Einstein's faith and struggles

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Is the aphorism that great men think alike always true?

And as many believe, do great minds think in a way different from lesser mortals? Since the beginning of the modern liberated era of human thinking, the minds of great thinkers have always been under close scrutiny. The belief systems that still divide humanity in different groups since Middle Age are deeply ensconced in the psyche of most people, whether enlightened in the sense that they are educated and live in the civilised world, or not.

The great 17th century physicist Sir Isaac Newton was a devout Christian and had an unshakeable belief in God. His contemporary and German philosopher and mathematician Leibniz was also a strong believer and tried to develop an equation that would prove the existence of God in one strike. However, the philosopher mathematician of the 17th century Leibniz and Newton, also a mathematician and physicist, fell out over the debate of who did invent the great mathematical tool called calculus first. But though the two titans quarrelled over the invention of calculus, they both converged in their religious belief systems. But that is a different story altogether.

However, the aphorism that all great men think alike has been proven both true and false at the same time. Consider the case of the great 20th century philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell and the great physicist Albert Einstein. They might have differed in their politico-ideological belief systems. But again, like Newton and Leibniz, they both held similar notions about the question of religious belief. But that Einstein held similar views about religion to that of Russell, who was rather explicit about expressing his views on religion during his life time, has come to light after his death. Einstein's real stand on religion was revealed through a little known letter that he wrote to philosopher Eric Gutkind, who wrote a book titled "Choose Life: The Biblical Call to Revolt." As would become clear from the letter, the author, who was a firm believer, tried to prove that the Jewish people were the ones chosen by God. However, Einstein, in his letter, refuted both religious belief and the notion that the Jews were special people.

The letter written in 1954, one year before his death, ran as follows in its English version as was published in the Guardian on May 13. 2008.

An abridgement of the letter from Albert Einstein to Eric Gutkind from Princeton in January 1954, translated from German by Joan Stambaugh. It will be sold at Bloomsbury auctions on Thursday

... I read a great deal in the last days of your book, and thank you very much for sending it to me. What especially struck me about it was this. With regard to the factual attitude to life and to the human community we have a great deal in common.

... The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this. These subtilised interpretations are highly manifold according to their nature and have almost nothing to do with the original text. For me the Jewish religion like all other religions is an incarnation of the most childish superstitions. And the Jewish people to whom I gladly belong and with whose mentality I have a deep affinity have no different quality for me than all other people. As far as my experience goes, they are also no better than other human groups, although they are protected from the worst cancers by a lack of power. Otherwise I cannot see anything 'chosen' about them.

In general I find it painful that you claim a privileged position and try to defend it by two walls of pride, an external one as a man and an internal one as a Jew. As a man you claim, so to speak, a dispensation from causality otherwise accepted, as a Jew the privilege of monotheism. But a limited causality is no longer a causality at all, as our wonderful Spinoza recognized with all incision, probably as the first one. And the animistic interpretations of the religions of nature are in principle not annulled by monopolisation. With such walls we can only attain a certain self-deception, but our moral efforts are not furthered by them. On the contrary.

Now that I have quite openly stated our differences in intellectual convictions it is still clear to me that we are quite close to each other in essential things, i.e. in our evaluations of human behaviour. What separates us are only intellectual 'props' and 'rationalisation' in Freud's language. Therefore I think that we would understand each other quite well if we talked about concrete things. With friendly thanks and best wishes.

Yours, A. Einstein

But Einstein's unpublished papers and letters not only revealed his real belief about religion. Those have also brought to light other unknown facts about his life, about his failures and sufferings. In the following James Randerson, science correspondent of The Guardian, narrates those anecdotes.

To many he is the greatest scientist who ever lived, but a unique collection of Albert Einstein's letters and papers has revealed a history of struggle and failure made worse by an apparently shaky grasp of maths.

An archive which goes on sale in London next month with a price tag of $1.5m (