![Preternatural tumours](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f2/Preternatural_tumours.jpg)
The preternatural (or praeternatural) is that which appears outside or beside (Latin: ''
præter'') the
natural
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are p ...
. It is "suspended between the mundane and the miraculous".
In
theology
Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...
, the term is often used to distinguish marvels or deceptive trickery, often attributed to
witchcraft
Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have us ...
or
demon
A demon is a malevolent supernatural entity. Historically, belief in demons, or stories about demons, occurs in religion, occultism, literature, fiction, mythology, and folklore; as well as in media such as comics, video games, movies, ani ...
s, from purely
divine power
Omnipotence is the quality of having unlimited power. Monotheistic religions generally attribute omnipotence only to the deity of their faith. In the monotheistic religious philosophy of Abrahamic religions, omnipotence is often listed as one of ...
of genuinely
supernatural
Supernatural refers to phenomena or entities that are beyond the laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin (above, beyond, or outside of) + (nature) Though the corollary term "nature", has had multiple meanings si ...
origin that
transcends the
laws of nature. Preternatural is also used to describe gifts such as
immortality
Immortality is the concept of eternal life. Some modern species may possess biological immortality.
Some scientists, futurists, and philosophers have theorized about the immortality of the human body, with some suggesting that human immorta ...
, possessed by
Adam and Eve
Adam and Eve, according to the creation myth of the Abrahamic religions, were the first man and woman. They are central to the belief that humanity is in essence a single family, with everyone descended from a single pair of original ancestors. ...
before the
fall of man
The fall of man, the fall of Adam, or simply the Fall, is a term used in Christianity to describe the transition of the first man and woman from a state of innocent obedience to God in Christianity, God to a state of guilty disobedience.
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* ...
into
original sin
Original sin is the Christian doctrine that holds that humans, through the fact of birth, inherit a tainted nature in need of regeneration and a proclivity to sinful conduct. The biblical basis for the belief is generally found in Genesis 3 (t ...
, and the
power of flight that
angels
In various theistic religious traditions an angel is a supernatural spiritual being who serves God.
Abrahamic religions often depict angels as benevolent celestial intermediaries between God (or Heaven) and humanity. Other roles include ...
are thought to have. In the
early modern period, the term was used by scientists to refer to abnormalities and strange phenomena of various kinds that seemed to depart from the norms of nature.
Theology
Medieval theologians made a clear distinction between the natural, the preternatural and the supernatural.
Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known wi ...
argued that the supernatural consists in "God’s unmediated actions"; the natural is "what happens always or most of the time"; and the preternatural is "what happens rarely, but nonetheless by the agency of created beings ... Marvels belong, properly speaking, to the realm of the preternatural." Theologians, following Aquinas, argued that only God had the power to disregard the laws of nature that he has created, but that demons could manipulate the laws of nature by a form of trickery, to deceive the unwary into believing they had experienced real miracles. According to historian Lorraine Daston,
By the 16th century, the term "preternatural" was increasingly used to refer to demonic activity comparable to the use of magic by human adepts: The Devil, "being a natural Magician ... may perform many acts in ways above our knowledge, though not transcending our natural power."
According to the philosophy of the time, preternatural phenomena were not contrary to divine law, but used hidden, or
occult
The occult, in the broadest sense, is a category of esoteric supernatural beliefs and practices which generally fall outside the scope of religion and science, encompassing phenomena involving otherworldly agency, such as magic and mysticism a ...
powers that violated the ''normal'' pattern of natural phenomena.
Orestes Brownson, in his nineteenth-century autobiographical novel ''The Spirit-Rapper'', has the Christian apologist Mr. Merton say "Man has a double nature, is composed of body and soul ... A supernatural power assists him to rise; a preternatural power assists him, so to speak, to descend".
Science
With the emergence of early modern science, the concept of the preternatural increasingly came to be used to refer to strange or abnormal phenomena that seemed to violate the normal working of nature, but which were not associated with magic and witchcraft. This was a development of the idea that preternatural phenomena were fake miracles. As Daston puts it, "To simplify the historical sequence somewhat: first, preternatural phenomena were demonized and thereby incidentally naturalized; then the demons were deleted, leaving only the natural causes."
The use of the term was especially common in medicine, for example in John Brown's ''A Compleat Treatise of Preternatural Tumours'' (1678), or
William Smellie's ''A Collection of Preternatural Cases and Observations in Midwifery'' (1754).
In the 19th century the term was appropriated in anthropology to refer to folk beliefs about fairies, trolls and other such creatures which were not thought of as demonic, but which were perceived to affect the natural world in unpredictable ways. According to
Thorstein Veblen
Thorstein Bunde Veblen (July 30, 1857 – August 3, 1929) was a Norwegian-American economist and sociologist who, during his lifetime, emerged as a well-known critic of capitalism.
In his best-known book, ''The Theory of the Leisure Class'' ...
, such preternatural agents were often thought of as forces somewhere between supernatural beings and material processes. "The preternatural agency is not necessarily conceived to be a personal agent in the full sense, but it is an agency which partakes of the attributes of personality to the extent of somewhat arbitrarily influencing the outcome of any enterprise, and especially of any contest."
The linguistic association between individual agents and unexplained or unfortunate circumstances remains. Many people attribute occurrences that are known to be material processes, such as "gremlins in the engine", a "ghost in the machine", or
attributing motives to objects: "the clouds are threatening". The anthropomorphism in our daily life is a combination of the above cultural stems, as well as the manifestation of our pattern-projecting minds.
Scholarship
In 2011, Penn State Press began publishing a learned journal titled ''Preternature: Critical and Historical Studies on the Preternatural''. Edited by Kirsten Uszkalo and Richard Raiswell, the journal is dedicated to publishing articles, reviews and short editions of original texts that deal with conceptions and perceptions of the preternatural in any culture and in any historical period. The journal covers "magics, witchcraft, spiritualism, occultism, prophecy, monstrophy, demonology, and folklore."
See also
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Paranormal
Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Nota ...
*
Supernatural
Supernatural refers to phenomena or entities that are beyond the laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin (above, beyond, or outside of) + (nature) Though the corollary term "nature", has had multiple meanings si ...
References
External links
{{Wiktionary, preternatural
"What is the difference between natural, preternatural and supernatural?"''Possession and Exorcism'', J.A. Fortea
Christian theology
Epistemology of science
Folklore
Nature