When a person of great intelligence achieves notoriety in their field and popularity in the broader culture, their words often carry a certain level of authority. When a successful scientist offers a thought or opinion on philosophy or religion the culture listens. With atheism predominating the scientific landscape today, Christians are particularly interested when a scientist says something positive about the existence of God. Having grown up in the church, I can recall countless sermons by pastors, and postings by Christians on social media where one scientist in particular has been quoted. The scientist I’m referring to is Albert Einstein. In one such quote, while speaking with a student, Einstein said, “I want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know his thoughts. The rest are details.” A statement like this can excite a believer and provide them with a certain amount of affirmation for their belief in God. But what does Einstein mean by his statement? Does his statement imply a belief in God? How does Einstein define God? By wanting to know God’s thoughts, does Einstein desire a more intimate relationship with God? Without knowing the answers to these questions, one can simply bend his statement to fit a belief system altogether different from Einstein’s. Perhaps when Einstein refers to God he’s referring some other god besides Yahweh. If this is the case, then his quotes regarding God are not particularly helpful for the Christian understanding of the one true God. The purpose of this paper will be to more clearly define Einstein’s beliefs regarding God and demonstrate that Einstein’s “God” is in no way the God of the Bible.
It is significant to briefly mention the religious background and context that sets the stage for Einstein’s later life. Mart́ínez explains that as a child Einstein was educated in a Catholic school and also learned the teachings of Judaism, in spite of his parents being irreligious. He writes that, “He developed deep religious feelings, and he began to observe religious prescriptions in every detail.” Whatever Einstein’s childhood was like, he clearly departed from his childhood religiosity and by age twelve and thought that the stories in the Bible were not possible. The focus of this paper will be primarily on Einstein’s view of God in his adulthood after he had already achieved notoriety for his scientific work.
Einstein was asked about his understanding of God, to which he replied, “My comprehension of God comes from the deeply felt conviction of a superior intelligence that reveals itself in the knowable world.” The statement demonstrates three underlying beliefs held by Einstein. Each one is significant for beginning to understand his worldview. First is that his understanding of God comes from a deeply felt conviction rather than philosophical reasoning, empirical evidence, or even religious experience. Rather, this feeling was generated by simply experiencing the world. Einstein felt a conviction based on his interaction with nature through scientific study. This view of God might best be described as pantheistic, where God is in nature.
The second belief embedded in his quote is that his conviction is specifically in a superior intelligence. This sounds like a general understanding of a God who is perhaps behind the laws nature and creation and whose intellect is greater than ours. This much is consistent with scripture (see Isaiah 55:9) but Einstein differentiates between belief in an anthropomorphic God and his own belief system in another article published in 1934 where he writes about being amazed at the laws of nature. God, according to scripture, is almost always described in an anthropomorphic way. God walks with his people (Genesis 3:8), dwells with them (Exodus 25:8) and speaks with them (Genesis 24:7) in the Old Testament. Critical to the New Testament is the belief that God then took on flesh and became a man (John 1:14).
In the incarnation we find the ultimate anthropomorphic expression of God’s being. About Jesus Einstein wrote, “No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life.” By this statement, it is unclear if Einstein is merely contrasting the personality found in the mythological Jesus verses other mythological characters or if he is saying that the life found in the story points to a factual being. Many of his statements on religion prove to be both vague and open to interpretation. Based on another statement he made elsewhere it appears that Einstein believed in a historical Jesus but that the events of Jesus’ life were poetically embellished. This is consistent with his view that miracles are impossible.
The final part of his statement refers to God as reveling itself in the knowable world. For Einstein, God is knowable through the study of nature. Charles Krauthammer wrote in the Washington Post that, “Einstein saw his entire vocation—understanding the workings of the universe—as an attempt to understand the mind of God.” Clearly he was drawing upon the earlier mentioned quote, but when combined with the statement above, Einstein’s view of God is that God’s thoughts are only knowable through what can be known of nature itself rather than through a personal relationship or the revelation of scripture. This is in contrast to the idea that God reveals his thoughts to us through the work of the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:11-12).
Ronald Numbers notes, “On several occasions [Einstein] identified himself as being a religious person, and he was frequently given to sage- like pronouncements about the actions and intentions of God. But he was also quite clear that he completely rejected [a] kind of personal God.” Clearly, the way in which Einstein is talking about God is less personal and more transcendent. Numbers also writes that, “Einstein rejected a personal God as implausible, primitive, and even dangerous to humanity.” By not believing in a personal God or divine revelation, he could be described as a deist at best, but further examination may show that to be premature assessment. Numbers also adds that, “his notion of religion was founded not on divine revelation or action but on his awe that the world was comprehensible.” For Einstein God is found in the study of the world.
To explore Einstein’s view of God further it is important to pause and examine his view of the supernatural in general. To believe in God is to believe in a being who is beyond our universe and exists outside of time. God’s very existence is miraculous and supernatural in nature. Does Einstein have room in his rational understating of the universe for the supernatural? Stannard writes that, “For [Einstein] the greatest sacrilege was belief in miracles.” If he did not believe in miracles then how could he believe in God? Isn’t God’s existence itself miraculous in nature? Perhaps Einstein’s use of the word God was not a literal reference to an actual being, but rather a borrowed word from religion to give voice to scientific realities on a more cosmic scale. Einstein did in fact consider himself religious, but he stated that, “It was the experience of mystery—even if mixed with fear—that engendered religion.” For Einstein, there was beauty in mystery. Scientific inquiry is the pursuit of knowing the unknown, compelled by the magnificence of the mysterious. In the same statement Einstein explained that this feeling of wonder and the knowledge of something existing, which is impenetrable, constitutes true religion. Religion can only exist then as long as there is something beyond our reach. Einstein’s statement leaves room for God, but only in a distant sense. He goes on to say, “I cannot conceive of a God who rewards and punishes his creatures, or has a will of the kind that we experience in ourselves.” It is clearer here that his conception of God is not only that God does not reveal himself to humans but also that God does not have a will. For Einstein, God is not a rational being or one who reasons.
For Einstein, God does not operate in a way that is similar to humans. It does not appear then that God is a being at all, but rather a force or idea. Jammer writes that if he refers to God as, “the inherent structure of the universe itself, rather than to the source of this structure, then Einstein is a pantheist” as was previously indicated. He addressed this but did not provide any clarity on the issue when he shared, “I am not an atheist. I do not know if I can define myself as a pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds.” Einstein could not himself provide a definition of his belief system, but further analysis can get closer to accurately describing his worldview.
In contrast to pantheism (if in fact Einstein hold to this view) the God of scripture is revealed though nature (Psalm 19:1, Romans 1:20) but is not himself in nature. Rather, God created nature (Hebrews 11:3) and holds it together (Colossians 1:17). It seems reasonable to call Einstein a pantheist because he frequently identified himself with the view of God presented by Baruch Spinoza. Mart́ínez describes Spinoza saying, “[he] was sometimes described as an atheist, and he also became known as a pantheist: one who believes that nature is God.” Spinoza’s theology puts Einsteins statements into a much clearer context. Numbers writes that, “In this kind of monistic theology, there is no separation between God and the world, so expecting the deity to direct miracles or interventions becomes nonsensical. God is nature and its laws, rather than being the creator of them.” So perhaps when Einstein talks of God he is merely speaking of nature in hyperbole. Nature therefore cannot contradict its own laws or intervene in human history in any miraculous sense. For Einstein, God cannot willingly act, speak or make himself known. Jammer does not call Einstein a pantheist or an agnostic, but Mart́ínez notes that Jammer also chooses not to include some statements in which Einstein calls himself an agnostic. On a several occasions Einstein used the term to describe himself stating that there is no need for God to exist in order for moral laws to exist, but he didn’t consider himself an atheist or willing to take up the cause of atheism. He said, “My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid awareness of the foremost importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment.”
If Einstein’s God is merely nature, this raises the question of whether or not Einstein worshiped nature. When asked if he prayed he said no but added, “everyone seriously engaged in science becomes convinced that the laws of nature manifest a spirit which is vastly superior to man, and before which we, with our modest strength, must humbly bow.” By this statement he acknowledges that nature, and the laws that govern it, are superior ad awe-inspiring when compared to the finite nature of humankind. His response as he describes it is to humbly bow. When it comes to worship, G. Campbell Morgan is quoted as having said, “The essential and simple meaning of the word, and therefore the fundamental thought is that of prostration, of bowing down.” While Einstein surely does not mean bowing down literally, there is still a sense in which he ascribed great worth to nature in a way that could be classified as worship in a broad sense of the word. Einstein on the one hand seems to be religiously devoted to science, but at the same time his life seems devoid of any organized religion.
Ten years after Jammer published his book on Einstein a letter was discovered which adds great perspective on his religious views as it relates to the God of scripture and scripture itself. Einstein wrote, “The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honor- able but still primitive legends aplenty. No interpretation, no matter how subtle, can change this (for me).” This statement seems to solidify the fact that Einstein does not use the term God in a way that refers to the God of the Bible. Numbers writes, “Taken in context, [his] comments [about God] were almost certainly metaphorical, as became apparent when Einstein clarified his ideas.” One might think from this statement that Einstein is in fact an atheist, but he is unwilling to claim that. To describe Einstein thus far would be to say that he is a pantheistic agnostic. In other words, God might exist, but if he does, he is simply part of nature and not a personal God. On this Einstein said, “I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me that can be called religious, then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as science can reveal it.” Einstein’s devotion was to the universe itself and he found himself in awe of it. Staune writes that, “his religion was an attitude of cosmic awe and a devout humility before the harmony in nature.” This is perhaps a subtle variation on naturalism. Naturalism teaches that nature is all there is. Einstein felt that this sense of awe for the universe could arise from art or science and that it should be kept alive by those who receive it. As it relates to a personal God, Einstein felt that this was the defining factor in the tension between religion and science.
Einstein apparently sees nature as the most important thing but is also not willing to exclude the existence of anything beyond nature. Malin writes that in response to the philosophy of Kant, “It was obvious to Einstein that there is an objective world, whose existence is independent of acts of consciousness. He was not, however, a naive realist. He did not believe that the world we perceive is the world as it is.” Einstein seems to live practically as an atheist but function on paper as an agnostic. Einstein leaves the door open to the existence of God, but the crack appears to be very thin.
In summary, Einstein’s views on God are complex and convoluted by his seemingly contradictory statements, but after analyzing all of his statements in context a worldview emerges. Einstein was religious about science. He did not believe that God existed, but allowed for the possibility that there is more to the universe than we can see. He attributed the term “God” to nature itself out of his devotion to the natural universe. For Einstein, God is an abstract construct of the mind and not a present reality. Einstein is part agnostic, part pantheist and part naturalist, but in no way a theist or even a deist. Jammer writes that, “Einstein's cosmic religion is, of course, incompatible with the doctrines of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and all other theistic religions. The crucial difference lies in its denial of a personal God who punishes the wicked or rewards the righteous and performs miracles by breaking the causal laws of nature.”
When Einstein makes statements about God he is usually talking about the universe or nature. Because of this, it is possible to say with certainty that when Einstein talks about God he is in no way talking about Yahweh, the God of the Bible. For illustrative purposes Einstein could have said that his chief concern was to know the thoughts of Baal or any other false God. When put in that context it is doubtful that many Christians would use Einstein’s quotes to authenticate their own beliefs about the one true God. As a final word, I would personally ask Christians to use caution when quoting anyone’s comments regarding God, unless the person quoted blatantly makes reference to the gospel of Christ.
I am the Lord, and there is no other;
apart from me there is no God.
- Isaiah 45:5a (ESV)
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