I often wonder why the gospels say Jesus performed the miracles he did. Why on earth did he decide to walk on water. It seems to be such a strange thing to do. Is it really just that he had literally missed the boat? I am not any sort of biblical scholar, I have used AI both in research and to summarise. I have done this to try and improve my own knowledge. I am always interested to hear comments, but do try and say something relevant and interesting.
If you remember the miracle follows the feeding of the five thousand. Jesus sends the disciples ahead to the boat to cross the Sea of Galilee while he goes up a mountain alone to pray. A strong headwind arises and the disciples are struggling against the waves when they see Jesus approaching them walking on the water.
I always imagined this scene:
The disciples are in the boat and not making any headway…
Peter (to Andrew). Ask Jesus to change the wind direction will you. We’re getting blown backwards. (Aside - no point in having a miracle worker on board if you don’t make use of him) Andrew. He’s up your end of the boat Peter. No, he’s down your end of the boat. Andrew. No he’s up your end if the boat. Peter. Oh no! We’ve left him behind. John. Who’s that figure with long blonde hair, a beard and dressed in a white robe walking… Peter. On the lake! Andrew. By the lake! Peter. On the lake! Andrew. By the lake! John. He’s on the stepping stones you idiots. Peter. I’ll nip out and meet him then… SPLASH!
The story appears in Mark, Matthew and John, but is one of the missing bits in Luke. At first the disciples are terrified, thinking he is a ghost. He identifies himself. “It is I, do not be afraid” and he calms the storm. In Matthew’s account, Peter asks to come to him on the water, briefly walks, then sinks when he becomes afraid of the wind. Jesus catches him and rebukes his “little faith.” They enter the boat, the wind ceases, and the boat immediately reaches shore. The disciples respond with awe or worship, recognizing Jesus as the Son of God.
The setting is the Sea of Galilee which is a freshwater lake apparently prone to sudden violent storms. Jesus has been preaching in Capernaum and nearby areas.
The story appears to originate in early Christian tradition. It is presented as a historical event in the life of Jesus, occurring after the feeding miracle and before key turning points such as Peter’s confession. According to AI Scholarly views on its precise origin and historicity vary:
• Traditional and many Christian interpreters treat it as a genuine miracle demonstrating Jesus’ divine power. • Some modern scholars note possible influences from Old Testament manifestations of God and sea-rescue motifs, or see it as a post-Easter narrative shaped by resurrection appearance traditions (e.g., similarities in setting, timing, initial fear of a “ghost,” and dialogue). • Parallel motifs exist elsewhere: Old Testament language of god treading or walking on the sea (Job 9:8; Psalm 77:19–20; Habakkuk 3:15; Isaiah 43:16); Greco-Roman myths of deities or heroes (Poseidon, Orion) riding, running, or flying over water (though precise “walking” parallels are debated and often not exact); and Indian Buddhist or earlier traditions of magical water-crossing or levitation. These are generally regarded as analogous rather than direct sources; the Gospel accounts are distinctly shaped by Jewish scriptural imagery of divine mastery over chaos.
No contemporary non-Christian sources confirm the event, which is typical for most Gospel miracle stories. Archaeological work around Capernaum has uncovered first-century harbor remains consistent with the setting, but of course I don’t think that committed Christians even believe this actually happened. The miracle is, like all the miracles in the Gospels, symbolic carrying layered theological meaning within Christian interpretation:
• Divine identity and power over chaos: In ancient Near Eastern and biblical symbolism, the sea often represents chaos, danger, death, or the Gentile nations—forces beyond human control. Walking on it (or stilling the storm) portrays Jesus exercising the prerogatives of God, who alone “treads upon the waves of the sea” (Job 9:8) and leads his people through the waters (Exodus Red Sea crossing; Isaiah’s new-exodus imagery). Jesus’ “I am” self-identification and the disciples’ confession reinforce this. • Faith amid storms: The disciples’ struggle and fear, Peter’s brief success then failure when he takes his eyes off Jesus, and Jesus’ rescue illustrate the necessity of trusting faith. Fear and faith are presented as incompatible; the “storms of life” are under Jesus’ control, and he comes to his followers in extremity. • New Exodus and Old Testament references: Mark’s detail that Jesus “meant to pass by” evokes Old Testament references (God “passing by” Moses or Elijah). The episode portrays Jesus as the divine agent of a new Exodus, leading and protecting his people through the waters toward safety. • Ecclesiological and relational notes: The boat is sometimes read as a symbol of the Church navigating the world’s storms; the focus is often less on the peril itself than on Jesus’ relationship with and instruction of the disciples.
In short, the account functions both as a demonstration of Jesus’ unique authority over creation and as a teaching narrative about faith, divine presence in crisis, and recognition of Jesus’ identity. Its core significance in Christian tradition remains the revelation of Jesus as the one who masters the chaotic forces that threaten human life.
So does the story reflect some sort of real event in the life of Jesus, perhaps a storm that the disciples weathered crossing the Sea of Galilee that got expanded into a miraculous event, or was it completely invented for some theological purpose? Perhaps the anonymous author of Mark didn’t mean that Jesus literally walked on the water. Mark 6:48–49 reads (in the standard critical text):
ἔρχεται πρὸς αὐτοὺς περιπατῶν ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης (“he comes toward them walking upon/on the sea”).
The key construction is the present participle περιπατῶν (“walking”) used with the preposition ἐπὶ with the genitive τῆς θαλάσσης (“of the sea/lake”). Ἐπὶ + genitive has a range of spatial senses that can include “on,” “upon,” “on the surface of,” or (in some contexts) “by/at/near.” Lexicons (e.g., BDAG) explicitly list “on the surface of” for this very passage. Rationalist proposals that Mark meant that Jesus was merely walking by the sea and the disciples misperceived him in the dark and storm have been generally rejected by virtually all serious commentators as special pleading that ignores both grammar and story logic
• The boat is explicitly “in the middle of the sea” (ἐν μέσῳ τῆς θαλάσσης, 6:47) after hours of hard rowing against a contrary wind. • Jesus “comes to them” (ἔρχεται πρὸς αὐτούς). • The disciples see him, are terrified, and take him for a φάντασμα (ghost/apparition) - a reaction that makes sense only if the figure is doing something unnatural on the water, not strolling along the beach in the pre-dawn light. • He then climbs into the boat with them and the wind ceases.
A large number of critical scholars (including many mainline Protestant and Catholic historical-critical researchers) regard the story as primarily or entirely a post-Easter christological confession cast in narrative form. John P. Meier (in A Marginal Jew) is representative: he concludes it is “most likely from start to finish a creation of the early church, a christological confession in narrative form,” shaped by Old Testament theophany motifs (God walking on the sea, “passing by”), the “I am” self-revelation, and experiences of the risen Christ. The Jesus Seminar and many others similarly doubt historicity. Some see it as a displaced resurrection appearance narrative. Some propose a historical kernel that was later interpreted miraculously. Jesus walking on the shore in mist or darkness and being misperceived; or an altered-state-of-consciousness vision experienced by exhausted disciples. Others accept that something extraordinary happened but focus on the story’s theological function rather than insisting on a modern scientific reconstruction. However we see it now, contemporary readers would have understood it as a literally true event that simultaneously carried deep symbolic and theological significance. In the cultural and religious world of the first century:
• Miracle stories were widely accepted as reports of real divine action, not as pure allegory or fiction. Both Jewish and Greco-Roman audiences expected gods, divine men, or prophets to exercise power over nature. • The Gospel writers present the episode as something the disciples saw and reacted to with terror and later confession; they give concrete details of time, place, distance, and reaction. There is no textual signal that the surface-walking is merely metaphorical. • At the same time, the story is saturated with Old Testament allusions (God treading the sea, theophany “passing by,” new-Exodus themes). First-century readers steeped in Scripture would have immediately recognized the claim that Jesus was acting with the power and identity of Israel’s God. The literal event and the theological claim were inseparable.
In short, early Christian audiences did not face a modern either/or of “literal history or symbol.” They heard a report of a real miracle that revealed who Jesus was. Modern scholarly disagreement arises largely from post-Enlightenment questions about the supernatural and from the tools of historical criticism—questions that first-century hearers did not ask in the same way.
“...no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavors to establish.” ― David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding/An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals
What skeptics say is that if a miracle is defined as some kind of violation, suspension, overriding or punctuation of natural law, then miracles cannot be historical. Of all of the legitimate sciences, history is the weakest. History, at best, produces only an approximation of truth. In order for history to have any strength at all, it must adhere to a very strict assumption: that natural law is regular over time.
Without the assumption of natural regularity, no history can be done. There would be no criteria for discarding fantastic stories. Everything that has ever been recorded would have to be taken as literal truth.
Therefore, if a miracle did happen, it would pull the rug out from history. The very basis of the historical method would have to be discarded. You can have miracles, or you can have history, but you can’t have both.
However, if a miracle is defined as a “highly unlikely” or “wonderful” event, then it is fair game for history, but with an important caveat: outrageous claims require outrageous proof. (This does not mean we need a miracle to prove a miracle. It means we need more proof for an outrageous claim than we do for a more credible claim.)
A skeptic who does allow for the remote possibility of accurate miracle reporting in the Gospels nevertheless must relegate it to a very low probability.
Since the New Testament contains numerous stories of events that are either outrageous (such as the resurrection of thousands of dead bodies on Good Friday) or impossible, the story must be considered more mythical than historical.
Source: "Godless; How an Evangelical Preacher Became One of America's Leading Atheists" by Dan Barker
@BlueSkyKing A very well reasoned argument. But it does omit one thing.
In history, the fact that so many people's have believed in the Bible means the book has influenced societal values and laws. The Bible and its offshoots have been successfully used as tools to persuade people to go to war, endure inquisitions, commit pogroms and racist genocides on vast scales, and who has (or had) the God given right to rule. We have so much documentary and physical proof of these events that we'd be idiots to deny them.
Trying to do a methodological sound historical research of the Bible and New Testament is another matter. The first is that most of the Bible was an oral traditon long before writing was invented. The emergence of a one-god faith coincides over the centuries when heiroglyphs and cuneiform were developing and had not yet developed beyond records of crops and stores, stories of gods, trees of royal families, and diplomatic or war correspondence. Chronological records of events were scant and biased by the egos of the kings who commissioned them. It was proto history, not yet a methodological displine requiring proof.
By the time of Jesus, the Romans certainly had begun to record what we now call history, but despite their census, allegedly on the night of Jesus's birth, the Catholic Church acknowledges that no one has ever found a record of Jesus's birth or his parentage. Either the records were lost, or never included all citizens. A former Catholic mank told me that all novices are taught this, that the Church has no proof that Jesus existed. It acknowledges that the New Testament is not proof. Its current stance is that faith is the only thing that matters.
It's not often I come across research and discussion of a topic at this level of depth except in university circles.
Apart from some of the same points being rephrased in different places, it's well-written and I find it interesting.
Did you remove the references for lay readers on Sim Worlds?
I wonder what sparked your interest. Are you at uni? Are you an atheist struggling to understand contemporary faith? Or a believer struggling to make sense of the way the Bible slides between fact and fiction, and what that might mean means for faith?
I was raised atheist so, for me, the Bible sits on the same shelf with Egyptian, Norse, Greek, Persian, Harrapan, Chinese, African, Australian Aboriginal, Inuit, Mayan, Incan and every other form of myth.
I think Jung and Joseph Cambell come closest to understanding them. But because myth concerns psycho-social archetypes, it is only ever symbolic, often ambiguous. It depicts wanderlust, hero-worship, needs for violence, adventure and war, bravado, wars over male and female rivalry, dominance and desire for power, love, lust, delusion, enchantment, deceit and revenge. But it doesn't explain them. Insteadm it blames God or the specific gods, goddesses or spirits. Myths could be described as ways of shifting blame and avoiding responsibility for bad behaviours. Believing in myth is like remaining stuck in childhood believing in The Tooth Fairy and that babies pop out of Mummy's navel.
Myth can't explain anythng in a definite and reliable way.
@hartfire In all my posts on the gospels I am interested in looking back at what I was taught in religious education lessons at school - this is what Jesus did and his miracles proved he was the son of god. When I look back from the mature age I have now reached it has become clear that much of the gospels were never meant to be taken literally and that the miracles have a symbolic meaning. I am no bible scholar and all the research is done using AI. I was of course brought up in a traditional C of E environment but although I’m pretty convinced the Jesus character in the gospels is based on a real character and the Mark author roughly sketched out his life I think the theology of the divinity of Christ and the Holy Trinity are inventions of the early church. If there is a god Indo hope he’s not that one in the Old Testament.
As for miracles it all depends on if one believes in God or believes in the possibility that a God exists.. If one believes in God then all the miracles in the Bible are acceptable because God can make them happen.. But if one does not believe that a God exists then even the most basic miracles are an impossibility..
Oh and sorry JoeXP i did not read your entire post.. Way too long for me..
