4. It is evident that in all this the problem of miracles is not solved, nor even correctly stated. Both rabbinical literature and the Bible abound with miracles about certain holy places and holy persons, which they never venture to doubt. But the rabbis were not miracle-workers like the Essenes and their Christian successors.(478) On the contrary, they sought to repress the popular credulity and hunger for the miraculous, saying: “The present generation is not worthy to have miracles performed for them, like the former ones;”(479) or “The providing of each living soul with its daily food, or the recovery of men from a severe disease is as great a miracle as any of those told in Scripture;”(480) or again, “Of how small account is a person for whom the cosmic order must be disturbed!”(481) Thus when the wise men of Rome asked the Jewish sages: “If your God is omnipotent, as you claim, why does He not banish from the world the idols, which are so loathsome to Him?” they replied: “Do you really desire God to destroy the sun, moon, and stars, because fools worship them? The world continues its regular course, and idolaters will not go unpunished.”(482) 5. In Judaism neither Biblical nor rabbinical miracles are to be accepted as proof of a doctrinal or practical teaching.(483) The Deuteronomic law expressly states that false prophets can perform miracles by which they mislead the multitude.(484) We can therefore ascribe no intrinsic religious importance to miracles. The fact is that miracles occur only among people who are ignorant of natural law and thus predisposed to accept marvels. They are the products of human imagination and credulity. They have only a subjective, not an objective value. They are psychological, not physical facts. The attitude of Maimonides and Albo toward Biblical miracles is especially significant. The former declares in his great Code:(485) “Israel’s belief in Moses and his law did not rest on miracles, for miracles rather create doubt in the mind of the believer. Faith must rest on its intrinsic truth, and this can never be subverted by miracles, which may be of a deceitful nature.” Albo devotes a lengthy chapter to developing this idea still further, undoubtedly referring to the Church; he speaks of miracles wrought by both Biblical and Talmudic heroes, such as Onias the rain-maker, Nicodemus ben Gorion, Hanina ben Dosa, and Phinehas ben Jair, the popular saints.(486) In modern times Mendelssohn, when challenged by the Lutheran pastor Lavater either to accept the Christian faith or refute it, attacked especially the basic Christian faith in miracles. He stated boldly that “miracles prove nothing, since every religion bases its claims on them and consequently the truth of one would disprove the convincing proof of the other.”(487)