Ibn Warraq - Why I Am Not a Muslim

The Koran 143
disclaimers, there are at least four places in the Koran that Muslims believe refer
to miracles.
1. The clefting of the moon: "The hour has approached, and the moon has
been cleft. But if the unbelievers see a sign, they turn aside and say, 'Magic!
that shall pass away!' " (sura 54.1, 2).
2. The assistance given to the Muslims at the battle of Badr: "When you
said to the faithful: 'Is it not enough for you that your Lord helps you with
three thousand angels sent down from high' No: if you are steadfast and fear
God, and the enemy come upon you in hot pursuit, your Lord will help you
with five thousand angels with their distinguishing marks" (3.120, 121).
3. The night journey: "We declare the glory of Him who transports his servant
by night from Masjidu 'l-Haram to the Masjiduf Aqsa [i.e., Mecca to Jerusalem]"
(sura 17.1).
4. The Koran itself, for Muslims, remains the great miracle of Islam (sura
29.48).
The traditions are full of Muhammad's miracles, curing the ill, feeding a
thousand people on one kid, etc.
As our knowledge of nature has increased, there has been a corresponding
decline in the belief in miracles. We are no longer prone to think that God intervenes
arbitrarily in human affairs by suspending or altering the normal workings of
the laws of nature. As our confidence in our discoveries of the laws of nature
has increased, our belief in miracles has receded.
David Hume argued in the following manner: 503
A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and as a firm and unalterable
experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very
nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly
be imagined. Why is it more than probable, that all men must die; that lead
cannot, of itself, remain suspended in the air; . . . unless it be, that these events
are found agreeable to the laws of nature, and there is required a violation of
these laws, or in other words a miracle to prevent them Nothing is esteemed
a miracle, if it ever happens in the common course of nature. . . . But it is a
miracle, that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed
in any age or country. There must, therefore, be a uniform experience against
every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit that appellation.
And as a uniform experience amounts to a proof, there is here a direct and
full proof, from the nature of the fact, against the existence of any miracle; . . .
The plain consequence is . . . "That no testimony is sufficient to establish
a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would
be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavours to establish."
And in every putative miracle, it is more reasonable and in accordance with
our experience to deny that the "miracle" ever happened. People are duped and
deluded, are apt to exaggerate, and have this strong need to believe; or as Feuerbach
put it, a miracle is "the sorcery of the imagination, which satisfies without