The Incongruity of Divinity’s Perfection with the Occurrence of Miracles

Why does God not cause amputees to spontaneously grow missing limbs, but instead aid in already curable diseases? Does a discrepancy exist between this and of God’s omnipotence – and his omniscience? In the book “Theological-Political Treatise”, Spinoza explains away this discrepancy, but through his argumentation rejects the traditional conception of the nature of God – in which case I deal with the Abrahamic one.

We start with the granted assumption that God is perfect in every way and infinite, whether potency or foreknowledge or morality etc., and this prior belief describing his very essence – the very nature of his existence. Since it is generally believed that one’s will is characterized by one’s nature – one’s essence, then it follows that whatever God wills is in essence what God causes, and that this will, or act, is therefore perfect. Yet, I say his essence, and therefore his will, is perfect on grounds granted by many religious people that to claim that God’s will, or act, as imperfect is, in essence, heresy and thus unacceptable. Therefore, this fundamental premise, as a whole, I use since it be granted true by many of faith. As Spinoza next reveals, natural laws are therefore divine decrees, or eternal truths.

It is believed that the universe had been singularly designed and created by this divine being(s), and thus by his very nature of his divine existence, the will for the universe to exist must come from perfect reasons, thus created in most perfect a manner. That is, God’s will is reflected by his very nature, so too does the nature of the universe also reflect his will – his nature also. Since his nature is of perfection, than his will, which is in essence what he wills, is therefore perfect. Rationality is a perfection of the intellect, and thus for the universe to have reflected God’s essence it must be inherently perfect – or rational. This means that whatever that which happens within it (miracles in this case) must be coherent with natural causes and natural law (which are described by Spinoza as God’s eternal truths), and thus the universe is in itself coherent – no divine intervention is necessary. For if to appeal to supernatural intervention to explain some strange phenomena is deemed necessary, then the universe is very much imperfectly created and designed. It is therefore by this line of reasoning that divine miracles do not actually occur, for they are in actuality rare occurrences in nature produced by natural law itself. Everything in the universe is pre-determined.

It remains for one to remark thus that when strange occurrences, or ‘miracles’, are used to convert the unbeliever, the faithful one is engaging in self deception. For if conceded that God be perfect in every conceivable way, then the universe cannot necessarily be divinely intervened with.

However, if the believer concedes that God can will anything he so wishes, than God is in itself incoherent and thus imperfect in every possible way. That is, if God can cause and will things random to our understanding of his divine nature, then it remains to us that God is not understandable and that we have no capacity to understand him. Therefore any statement from theology ultimately refutes its own validity if one insists in conceding that God is perfect. That is, if God exists, and miracles of divine intervention do indeed occur, then God is very much imperfect. If this be true, then the existence of an utterly unpredictable God, one of no definite morals or knowledge, is thus validly claimed. Yet, if I grant the possibility of God’s nature being fundamentally incoherent, I proclaim that the incoherence of things is plausible – over coherence, and thus I have refuted myself. That is, if incoherence is preferred over coherence, my attempt to rationalize the state of God’s nature can be called into question. Clearly, then, it is only plausible that an impersonal God exists – if God(s) exists at all.