There is a scene from a series called Joan of Arcadia (a truly undervalued series from the early 2000s) where Joan asks teen boy God to show her a miracle, and he points to a tree. She says “that’s just a tree” and he replies “Lets see you make one”
Do you believe in magic?
You are starting to see the beginnings of wisdom.
What is the definition of divine if the entire material universe is divine? And if everything is divine, how is that any sort of evidence or argument for the existence of a god?
Seeing the numinous in the material universe is no reason to jump all the way to deism or pantheism, if you ask me.
Yeah, that was kind of where I was going
Or, to put it another way…
Then why bother to use the emotionally and theologically loaded term “divine?”
I wasn’t the first one to use it.
And, as I said (a few posts up) in a more philosophical than antagonistic discussion (at least I hope it is that) then I am inclined to reply using the terms of those to whom I am replying.
I started off with a post about a tree being a miracle, at least from a certain point of view. I didn’t mention divine until someone else brought it up :)
Ok, then replace “divine” in my last comment with “miracle”. It’s still a theologically and emotionally loaded term
That was kind of my point – people associate “miracle” with good. With an act of God (whoever their God might be) but they don’t see an unexplained act of badness the same way.
That was the debate that started all this :)