JesusDraft · awaiting advisor review
Did Jesus really do miracles?
In short
Many historians, including sceptical ones, accept that Jesus was widely known as a healer and exorcist, and that people believed they had seen him do wonders. Whether God was truly at work depends partly on whether you think God exists and acts. Christians believe he did, and that his miracles were signs of who he is.
The Objection
Miracles break the laws of nature, and human testimony is often mistaken, credulous or exaggerated. The Gospels were written decades later by believers keen to glorify Jesus, and the ancient world credited many holy men with wonders. As David Hume argued, it is always more likely that a report of a miracle is mistaken than that the miracle happened. Psychosomatic healing, legend and storytelling explain the accounts better.
Put as its strongest advocates would put it.
The Christian Case
- Historical evidence
Jesus’ reputation for healing and exorcism appears in every layer of the Gospel tradition: Mark, the sayings shared by Matthew and Luke, and John, in many different kinds of story. For this reason many critical scholars, such as John P. Meier and E. P. Sanders, accept that his contemporaries saw him as a worker of wonders.
- Historical evidence
His opponents did not deny his deeds; they said he drove out demons by the power of Beelzebul. Josephus, a Jewish historian writing around AD 93, calls Jesus a doer of “surprising deeds”. Christians later altered this passage, but many scholars think this phrase is original. Islam also honours Jesus’ miracles, done “by God’s permission” (Qur’an 3:49; 5:110).
- Historical evidence
Some miracle stories are set in real places that archaeologists have found. Excavations in Jerusalem uncovered the colonnaded Pool of Bethesda and a Pool of Siloam from Jesus’ time, where John places two healings. This shows the writer knew Jerusalem well. It cannot show that the healings happened.
- Philosophical argument
Hume’s argument assumes that nature is all there is. If God made the world, he is free to act within it, and a miracle is not a broken law but God doing something new. Then the question is not whether miracles can happen, but whether the evidence and setting of a particular claim make sense of it. This is an argument, not a proof.
- Scripture
The Gospels present Jesus’ miracles as signs pointing to God’s kingdom and to who Jesus is, not as magic tricks. He refused to perform signs on demand to win arguments.
- Christians differ
Christians agree that Jesus did miracles but differ on whether such gifts continue today. Many Pentecostal and charismatic Christians expect healings and other miracles now. Others, often called cessationists, believe miraculous gifts mainly marked the time of Jesus and the apostles, though God still answers prayer. Many sit somewhere between these two views.
Where the Evidence Is Weaker
History can show that Jesus had a reputation as a miracle-worker. It cannot show that a given event had a supernatural cause; that step depends on beliefs about God. Other Jewish holy men, such as Honi the Circle-Drawer and Hanina ben Dosa, were also credited with wonders. The “nature miracles”, such as walking on water, are more widely doubted by critical scholars than the healings, and individual stories are hard to check.
Arguments to Avoid
- Claiming miracles alone prove Jesus is God: the Bible says prophets did miracles too and warns of false signs (Mark 13:22).
- Presenting Josephus as clear independent proof of miracles, without saying his passage was altered.
- Saying Jesus’ miracles were simply copied from pagan myths: the parallels usually suggested are loose and often overstated.
- Brushing aside all modern reports of healing, or promising that faith always brings healing.
Read for Yourself
Mark 2:1–12
1And again he entered into Capernaum after some days; and it was noised that he was in the house. 2And straightway many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, not so much as about the door: and he preached the word unto them. 3And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four. 4And when they could not come nigh unto him for the press, they uncovered the roof where he was: and when they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of the palsy lay. 5When Jesus saw their faith, he said unto the sick of the palsy, Son, thy sins be forgiven thee. 6But there were certain of the scribes sitting there, and reasoning in their hearts, 7Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies? who can forgive sins but God only? 8And immediately when Jesus perceived in his spirit that they so reasoned within themselves, he said unto them, Why reason ye these things in your hearts? 9Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk? 10But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he saith to the sick of the palsy,) 11I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house. 12And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all; insomuch that they were all amazed, and glorified God, saying, We never saw it on this fashion.
John 9:1–41
1And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth. 2And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind? 3Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. 4I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. 5As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world. 6When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay, 7And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing. 8The neighbours therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind, said, Is not this he that sat and begged? 9Some said, This is he: others said, He is like him: but he said, I am he. 10Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened? 11He answered and said, A man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said unto me, Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash: and I went and washed, and I received sight. 12Then said they unto him, Where is he? He said, I know not. 13They brought to the Pharisees him that aforetime was blind. 14And it was the sabbath day when Jesus made the clay, and opened his eyes. 15Then again the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. He said unto them, He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see. 16Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them. 17They say unto the blind man again, What sayest thou of him, that he hath opened thine eyes? He said, He is a prophet. 18But the Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind, and received his sight, until they called the parents of him that had received his sight. 19And they asked them, saying, Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? how then doth he now see? 20His parents answered them and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind: 21But by what means he now seeth, we know not; or who hath opened his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him: he shall speak for himself. 22These words spake his parents, because they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already, that if any man did confess that he was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. 23Therefore said his parents, He is of age; ask him. 24Then again called they the man that was blind, and said unto him, Give God the praise: we know that this man is a sinner. 25He answered and said, Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not: one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see. 26Then said they to him again, What did he to thee? how opened he thine eyes? 27He answered them, I have told you already, and ye did not hear: wherefore would ye hear it again? will ye also be his disciples? 28Then they reviled him, and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are Moses’ disciples. 29We know that God spake unto Moses: as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is. 30The man answered and said unto them, Why herein is a marvellous thing, that ye know not from whence he is, and yet he hath opened mine eyes. 31Now we know that God heareth not sinners: but if any man be a worshipper of God, and doeth his will, him he heareth. 32Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind. 33If this man were not of God, he could do nothing. 34They answered and said unto him, Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out. 35Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God? 36He answered and said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? 37And Jesus said unto him, Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee. 38And he said, Lord, I believe. And he worshipped him. 39And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind. 40And some of the Pharisees which were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind also?
Matthew 11:2–6
2Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples, 3And said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another? 4Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: 5The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. 6And blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me.
John 20:30–31
30And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: 31But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
Related Finds
Pool of Bethesda
2nd century BC – 1st century AD · Found: Near St Anne’s Church, Jerusalem, excavated 19th–20th centuries
In place, Jerusalem
Two large pools with colonnades north of the Temple Mount.
What it shows
John’s pool “with five porticoes”, once thought a literary invention, fits a double pool with colonnades on four sides and one between.
What it doesn’t show
Exactly how the porticoes were arranged is still discussed.
Pool of Siloam
1st century BC – AD 70 · Found: Jerusalem, during pipe works, 2004
In place, City of David, Jerusalem
A large stepped pool of the Second Temple period.
What it shows
The pool where Jesus sent the man born blind to wash, in use in his day.
What it doesn’t show
It shows the place, not the event.
Further Reading
- A Marginal Jew: Rethinking the Historical Jesus, Volume II: Mentor, Message, and Miracles · John P. Meier (1994)A detailed critical study by a Catholic scholar.
- Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts · Craig S. Keener (2011)
- An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding · David Hume (1748)Contains the classic sceptical essay “Of Miracles”.
Drafted with Opened AI and awaiting review by Opened’s apologetics advisors. Labels show the kind of support each point has: Scripture is what the Bible says; historical evidence and philosophical arguments can be checked by anyone; “Christians differ” marks questions on which faithful Christians disagree.
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