Spirit. The Church draws, therefore, its strength from the Word of Jesus' miracles and teaching are supported on the same basis. It is not begging the question, is a concatenation test and principles that respond to each other and that claims to each other by the power and light. That the magicians, the false prophets, the Antichrist can take some actions that, considered in themselves, appear as other miraculous actions of Moses, Jesus Christ and the Apostles, is indisputable, but that wizards and other ministers devil have done such a great noise of miracles, so detailed, it followed that they have made with the same authority and the same readiness that they have predicted that they have stopped the course when they wanted them to have facts to support a doctrine of God, to establish the truth, to destroy the error, idolatry, superstition, deceit, the kingdom of the devil, and the glory of God, is what you do not absolutely deny.
The Savior had to perform miracles similar to those of the ancient Prophets had announced, says St. Augustine, as their God, their Lord, their Master, for fear it did not seem absurd if he did what others had done. But there are some miracles that no one else has ever done or could do, to prove that he was above all the miracle worker, of whatever nature and quality of whatever they were, as "born of a virgin, raised from the dead by its own virtue, he ascends into heaven. " If these actions do not enough to prove his divinity, I do not know what could prove it. Celsius objected, however, Christians are supposed miracles of the gods of paganism, authority to enforce against those of Jesus Christ. But Origen makes much difference to note the diversity that lies between morality and the doctrine of Jesus Christ, and the absurdities and abominations of the worship of false gods. Who can support, he said, that the correction of the ways is by cheating? What interest can have the devil in the deployment of miracles for the sanctification of mankind? Arnobius challenged the pagans to make them see that their gods had never wrought miracles similar to those of Jesus Christ, with their single command. It 's impossible that God allows man to be fooled by a long following of false miracles, especially if the man is in good faith and if the corruption of his heart, and contempt for truth and justice does not render him worthy of darkness and error to find the love that he likes. The Pharaoh's magicians did, no doubt, something that seemed miraculous, changing their rods into snakes. But God does not already confused the first time by devouring, the rod of Moses, who had snakes appear? And when Moses took the example of production of gnats, God does not stop their power and were not forced to confess that it was the finger of God acting through Moses? They were affected, like other Egyptians, the plague of ulcers, and their art could do nothing against the evil Israel, who were free of these scourges with which God smote the Egyptians, and rejoiced that a profound peace, while all the rest of the country was desolate, so much for changing the water into blood, so much for the hail and lightning, and finally to the darkness and death of humans and animals. That you compare the alleged miracles of the magicians of Pharaoh, those of Apollonius of Thyane, and deities of paganism with those of Jesus, Moses and the Apostles: which disproportion there notice?
We have seen that the devil has stopped the course of rivers, which has divided the waters of the sea, which has softened the salty waters of a spring, which has extracted water from a rock, which has predicted things that depended on the combination of different things free, long before they happened? He raised the dead buried for several days? Wizards have walked on water, healed the blind, the lame, the dumb from birth, without touching, without prepare, with their single command? The miracles that are mentioned, magicians and gods of paganism, who are given? Authors are faithful, contemporary witnesses of what they write, and suffer the torments and death itself, to support what they teach? The devil obsessed and tormented bodies, due to illness, good try here the effects of his power. If you see Jesus, is to encourage him, if he could, groped to God, to worship the most unworthy of all creatures. All it does, proceed from a power dangerous and harmful. Appeared everywhere as the father of lying, impiety, and superstition. Talk to Eve, is to drop it in his disobedience to God makes it look if the wonders of his power against Job, and to commit impatience and despair. Finally, all those supposed miracles that do not tend to do with the poor souls, of the wicked and evil. That's what leads to the power of the devil and his ministers. Thus, as the angel of darkness turns into an angel of light that Beelzebub cast out demons, that false prophets do miracles that lead to error, if possible, even the elect will always be easy to discern truth from falsehood. The actions, opinions, doctrine, the end of the spirit of the sons of darkness, they soon recognize them for what they were. Most laymen will never be fooled by false miracles, if they have just as much deference to the proceedings and orders of the Church as it should have. E 'to you to judge the merits of the mission and the true from the false apostles. If the Church condemns Simon, it is because he had to do the most amazing wonders, would rise in clouds, it was necessary to tell him anathema (Acts 8.20 to 21). The doctrine
helps wonders and miracles argue doctrine. These two must be inseparable: they are two principles related to each other and cemented. The people should not judge at all nor the doctrine nor by miracles, and his faith includes one other, and the submission of the truly faithful embracing the doctrine, proved by miracles, and miracles, accompanied by sound doctrine. The proof of miracles, recognized by the Church, there is always, in all its force, in relation to the wise simple coma. We respect, miracles, the nature of God's omnipotence that strikes us, and the authority of the Church, which recognizes them. So a miracle must be: 1 - Above the natural forces and known by what it produces, 2nd - must lead to God and Jesus Christ, 3 ° - I must not have anything against the true doctrine, piety, to the Church. It seems that the Jews and the Pharisees of Jesus' time had, up there, the same as our idea, and it is this idea, poorly understood, which they took as a pretext to reject the Savior, in the teaching and actions, which demanded not see all these characters. They had God's Law, which forbade them to listen to every worker of miracles, which would teach them a doctrine that would maintain or conduct contrary to this Act, and orders to appeal to the Fathers, to discern the good from the bad prophets. Jesus Christ, according to the Pharisees, to break the law, the priests disapproved of his teaching and his actions. It seems, therefore, that the people should not adhere to Jesus, however, the Savior says that the Jews are very guilty of not to accept his doctrine and that "they would not sin, if He had not done among them works that no one else had ever made "(John 15:24). He wanted, therefore, that he believed that his works miracles were certain of what he taught. He demanded that the Jews had the obligation to believe, and that was enough that he did miracles, to justify his conduct and his teaching. It 's the conclusion I drew Nicodemus when he said to Jesus: "We know that you are a teacher sent from God, because anyone can do wonders that you do unless God is with him" (John 3:2).
In fact, when miracles are sure, no one should host of other serious as the one sent by God who makes them. They necessarily carry with them the nature of truth and divinity. And 'when the doctrine was suspect, like that of Jesus to Nicodemus could have been because it seemed to destroy the traditions of the Pharisees, if there are some miracles and manifest the same side, they need to prevail on the evidence of miracles that could be difficult by the doctrine. What property is based on this principle that God can not deceive. Now he be misleading if the miracles being reported a false doctrine that did not seem obviously false to the light of common sense and if a great worker of miracles had not already warned not to believe them. So if there was a division in the church and the Arians, for example, who said they were grounded in Scripture, as the Catholics had done miracles, and non-Catholics, they had been misled, because there was the need to conclude favor of miracles or to follow a falsehood. Now that is what God can do and what they would do, however, if he allowed, in a dark matter and doubtful, there were the miracles from the two sides, this would be the case, then that should be used to the rules that we have proposed: the examination of Scripture, the nature of the miracle, the conduct of what it does, the authority of the Church, and, most importantly, prayer, to purify his heart from the presumption and unruly desires that can close your eyes and lead us into error.
Tertullliano note on this subject, something that deserves much attention. It seems, he says, that the Son of God could no longer use the authority of miracles to prove his mission, after having weakened or destroyed the evidence rather than by preaching that the imposters would do miracles that could deceive even the elect "Temerariam signorum atque virtutum ostendit fidem, ut etiam apud pseudo christos facillimarum. Where does so, he adds, that Jesus Christ wants us to approve it, whether we recognize, whether we receive the witness of his miracles, but he refused the same privilege to other workers of miracles? E ', no doubt, because, having come first, and having the first, since the precepts of the nature and quality of miracles, has earned the trust and made himself the master of spirits. As what comes first in the bathroom, fill the position and closes the door to others, so Jesus Christ has thrown everyone else, and has reserved, to Him alone, the trust: "Ita fidem occupavit, posteris quibusque proeripuit!
Having the advantage of coming first, have discredited those who had come after him, tarring and preachers.
St. Augustine, in response to the Donatists, who boasted of having workers of miracles, and who said they had made one Pontius, and that God had answered Donato, when he prayed, the Holy Father said: 1 - that the heretics are the first to be duped, believing in fairy tales or cheating, telling us what they themselves did not believe. 2nd - Assuming that they did miracles, he argues that they did not charity at all, without which, the fede, che fa trasportare le montagne, non serve a niente. Ora egli giudica che essi non hanno affatto la carità, perché hanno rotto l’unità. 3° - Infine, egli dice che il Figlio di Dio ci ha messi in guardia contro questi operatori di miracoli : “Contra istos mirabiliaros cautum me fecit Deus meus, dicens : In novissimis diebus exurgent pseudoprophetae, facientes signa et portenta, ut in errorem inducant, si fieri potest, etiam electos”. Un soldato disertore può far spavento ad un uomo di campagna ; ma quello che non vuol essere sorpreso, né spaventato, fa attenzione, se questo soldato è nel suo campo e se segue il suo esercito, e se la divisa che egli porta può dargli qualche autorità. Se is separated from his body and no way to distinguish the uniform that does not fear the threats and is opposed to his efforts. He still serves, elsewhere, the same comparison and distinguishes the miracles of the magicians from those of the saints, for the purpose you propose, and for the right and authority with which they do. Wizards seek their own glory and the saints, the glory of God the first act with a power that is granted to them in a certain order and in some extent, but the Saints operate with public authorities, emanated from the One to whom all power has been given in Heaven and on Earth. Finally all we have said so far, touching the true and false miracles, you can ensure: 1 - God alone can do miracles, for he alone can act against the normal rules of nature or suspend the action, when and how he deems appropriate. 2nd - That men, angels and demons can sometimes make miraculous actions, the express will of God, making good use of her child, to carry out his orders and to serve as a tool to his or her mercy Justice . 3rd - What spirits are separated from matter, may, of course, without miracle, to act on the bodies. 4th - That the alleged miracles of the magicians of Pharaoh are magical operations, of which the devil is the author and the instrument. 5th - What is the real miracle is a lot of its external authority, compared to the people, doctrine and merit of one who does it, and the opposition of the Church.
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