Einstein was a deeply religious individual and wrote extensively about
the philosophy of religion. Although he was born a Jew, his family
was not particularly observant, choosing not to follow traditional
dietary laws or attend religious services. They sent Albert to
a Catholic public primary school at age six, though he did receive instruction
in his own religion from a distant relative, as such instruction
was compulsory in the state of Bavaria. When Einstein moved on
to the Luitpold Gymnasium, he received the two hours of religious
instruction per week that the school offered its Jewish pupils.
Einstein studied the Ten Commandments, biblical history, and the
rudiments of Hebrew grammar. Although he went through a strong
religious phase as a child, his acquaintance with Max Talmud, the
poor Jewish medical student who joined the Einstein family for
a weekly meal, soon weakened his regard for traditional religion.
Talmud recommended philosophical and popular scientific books that
led Einstein to doubt the religious precepts he had been taught
in school. Einstein began questioning the veracity of the Bible
and discontinued the preparation for his bar mitzvah. Some biographers
point to this early religious skepticism as the source of Einstein's
freedom of thought and intellectual independence as a scientist;
in any case, it is clear that his defiance of authority was to
remain an important aspect of his thinking and his personality
for the rest of his life.
Einstein remained indifferent to religious conventions
and precepts throughout his adult life. His first wife, Mileva
Maric, was a member of the Greek Orthodox Church, and the marriage
took place without the presence of a rabbi or a priest. Although
the religious difference caused both sets of parents to object
to the marriage, it did not trouble Einstein: he did not want his
children to receive any form of religious instruction and the couple
practiced no formal religion in their home. Additionally, Einstein
asked to be cremated rather than buried in the Jewish tradition.
Thus his disregard for religious rituals lasted his whole life.
Yet in spite of his disdain for religious instruction
in accordance with any particular denominational tradition, Einstein
nonetheless always maintained a pious sentiment of inspired religious
devotion. He identified very closely with the seventeenth-century
Dutch Jewish philosopher Baruch Spinoza, who rejected the traditional
theistic concept of God in favor of an impersonal cosmic order.
Spinoza believed that the universe is governed by a mechanical
and mathematical order such that all events in nature occur according
to immutable laws of cause and effect. He held that God is devoid
of ethical properties and therefore does not reward or punish human behavior.
Einstein, who studied Spinoza's Ethics in Bern
with his friends of the Olympia Academy, was drawn to this philosopher because
they shared a love of solitude and the experience of having rejected
their Jewish religious tradition. Einstein also joined with Spinoza
in denying the existence of a personal God and an unrestricted
determinism. Yet Einstein was not an atheist; indeed, he is often
quoted as having said, "Science without religion is lame, religion
without science is blind." Though he denied any sort of personal
God, he shared Spinoza's faith in a superior intelligence that reveals
itself in the beauty of nature.
Einstein was also a proponent of Schopenhauer's idea of
a "cosmic religious feeling," in which true religiosity is constituted
simply by a sense of wonder and awe for the world. Einstein claimed
that although science and religion as traditionally conceived were
antagonistic, the religiosity of cosmic religious feeling is actually
the strongest motive for scientific research; only those who feel
a rapturous amazement at the harmony of nature can delve into her secrets.
He argued that Kepler and Newton were inspired by a deep belief
in the rationality of the universe and a faith in universal causation.
Einstein thus understood science and religion to function in concert
with one another.
Another aspect of Einstein's religious life was his relationship
to the Jewish people. Although he did not observe Jewish traditions, Einstein
appreciated the love of truth and justice that he saw as constituting
the core of Judaism. He claimed that Jews have been united throughout
the centuries by a reverence for truth, a democratic ideal of social
justice, and a desire for personal independence. In Einstein's
view, the greatest Jews, including Moses, Spinoza, and Marx, were
those who sacrificed themselves for these ideals. Above all, Einstein
believed that Judaism involves a strong sense of the sanctity of
life and a rejection of all superstition. He contended that the
creation of a Jewish state would preserve these values for the world.
Einstein thus had a cultural and intellectual vision for Israel, rather
than a political one. The greatest danger posed by anti-Semitism,
he believed, was the threat it posed to the survival of Jewish
ideals; thus Israel must serve as a region sheltered from Europe's deep-seated
anti-Semitism, must constitute a seat of modern intellectual life
and a spiritual center for the Jews.
