"Miracles do not, in fact, break the laws of nature"

C. S. Lewis’s statement challenges the common perception that miracles are violations of natural law. Many people suppose that if a miracle occurs, it must be an event in direct conflict with established scientific principles. Lewis, however, argues for a more nuanced understanding. He suggests that true miracles are not disruptions or contradictions of nature’s order, but rather extraordinary events that work within, or alongside, the existing laws.

If the laws of nature are consistent patterns by which the universe ordinarily operates, miracles can be seen as rare interventions or additions, not abolishments, within that framework. For instance, if someone were to turn water into wine, every process involved, dissolution, fermentation, creation of chemical bonds, still conforms to chemistry and physics. What is miraculous is not the contradiction of chemistry, but the timing, manner, or orchestration of those natural processes, perhaps initiated by an external agent or purpose beyond ordinary human ability.

Lewis’s perspective encourages seeing miracles as acts that have complete internal coherence once initiated, even if their initiation is inexplicable by natural causes alone. The laws of nature remain intact; they simply do not account for every starting point. Imagine a chess game: the rules govern how pieces move, but the rules do not dictate the moves themselves. Should a grandmaster make a surprising play, it wouldn’t break the rules, but it would transcend routine expectation. Miracles, in this framework, are surprising moves within the universal game.

Moreover, Lewis challenges materialistic assumptions about causality. He prompts us to consider whether natural law is an exhaustive descriptor of all reality or simply of regular processes. By distinguishing between the existence of laws and the causes that start sequences within that law, Lewis allows for the possibility that what we call miracles may be purposeful acts, signs pointing beyond the physical world, without rendering the natural world incoherent or lawless.