The idea of a miracle is the most important, and sometimes even the main component of religious cultures: “faith” and “miracle” in many cases are closely connected, and even identical. Unusual, amazing events leave an indelible imprint on the emotions and consciousness of the people involved and can be the basis for emerging beliefs. Belief in miracles, as well as miracles as the faith basis, is found in almost all the peoples of the world, although they are differently recognized, described and explained. What is a miracle, what is its mechanism, and how should it be treated?

The article focuses on legends about miracles in Judaism. Particular attention is paid to miracles in the context of the early Biblical period of the prophets and modern Hasidism; similarities in motives and plots are found between the narratives of different times. The authors analyze in detail two 20^th-century plots about miracles related to Chaim Zanvl Abramovich, known as the Ribnitzer Rebbe (1902–1995). The miracles that are told about him have many parallels with the legends about miracles performed by the founder of the Hasidic movement, Israel Baal Shem Tov (BeShT), who lived in the middle of the 18^th century. The article reveals a connection between the Biblical and Hasidic miracle stories not only at the level of how the miracle is functioning in Jewish culture in general.

This is an anthropological study of the concepts of miracles and the miraculous, and the practices that have developed around them, in two regions of Italy – Sicily and Sardinia. The article is written primarily on ethnographic material collected by the author in 2017–2020, as well as on published descriptions of the individual and collective knowledge of “experiencing a miracle”. The article analyzes the “disposition” of the inhabitants of the regions under study to the occurrence of a miracle, the range of manifestations and “range” of miracles, harbingers of the phenomenon of a miracle, the polymorphism wonders, their symbolism and functionality, the place and role of Christian part of the miracle, the psycho-emotional aspect of meeting it, the nature of “miracle”, its source and various other factors.

The paper deals with the evolution of the imagery and perception of the miraculous in the South Asian countries during the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period as they were described by two famed Venetian merchants and travellers in their reports: Niccolo de’ Conti (1439) and Cesare Federici (1587). Those examples can shed some light on how the traditional European view of the “wonders of India” was transformed during the 15^th and the 16^th centuries. Niccolo de’ Conti’s report was recorded by the prominent humanist Poggio Bracciolini. Conti saw the miraculous mainly in the religious practices of the region, he thought the Brahmins were philosophers, astrologers and sorcerers. Conti’s record contains ethnographically correct description of the trance state. Cesare Federici visited South Asia yet at the time of the Portuguese colonial Empire hegemony in the Indian Ocean. He considered various material objects as the curious and remarkable things. In general, the comparison of those two reports leads to the conclusion that the European stereotypes of the “wonders of India” gradually receded from the South Asian imagery in Europe.

The paper deals with the concept of miracle in the language and culture of the Jaisalmer district (Rajasthan, India). It is argued that a special understanding of miracle in that region is directly related to perceptions of the vernacular Hinduism prevalent in Rajasthan, which is based on mediumism. The concept of miracle, parco in Marwari (from the Old Indo-Aryan paricaya ‘acquaintance’), is a special cultural phenomenon that characterizes cases of unexpected manifestation of a deity or divine power outside the mediumship related rituals aimed at invoking the deity, and mostly not through a medium. The difference between parco in Marwari and camatkār in Standard Hindi is analyzed. Narratives on cases of parco related to the region under study are given as illustrative material.

The sphere of the unknown, supernatural and miraculous is one of the most popular subjects for everyday discussions in Ayodhya – the last of the provinces of the Mughal Empire, which entered the British Raj in 1859, and in the distant past – the space of many legendary and mythological events. Mostly they concern encounters with inhabitants of the “other world” – spirits, ghosts, jinns as well as miraculous healings following magic rituals or meetings with the so-called saints of different religions (Hindu sadhus, Sufi dervishes),with incomprehensible and frightening natural phenomena. According to the author’s observations ideas of the unknown in Avadh are codified and structured in Avadh better than in other parts of India. Local people can clearly define if they witness a bhut or a jinn and whether the disease is caused by some witchcraft or other reasons. Perhaps that is due to the presence in the holy town of a persistent tradition of katha, the public presentation of plots from the Ramayana epic in both the narrative and poetic as well as performative forms. But are the events and phenomena in question a miracle for the Avadhvasis, residents of Ayodhya and its environs, or are they so commonplace that they do not surprise or fascinate? That exactly is the subject of the essay, written on the basis of materials collected by the author in Ayodhya during the period of 2010 – 2019. The author would like to express his appreciation to Mr. Alok Sharma (Faizabad) for his advice and cooperation.

Perceptions of a miracle are extremely diverse and, in many ways, culturally determined. The article discusses a local example of a miracle – the ritual of rain management, which is widespread in Indonesia. In the article, the author inquires, where is the boundary between the shaman’s actions perceived by the participants of the rite as a craft or a practical skill, and at what point in that rite the public has the feeling of witnessing a miracle. In addition, the rain shamans who belong to the Sundanese ethnic group are faithful Muslims and convinced that all miracles come from Allah. The power to move or hold the rain is not the ability of the shaman himself.

The article discusses the role of the concept of miracle (karamat) in the worship of two categories of religious authorities of the Nogai steppe: mullahs with genies (jinn) and saints. An analysis of the veneration of mullahs possessing jinn allows us to assert that it was based on their ability to perform miracles. The reputation of a miracle worker accompanied such a mullah throughout his life. However, this miraculous work was not associated with holiness, but, on the contrary, with the frowned upon orthodoxy connection with the jinn spirits. Accordingly, these mullahs could not be worshiped after their death. A completely different example of miracle workers in the Nogai steppe was provided by Muslim saints. They deserved the right to work miracles with their righteous life and religious practices. After the death of the saints (Sheikhs), their graves become an object of pilgrimage for the purpose of miraculous healing. Thus, in the Nogai steppe there were two institutions associated with miracles: mullahs who possessed jinn, and saints. The mullahs lost their ability to work miracles after death, while the saints acquired it with death.