Albert Einstein
January 14, 2000

I don't know if you receive Time Magazine at home, but if you do, or if you have seen it elsewhere, you surely noticed the picture of Albert Einstein on the New Years issue's cover. The editors of Time selected Einstein as the most important person of this century. As Jews, we can't help but be proud that a co-religionist achieved this singular honor.

Albert Einstein was not only one of the greatest scientists of all times but also a great humanitarian and a proud Jew who was involved in many Jewish causes. In the next few minutes, I would like to examine several aspects of Albert Einstein's life that are of especial interest to me as a rabbi and that I hope will interest you as well. To begin with, as a German Jew, his life story gives us insight into the history of one of the most significant Jewish communities of modern times that came to an abrupt and cruel end with the rise of Hitler. Jews had lived in Germany for many centuries. In fact, the oldest Jewish settlements there date back at least 1,000 years. For most of that period, Jews tended to live together in a Jewish quarter in each of the many towns they inhabited. The centuries of isolation, however, came to an end in the wake of the French Revolution in 1792. Its ideology of "freedom, brotherhood and equality" for all not only bestowed citizenship upon French Jews but crossed France's borders and influenced every European nation. By the middle of the 19th century, the blessings of freedom and equality also had come to the Jews of Germany. German Jews eagerly welcomed the opportunity for integration into German society. For example, Jewish boys and girls, who previously had received only a traditional Jewish education in the heder, excitedly rushed to attend the gymnasium that served as the stepping stone to the universities.

By the time Albert Einstein was born in 1879, German Jews were beginning to make headway into law, medicine and science. Had Einstein been born but fifty years earlier, it is highly unlikely that he would ever have achieved his level of greatness because of the discrimination and limitations encountered by Germany's Jews at that time. And had he been born 50 years later his education would have been seriously hampered by the newly instituted Nuremberg Laws.

Einstein was born just at the right time. He was able to receive the higher education he needed to create his innovative theories, and by the time Hitler came to power, Einstein had achieved sufficient fame to be offered asylum in America - something that regrettably was denied to hundreds of thousands of lesser known European Jews.

I am not going to discuss Einstein's theories since science is not my strong suit. But I found interesting what the author of Jewish Influence in Modern Thought wrote about the importance and effect of Einstein's Jewish heritage on his scientific genius. The author proposed that the Jewish mind is less inclined toward dogma and therefore more willing to break with conventional thinking. In Einstein's time, most scientists were seeking to explain newly discovered scientific information within the existing concepts of physics. Einstein, however, dared to challenge the whole point of view, and on the basis of his speculation, build a new system. What I found particularly striking about this author's observations was the year it appeared. His book was published in 1929, just as racist ideas about the inferiority of Jews were gaining an unrelenting hold in Germany. I especially appreciated the pointed irony in his last paragraph. He wrote:

"In the development of the relativity theory, it is perhaps significant that the Jewish stamp is found at almost every turn. Were Einstein solely responsible for the theory of relativity, the connection between it and the Jews could be regarded as wholly fortuitous. But in as much as the names of Michelson, Levi Civita, Minkowski, Borne and Silberstein are all associated with it. . . one begins to feel that the 'Elders of Zion' have unwittingly conspired to explain the world's most baffling phenomena and apparently have met with success."

Einstein's insights into science were not only theoretical. In 1939, he wrote a letter to President Franklin Roosevelt, alerting him to experiments in nuclear fission at Columbia University. He told the president that the element uranium could be turned into an important source of energy and could also be used to construct extremely powerful bombs. Six years later the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima ending the war with Japan. How ironic that Nazi anti-Semitism which forced many outstanding Jewish scientists out of Germany guaranteed that the Axis powers would lose the Second World War. Exiled Jewish scientists were the backbone of the American team working on nuclear fission. Had those scientist stayed in Germany, it is probable that Germany would have developed the atom bomb first and the history of the world would be radically different.

The association of Einstein with the creation of the atomic bomb signaled a marked change in his political thinking. For much of his life he had been a pacifist in the mold of Ghandi. But the rise of Nazism caused him to reconsider his absolute opposition to warfare. After the war, however, as president of the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists, he urged the outlawing of the atomic and hydrogen bombs.

From the Jewish point of view, what is laudable about Einstein is that unlike many twentieth century Jews who achieved fame and prominence in science and the arts, he was fiercely loyal to the Jewish people. His good fortune in arriving at a safe haven in the United States, did not turn his head away from the suffering of the Jewish people. After the war against the Nazis was won, he put his prestige and his time behind efforts to raise money for refugee relief. In another realm, in order to help Yeshiva University build a medical school, he allowed his name to be attached to the project. As you know, this outstanding school is known as the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University.

Throughout his life, Einstein identified with Zionism. He wrote extensively about Zionism and attended many functions devoted to Zionist affairs. He was a friend of Israel's first President Dr. Chaim Weitzman and joined him on a highly successful fund-raising tour of the United States aimed at buying land in Israel and in funding the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. When Weitzman died, Prime Minister David Ben Gurion asked Einstein to accept the Presidency of Israel. Einstein declined the honor, saying he was deeply touched by the offer but did not feel suited for the position. It is illustrative of his commitment to Zionism, that when he went to the hospital for what proved to he his final days, he took with him his notes for a television address he was to give on the occasion of Israel's seventh anniversary.

Einstein did not consider himself religious in the conventional meaning of that term, but he was a believer in God. Although we often think of science as being an impediment to belief, for Einstein science was a path leading to God. He wrote that God reveals himself in the harmony of all that exists. His faith in this divine harmony caused him to reject the view held by many scientists of his day that the universe is subject to randomness and uncertainty. He said, "The Lord God is subtle but malicious he is not. God does not play dice with the universe."

Einstein's profound understanding of the workings of the universe did not lead to arrogance. Quite the opposite! Einstein reported that he felt like a speck of dust in the presence of nature's grandeur. He wrote, "The more we gain insight into universe's mysterious forces, cosmic and atomic, the more reason we, with our modest powers, must feel humble."

In announcing its choice of Albert Einstein as the outstanding individual of the century, Time magazine's editors called him: a genius, humanitarian and locksmith of the mysteries of the atom and the universe.

But what stands out most in my mind about this extraordinary person is that he did not use his fame and demanding career as an excuse to distance himself either from his own people or from humanitarian causes. Nor did he capitalized on his renown for personal gain. Rather he utilized his fame and prestige to garner support for worthy causes so that they could achieve success. What made Einstein the man of this century was not just his mind, it was also his soul. And for us, whatever our calling, we could do no better than remember that as with Albert Einstein, it is humility, caring and charity that raises our life's work to true significance.