EINSTEIN'S ANSWER

Evening Post, Volume CXIV, Issue 126, 24 November 1932, Page 8

EINSTEIN'S ANSWER

JEWISH VIEW. OF LIFE

Professor Albert Einstein's answer to the'question, "Is Where a Jewish view of iif e?"_ is ! jrinteja in : "Opinion/ a journalof Jewish Jtefe and letters.

"There is, in mjjr opinion, no Jewish view, of life in tl-ae philosophic sense," Dr. Einstein saj«i. "Judaism appears to me to be alnwxst exclusively concerned with the mc«al attitude in and to-

ward life.

"Judaism I feeiieve io be rather the content of" tJie life- approach of the Jewish people than the contents of laws laiddo<ivn in the Torah and interpreted my the Talmud. Torah and Talmud, are; fox, me only- the most weighty eyidence of the governing concepts [nft Jeirish.life in earlier 'time's.?-' %' '■. ...j /' " -!, :. ', ,' '■; At another;.point Professor Einstein ::asserts:-A ""''' "'i - ? . "JudaJism is not ;a faith.' The Jewish Gp'cL- is but & negation of superstition ar«l an imaginative result of its elimin;«tion. He also represents an. at-, tempt, to ground, morality in fear—a deplorable, discreditable attempt..-Yet itise'wms to me that the powerful moral taajiTtaon* in the Jewish has, .in gi'orjft measure, i-elcased itself from this fea,K. ''"•■> ~ •■:■-."- ■■'•.; .■•'■':'

, it is clear that >!to .sen^e G/^xl* is equivalent to serving 'every living thing.' It is for this that the liest ampiig the Jewish people, espeei; felly thQ.i.pr^phetSj including Jesus, 'ceaselessly.v^ttled. Thus Judaism is not;:.ayjtransc'"e;i}cl.eutal religion. ; It is ;con_QfeirneU;: only with th^ tangible i expe'rieiices"'of life and with nothing else" '" ' " 7

Emphasising tne principle of the sanctity ot hto in Judai m, Piofessoi Einstein adds — i

( "To hew great an extent the conselousiess of th.c 's^ndtity of bfa is alive in the Jewisfi is beautifully illusti ated bj'l a Remark ' once made to me by Walter Rathenau 'When ,t Jew sa\s he takes pleasuie in the hunt, he he*' It is impossible to cxpiesi Hioro^simplv tlie fouseiousiics ot the sam'tity and the unity of all lite as ifc exists in the Jewish people"