Albert Einstein’s Cosmic Religion

  • Article (book chapter)
  • 11 pages
  • Level: university

In this essay Nicholas Campion writes that,

Many biographies pay no attention to Einstein’s religion, the clear inference being that it was not important.  Was Einstein religious, or not? The answer is not easy, for it all depends on what we think a religion is.

This essay was published in the 2021 book Intersections of Religion and Astronomy. One of the editors of the book is Chris Corbally, an astronomer with the Vatican Observatory.  Campion concludes that,

Einstein’s claim to be religious should… be taken at face value.

From the publisher (Routledge), regarding Intersections as a whole:

This volume examines the way in which cultural ideas about “the heavens” shape religious ideas and are shaped by them in return. Our approaches to cosmology have a profound effect on the way in which we each deal with religious questions and participate in the imaginative work of public and private world-building.

Employing an interdisciplinary team of international scholars, each chapter shows how religion and cosmology interrelate and matter for real people. Historical and contemporary case studies are included to demonstrate the lived reality of a variety of faith traditions and their interactions with the cosmos. This breadth of scope allows readers to get a unique overview of how religion, science and our view of space have, and will continue to, impact our worldviews.

Click here for information from Routledge, the publisher.

Click here for a preview of “Albert Einstein’s Cosmic Religion”, courtesy of Google Books.