Matthew gives the particulars of about twenty-two miracles, Mark of about nineteen, Luke of about eighteen and John of about seven.
According to the gospels, Christ healed diseases, cast out devils, rebuked the sea, cured the blind, fed mult.i.tudes with five loaves and two fishes, walked on the sea, cursed a fig tree, turned water into wine and raised the dead.
Matthew is the only one that tells about the Star and the Wise Men--the only one that tells about the murder of babes.
John is the only one who says anything about the resurrection of Lazarus, and Luke is the only one giving an account of the raising from the dead the widow of Nain"s son.
How is it possible to substantiate these miracles?
The Jews, among whom they were said to have been performed, did not believe them. The diseased, the palsied, the leprous, the blind who were cured, did not become followers of Christ. Those that were raised from the dead were never heard of again.
Does any intelligent man believe in the existence of devils? The writer of three of the gospels certainly did. John says nothing about Christ having cast out devils, but Matthew, Mark and Luke give many instances.
Does any natural man now believe that Christ cast out devils? If his disciples said he did, they were mistaken. If Christ said he did, he was insane or an impostor.
If the accounts of casting out devils are false, then the writers were ignorant or dishonest. If they wrote through ignorance, then they were not inspired. If they wrote what they knew to be false, they were not inspired. If what they wrote is untrue, whether they knew it or not, they were not inspired.
At that time it was believed that palsy, epilepsy, deafness, insanity and many other diseases were caused by devils; that devils took possession of and lived in the bodies of men and women. Christ believed this, taught this belief to others, and pretended to cure diseases by casting devils out of the sick and insane. We know now, if we know anything, that diseases are not caused by the presence of devils. We know, if we know anything, that devils do not reside in the bodies of men.
If Christ said and did what the writers of the three gospels say he said and did, then Christ was mistaken. If he was mistaken, certainly he was not G.o.d. And if he was mistaken, certainly he was not inspired.
Is it a fact that the Devil tried to bribe Christ?
Is it a fact that the Devil carried Christ to the top of the temple and tried to induce him to leap to the ground?
How can these miracles be established?
The princ.i.p.als have written nothing, Christ has written nothing, and the Devil has remained silent.
How can we know that the Devil tried to bribe Christ? Who wrote the account? We do not know. How did the writer get his information? We do not know.
Somebody, some seventeen hundred years ago, said that the Devil tried to bribe G.o.d; that the Devil carried G.o.d to the top of the temple and tried to induce him to leap to the earth and that G.o.d was intellectually too keen for the Devil.
This is all the evidence we have.
Is there anything in the literature of the world more perfectly idiotic?
Intelligent people no longer believe in witches, wizards, spooks and devils, and they are perfectly satisfied that every word in the New Testament about casting out devils is utterly false.
Can we believe that Christ raised the dead?
A widow living in Nain is following the body of her son to the tomb.
Christ halts the funeral procession and raises the young man from the dead and gives him back to the arms of his mother.
This young man disappears. He is never heard of again. No one takes the slightest interest in the man who returned from the realm of death. Luke is the only one who tells the story. Maybe Matthew, Mark and John never heard of it, or did not believe it and so failed to record it.
John says that Lazarus was raised from the dead; Matthew, Mark and Luke say nothing about it.
It was more wonderful than the raising of the widow"s son. He had not been laid in the tomb for days. He was only on his way to the grave, but Lazarus was actually dead. He had begun to decay.
Lazarus did not excite the least interest. No one asked him about the other world. No one inquired of him about their dead friends.
When he died the second time no one said: "He is not afraid. He has traveled that road twice and knows just where he is going."
We do not believe in the miracles of Mohammed, and yet they are as well attested as this. We have no confidence in the miracles performed by Joseph Smith, and yet the evidence is far greater, far better.
If a man should go about now pretending to raise the dead, pretending to cast out devils, we would regard him as insane. What, then, can we say of Christ? If we wish to save his reputation we are compelled to say that he never pretended to raise the dead; that he never claimed to have cast out devils.
We must take the ground that these ignorant and impossible things were invented by zealous disciples, who sought to deify their leader.
In those ignorant days these falsehoods added to the fame of Christ.
But now they put his character in peril and belittle the authors of the gospels.
Can we now believe that water was changed into wine? John tells of this childish miracle, and says that the other disciples were present, yet Matthew, Mark and Luke say nothing about it.
"Take the miracle of the man cured by the pool of Bethseda. John says that an angel troubled the waters of the pool of Bethseda, and that whoever got into the pool first after the waters were troubled was healed.
Does anybody now believe that an angel went into the pool and troubled the waters? Does anybody now think that the poor wretch who got in first was healed? Yet the author of the gospel according to John believed and a.s.serted these absurdities. If he was mistaken about that he may have been about all the miracles he records.
John is the only one who tells about this pool of Bethseda. Possibly the other disciples did not believe the story.
How can we account for these pretended miracles?
In the days of the disciples, and for many centuries after, the world was filled with the supernatural. Nearly everything that happened was regarded as miraculous. G.o.d was the immediate governor of the world. If the people were good, G.o.d sent seed time and harvest; but if they were bad he sent flood and hail, frost and famine. If anything wonderful happened it was exaggerated until it became a miracle.
Of the order of events--of the unbroken and the unbreakable chain of causes and effects--the people had no knowledge and no thought.
A miracle is the badge and brand of fraud. No miracle ever was performed. No intelligent, honest man ever pretended to perform a miracle, and never will.
If Christ had wrought the miracles attributed to him; if he had cured the palsied and insane; if he had given hearing to the deaf, vision to the blind; if he had cleansed the leper with a word, and with a touch had given life and feeling to the withered limb; if he had given pulse and motion, warmth and thought, to cold and breathless clay; if he had conquered death and rescued from the grave its pallid prey--no word would have been uttered, no hand raised, except in praise and honor.
In his presence all heads would have been uncovered--all knees upon the ground.
Is it not strange that at the trial of Christ no one was found to say a word in his favor? No man stood forth and said: "I was a leper, and this man cured me with a touch." No woman said: "I am the widow of Nain and this is my son whom this man raised from the dead."
No man said: "I was blind, and this man gave me sight."
All silent
VIII. THE PHILOSOPHY OF CHRIST
MILLIONS a.s.sert that the philosophy of Christ is perfect--that he was the wisest that ever littered speech.
Let us see:
_Resist not evil. If smitten on one cheek turn the other_.
Is there any philosophy, any wisdom in this? Christ takes from goodness, from virtue, from the truth, the right of self-defence. Vice becomes the master of the world, and the good become the victims of the infamous.