Einstein's 'God Letter' may fetch $1.5M at auction

Dec. 4 (UPI) -- Albert Einstein's "God Letter," a handwritten letter detailing some of the German-born physicist's observations on religion, is expected to fetch up to $1.5 million at auction Tuesday.

Einstein, known as one the 20th century's greatest minds, penned the letter containing his thoughts on "the word God" in 1954 in German, addressed to philosopher Eric Gutkind.

"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable, but still primitive, legends which are nevertheless pretty childish," Einstein wrote in the letter.

The one-and-a-half-page letter is being auctioned at Christie's on Tuesday at 2 p.m. for an estimated $1 million to $1.5 million.

Einstein also expressed his thoughts on Judaism in the letter.

"For me the Jewish religion like all others is an incarnation of the most childish superstitions," he wrote. "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."

Some have viewed the letter as evidence that Einstein was an atheist, but Einstein resented being labeled an atheist and was critical of fanatics in support of both religion and science.

At one point, he criticized "fanatical atheists whose intolerance is of the same kind as the intolerance of the religious fanatics."

Einstein said he believed in a god "who reveals himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a god who concerns himself with the fate and the doings of mankind, referring to a concept developed by 17th century Dutch thinker Baruch Spinoza.

A 1996 biography titled Einstein: A Life said at 13, Einstein "abandoned his uncritical religious fervor, feeling he had been deceived into believing lies."