If these suggested solutions seem improbable, let me once more remind you that you have to choose between them and greater improbabilities. Either the miraculous narrative must be historically true; or it must have been deliberately fabricated; or it must have sprung into existence without intention to deceive. As to the improbability of the first of these solutions, I say nothing, because you have rejected it. Certainly it would be difficult for a painter to depict in detail the processes necessitated by this miracle without producing a grotesque impression: but on this point I am silent, as it is beside my purpose. It remains therefore for you to decide whether the theory of deliberate falsehood, or of the unconscious accretions of tradition and misunderstanding of metaphor, supplies the least improbable explanation. For my part, having regard to the character of Christ’s disciples, the abundant evidence that they misunderstood the teaching of their Master, and the frequent instances of miraculous narrative arising from misunderstanding in other cases, I have no hesitation in saying that, in this case also, the hypothesis of deceit is far more improbable than that of misunderstanding.
I had not intended to touch on any other miracle; but one more can be so briefly discussed that I will not omit it. I dare say you have anticipated (though you have not read _Onesimus_[26]) that I should explain the “walking on the waves” and the “stilling of the sea” as narratives derived from early Christian hymns representing the Son of God as stilling the storms that threaten the bark of the Church. Nevertheless you may not have perceived how easily a historical and authentic tradition of the deeds and words of Christ would lend itself to amplification so as to be elaborated into the full miraculous narrative as we now find it in the Gospels. Well then, open your Greek Testament at St. Mark’s narrative (i. 25-27, or Luke iv. 35, 36) of the exorcism of an unclean spirit. You will there find it stated that Jesus “rebuked an unclean spirit;” and a somewhat rare word is used to express the rebuke, “Be thou _muzzled_ (φιμώθητι).” It is further added that the disciples, in their astonishment, said to one another “What is this? _With authority he commandeth even the unclean spirits and they obey him._” Now you know very well that the same Greek word (πνεῦμα) expresses two totally distinct English words “spirit” and “wind;” but you may not so well know that the same ambiguity is found in Hebrew. Look at Psalm civ. 4 in the Old Version, and you will find “Who maketh his angels (_i.e._ messengers) _spirits_;” but the New Version gives, more correctly, “Who maketh _winds_ his messengers,” or, “Who maketh his angels _winds_.” Now suppose that in some cases where the above tradition was circulated in the Church, either in Greek or Aramaic, the word “unclean” was omitted, as it easily might be for brevity. It would follow that, without the change of a single word, the hearers might interpret the story as follows: “Jesus _rebuked the wind_, saying to it, _Be thou muzzled_. His disciples marvelled, saying, What is this? _With authority he commandeth even the winds_ and they _obey_ him.”