Tahafut_al-Tahafut-transl-Engl-van-den-Bergh

I say:
falls, but when this plank is on the earth, he walks over it
without falling. ‘ This happens because the body and the
bodily faculties are created to be subservient and
subordinate to the soul, and there is a difference here
according to the purity and the power o: the souls. And it is
not impossible that the power of the soul should reach such
a degree that also the natural power of things outside a
man’s body obeys it, since the soul of man is not impressed
on his body although there is created in man’s nature a
certain impulse and desire to govern his body. And if it is
possible that the limbs of his body should obey him, it is not
impossible that other things besides his body should obey
him and that his soul should control the blasts of the wind or
the downpour of rain, or the striking of a thunderbolt or the
trembling of the earth, which causes a land to be swallowed
up with its inhabitants. s The same is the case with his
influence in producing cold or warmth or a movement in the
air; this warmth or cold comes about through his soul, b all
these things occur without any apparent physical cause, and
such a thing will be a miracle brought about by a prophet.
But this only happens in matters disposed to receive it, and
cannot attain such a scale that wood could be changed into
an animal or that the moon, which cannot undergo cleavage,
could be cloven. This is their theory of miracles, and we do
not deny anything they have mentioned, and that such things
happen to prophets; we are only opposed to their limiting
themselves to this, and to their denial of the possibility that a
stick might change into a serpent, and of the resurrection of
the dead and other things. We must occupy ourselves with
this question in order to be able to assert the existence of
miracles and for still another reason, namely to give effective
support to the doctrine on which the Muslims base their
belief that God can do anything. And let us now fulfil our
intention.
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