Miracles are an act by God or an agent of God, doing something that would normally be impossible. A miracle can be an act that affects one person or changes the whole world.
The Abrahamic religions have different ideas about miracles. These ideas have also changed over time.
Jewish scriptures mention many events that are wondrous or unexpected. For example, in the Hebrew Bible, Moses parts the Red Sea so the Israelites could escape Egypt, as shown in this illustration from the 12th century CE. However, Judaism includes many different opinions and understandings of miracles.
In the Christian Gospels, Jesus is described as performing miracles. For instance, Jesus raises a man named Lazarus from the dead. Miracles still play an important role in the lives of some Christians today.
In the Qur’an, Muhammad performs the miracle of splitting the Moon into two halves. In Islam, miracles are often taken as signs to prove the truthfulness of prophets. They can also be signs of Allah‘s omnipotence.
Understanding how religious people see miracles helps us understand how they see God, nature, and the world and the relations between them.
Text adapted from Simple English Wikipedia, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 4.0.
Hortus Deliciarum by Herrad of Landsberg, Public Domain
