Signs & Miracles · Saying This Well
"Show me a miracle now"
Handle with care. Do not claim personal miracles, dreams or healings as evidence, and do not offer to pray for a sign to convince them.
In short
- 1.The Quraysh demanded springs, gardens, a house of gold, a ladder to heaven (Q 17:90-93).
- 2.The reply given is: glory be to my Lord, am I anything but a human messenger?
- 3.Q 29:50-51 says the signs are with God, and then asks: is it not enough for them that We sent down to you the Book, recited to them?
- 4.So the honest answer to 'show me a miracle now' is: I can't, and neither could he on demand. What is still here is the book.
The claim being examined
People asked the Prophet for miracles on demand too. The Qur'an's answer is worth knowing, because it is not the answer most people expect.
The Islamic position
The Qur'an says signs are with God, that earlier nations rejected them anyway, and it points to the book itself as the sign that remains.
Analysis
Q 17:90-93 records the Meccan demands for miracles and the response. Q 29:50-51 relocates the argument to the Qur'an itself as an enduring sign, and Q 6:109-111 states that even a requested sign would not produce belief in those determined to reject. The classical commentators note that the miracles of earlier prophets were witnessed by their generation alone, whereas the Qur'an is presented as an accessible standing claim. This is the argumentative basis for not attempting to perform or promise miracles in dawah.
From the Qur'an
أَوَلَمْ يَكْفِهِمْ أَنَّا أَنزَلْنَا عَلَيْكَ الْكِتَابَ يُتْلَىٰ عَلَيْهِمْ
Is it not enough for them that We sent down to you the Book which is recited to them?
قُلْ سُبْحَانَ رَبِّي هَلْ كُنتُ إِلَّا بَشَرًا رَّسُولًا
Say: glory be to my Lord, am I anything but a human messenger?
Sources
Al-Tabari, Jami' al-Bayan · Ibn Kathir, Tafsir al-Qur'an al-'Azim · Q 17:90-93; Q 29:50-51; Q 6:109-111
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