1. Here, however, we are introduced to the question of “special providences,” one of the most perplexing questions in theology or in life. The convergent testimony in favour of the answer to prayer is so impressive that he would be a hardy man who should question it, were it not for the presence of what seems particularly strong negative evidence which, he may plead, abundantly justifies him in adopting an attitude of incredulity. The power of prayer and the reality of the answers that it is supposed to gain are questioned, not because there is so little to be said for, but rather because there is so much to be said against, them. We are familiar with the old story of the cynical visitor to the temple of Neptune, who, when the priest triumphantly exhibited, to the glory of his god, the votive tablets of those who had been saved from a watery grave by him in response to their vow, grimly inquired where were the tablets of those who had made their vow, and yet had been drowned none the less.
2. The argument against “special providences” is felt strongly in our day, for various reasons. It is expressed forcibly by Dr. Warschauer: While the scientific temper of the present day could not fail to affect our thoughts concerning prayer in some directions, the same has surely to be said about the ethical temper of the age, as shown in our enlarged conceptions of God. To put it bluntly, much of the language about what used to be called “special providences” has become unreal and ceased to be edifying for us. On this whole subject some words of Principal Adeney’s can hardly be bettered:—
“Under the old theory God had His favourites, who were saved by their hairbreadth escapes in accidents that were fatal to persons who were not the objects of ‘special providences’; this was supposed to account for the fact that one man in particular found that somebody else had taken the last berth in the ship he had meant to sail by, and so escaped the fate of the crew and passengers when it went down with all on board—no ‘special providence’ saving them. It looks like a reflection of the pagan mythological tales about heroes rescued by the timely interference of gods and goddesses in battles where thousands of common mortals perish unheeded. It is the aristocratic idea of privilege carried up to religion. The newer view is more democratic, and it seems to agree better with our Lord’s assurance that not a sparrow falls to the ground without our Father’s notice, that the very hairs of our heads are all numbered.”
All this has its direct bearing upon the subject of prayer. We may still be occasionally regaled with stories of one solitary sailor being saved—Providence looking after him in response to his mother’s petitions—while every other soul on board was drowned; but these narratives, once irresistible in the impression they created, are today received with somewhat mixed feelings. The view of God’s character which they inculcate is apt to strike us as unsatisfactory; that He should avert a great and presumedly unmerited physical calamity from one individual simply and solely because He has been asked to do so by some other individual, while allowing the same calamity to overtake numerous others no more deserving of affliction, does not fit in with our conception of Him. We are slowly learning to substitute for the notion of any kind of preferential treatment at the hand of God a belief in the unchanging goodness of His decrees, in the wisdom of His counsel, and in the reality of His abiding and enfolding love; by Providence we mean something that is neither local nor personal, nor particular, but universal—the Providence of unchanging law, that living and loving will which “knoweth altogether”. [Note: J. Warsehauer, Problems of Immanence, 199.]
The most familiar, perhaps, of all cases of answers to prayer involving such special providences is that of George Muller. Prof. William James quotes Muller’s experience as related in his autobiography, and then subjects it to the following criticism: “George Muller’s is a case extreme in every respect, and in no respect more so than in the extraordinary narrowness of the man’s intellectual horizon. His God was, as he often said, his business partner. He seems to have been for Muller little more than a sort of supernatural clergyman interested in the congregation of tradesmen and others in Bristol who were his saints, and in the orphanages and other enterprises, but unpossessed of any of those vaster and wider and more ideal attributes with which the human imagination elsewhere has invested him. Muller, in short, was absolutely unphilosophical. His intensely private and practical conception of his relations with the Deity continued the traditions of the most primitive human thought. When we compare a mind like his with such a mind as, for example, Emerson’s or Phillips Brooks’s, we see the range which the religious consciousness covers.” [Note: W. James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, 470.]
In one of his letters the Quaker poet Whittier says: “I have been in the habit of reading a paper published by Dr. Cullis, of Boston. But I don’t place much credit in the answers to prayer there stated. He gets his contributions just as many other institutions do. Here is a man who has $100 to give to benevolence, and he gives it, giving the Doctor $25, the missionary society $25, etc. Dr. Cullis publishes that his came in answer to prayer. So does the other just as much. [Note: S. T. Pickard, Life and Letters of J. G. Whittier, 2: 632.]
The entire question of miracle is involved with that of the special providences which are supposed, in some theories of religion, sometimes to confound the enemies, and always to protect the darlings of God: and in the minds of amiable persons, the natural and very justifiable sense of their own importance to the well-being of the world may often encourage the pleasant supposition that the Deity, however improvident for others, will be provident for them. I recollect a paper on this subject by Dr. Guthrie, published not long ago in some religious periodical, in which the writer mentioned, as a strikingly Providential circumstance, the catching of his foot on a ledge of rock which averted what might otherwise have been a fatal fall. Under the sense of the loss to the cause of religion and the society of Edinburgh, which might have been the consequence of the accident, it is natural that Dr. Guthrie should refer to it with strongly excited devotional feelings: yet, perhaps, with better reason, a junior member of the Alpine Club, less secure of the value of his life, would have been likely on the same occasion rather to be provoked by his own awkwardness, than impressed by the providential structure of the rock. At the root of every error on these subjects we may trace either an imperfect conception of the universality of Deity, or an exaggerated sense of individual importance: and yet it is no less certain that every train of thought likely to lead us in a right direction must be founded on the acknowledgment that the personality of a Deity who has commanded the doing of. Justice and the showing of Mercy can be no otherwise manifested than in the signal support of causes which are just, and favour of persons who are kind. The beautiful tradition of the deaths of Cleobis and Bito, indeed, expresses the sense proper to the wisest men, that we are unable either to discern or decide for ourselves in what the favour of God consists: but the promises of the Christian religion imply that its true disciples will be enabled to ask with prudence what is to be infallibly granted. [Note: Ruskin, On the Old Road (Works, 34: 119).]
3. It must be frankly conceded that, with our present very limited knowledge, we are not in a position to give an adequate or a wholly satisfactory answer to this argument. All that we can hope to do is to prove that the argument does not really carry as much weight as at first it seems to do. We may show that in a very large number of cases the phenomena simply could not be otherwise than they are; that in a vast majority of such cases the explanation is plain and obvious, and that, while in some cases we may have to wait for an explanation till all the mysteries are cleared up, we may find in other cases sufficient light to suggest inferences of an explanatory character, where direct knowledge and information fail us. Alleged answers to prayer should in any case be carefully scrutinized before being allowed, and carefully interpreted when allowed. There is in popular thought considerable ignorance on this point, which often leads to religious scandal. There is in religious experience so much of what from the popular standpoint must be viewed as unanswered prayer, and that on the part of the best and holiest, that we cannot be too careful in our interpretation. It is well known what crude and irreverent interpretations of God’s providential government are often given by the ignorant and unspiritually-minded; and the same thing occurs in the matter of prayer. Some coincidence that fits into the person’s desire is fastened upon as an answer to prayer, and not infrequently spiritual pride and Pharisaism result.
It has sometimes seemed to me that God does not intend the faith in prayer to rest upon an induction of instances. The answers, however explicit, are not of the kind to bear down an aggressive criticism. Your Christian lives a life which is an unbroken chain of prayers offered and prayers answered; from his inward view the demonstration is overwhelming. But do you ask for the evidences, and do you propose to begin to pray if the facts are convincing, and to refuse the practice if they are not? Then you may find the evidences evanescent as an evening cloud, and the facts all susceptible of a simple rationalistic explanation. “Prayer,” says an old Jewish mystic, “is the moment when heaven and earth kiss each other.” It is futile as well as indelicate to disturb that rapturous meeting; and nothing can be brought away from such an intrusion, nothing of any value except the resolve to make trial for oneself of the “mystic sweet communion”.
I confess, therefore, that I read examples of answers to prayer without any great interest, and refer to those I have experienced myself with the utmost diffidence. Nay, I say frankly beforehand, “If you are concerned to disprove my statement, and to show that what I take for the hand of God is merely the cold operation of natural law, I shall only smile. My own conviction will be unchanged. I do not make that great distinction between the hand of God and natural law, and I have no wish to induce you to pray by an accumulation of facts—to commend to you the mighty secret by showing that it would be profitable to you, a kind of Aladdin’s lamp for fulfilling wayward desires.” Natural law, the hand of God! Yes! I unquestionably admit that the answers to prayer come generally along lines which we recognize as natural law, and would perhaps always be found along those lines if our knowledge of natural law were complete. Prayer is to me the quick and instant recognition that all law is God’s will, and all nature is in God’s hand, and that all our welfare lies in linking ourselves with His will and placing ourselves in His hand through all the operations of the world and life and time. [Note: R. F. Horton.]
