Yawpy Brits

Some British yawp I was reading (the Brits make the best yawps) quoted the philospher David Hume on the issue of miracles. The yawp, of course, is too smart to believe in such things and apparently believes such belief should be outlawed. Whatever. Anyway, here is what he quotes Hume saying

A miracle, began Hume (On Miracles, pt I), “may be accurately defined, [as] a transgression of a law of Nature by a particular volition of the Deity”.

But “there is not to be found, in all history, any miracle attested by a sufficient number of men, of such unquestioned good sense, education and learning, as to secure us against all delusion in themselves.”

Um -- Huh? What about the resurrection of Jesus? Little miracle there, if true, right? And the New Testament says hundreds witnessed it, and then told others, revolutionized their lives and the communities around them, and in many cases then died violent deaths for insisting the resurrection was real.

There are two responses, I guess. I would assume 500 witnesses would be "a sufficient number," or else there probably isn't a sufficient number of witnesses to prove any historical event before the age of videotape. The responses to the resurrection evidence are (i) "these are not people of good sense," or (ii) "they lack education and learning."

The first response is simply untenable. How can anyone know whether an individual is a person of good sense without meeting them or otherwise having evidence of some other kind to assess their good sense? No doubt, the yawp would say, "well, they believed in resurrection; how could they have any good sense?" But not having seen what they saw, the yawp is merely passing on these witnesses' good sense based on his own prejudices and experiences. Having done so, he has no reason to examine the rest of their story: how these people changed, what they did in response to what they experienced, and what they were willing to give to assert its truth. In other words, the yawp's dismissal of this testimony is baseless.

The second response is simply a philosopher's mask: What he means is -- they don't have the same education or learning that I do. Because I -- the yawpish philosopher -- have been educated to believe as I do and learned that such things as resurrections are hogwash, then they are hogwash, and anyone who disagrees "lacks education and learning" and so is an incompetent witness.

I don't really care what the yawp says or believes, I was just struck by the Hume quote, which seems laughable in light of the historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus. If I were this yawp I would be directing my attention toward the purveyors of Shariah law, under which he will soon live if he is not careful. But I suppose it's safer bad mouthing Christians. Hmm. A coward and a yawp.

Here is a recent photo of a philopher's mask: