Einstein's letter

rejecting God set to go on sale

A handwrit- ten letter from physicist Albert
Einstein in which he explicitly rejected God and religion is set to be auctioned at Christie's auction house in New York City on Tuesday for the second time since he wrote it a year before his death.Einstein wrote the infamous "God letter" to German philoso- pher Eric Gutkind in 1954 who had

written a book called Choose Life: The Biblical Call to Revolt that, apparently, Einstein did not like. His letter, written in German, caused a sensation when it first
went public at an auction sale in
S 2008. The letter is now expected to
sell for between $1 million and $1.5
million, according to a statement
from Christie's cited by the New
York Times.
"The word God is for me nothingmore than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish,"
Einstein wrote. "No interpretation, no matter how subtle, can (for me) change
anything about this." He began his letter by praising Gutkind for sharing a common
impulse of "striving for the
improvement and refinement of
existence", but soon took issue
with Gutkind's religious ideals.
In the letter, Einstein turned a
critical eye towards his own Jewish
identity, specifically questioning the
assertion that Jews were "chosen
people".
"The Jewish people to whom I gladly belong, and in whose mentality I feel profoundly anchored, still for me does not have any different kind of dignity from all
other peoples," he wrote. "As far as my experience goes, they are in fact no better than other human groups, even if they are
protected from the worst excesses by a lack of power. Otherwise I cannot perceiveanything 'chosen' about them." — IANS