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Since Einstein was a Jew - he may have believed in a Judeo-Christian type God, but not a strictly Christian type God in any narrower sense.The ancient Greeks had quite a lot more diversity in their beliefs, and the notion that you were somehow persecuted if you did not believe – just look up Epicurus , or his later Roman counterpart, Lucretius.It was the Jews who introduced the idea that religion was a matter of social loyalty (Judaism has always been a nationalistic religion – and while Christianity and Islam may have gone further, and become supra national, they still demanded unconditional allegiance).One also has to bear in mind that in past centuries, the accusation of atheism had a different meaning to what it has today – and atheist was not one who did not believe in God, but rather one who was not God fearing, and thus was judged as amoral.As for whether people who, in the Christian era, genuinely believed in God, or just found they had to use the language of God to express ideas for which they had no other widely accepted language, that is a matter that is always difficult to debate, because how can one look behind that which is said, to ideas that could not be expressed at the time. If we try and apply modern language to past ideas, we come across the problem that people of the past would have no understanding of the modern language, and would have found it as alien as we find their language.Ofcourse, when we get to the Oppenheimers and Einsteins of this world, we are talking about substantially modern personages, who had access to much of the vocabulary we use today, so the argument that they simply could not have expressed themselves in any other way does not hold true.I think the bigger problem when we discuss the Einstiens and Oppenheimers, is our own attitude to these people (and to great scientists in general), that we regard them in some way as great prophets of life in general – these guys were good at what they did, but it does not follow that everything they said and believed must somehow be superior to the rest of humanity – they were still, outside of their own field, just ordinary human beings.
Einsteins parents may have been jewish but I don't think they where strict. Einstein on many occasion stated he didn't believe in a god that hears & answers prays. He also didn't believe in an afterlife.
If god dose exist he/she wont let you prove he/she does. that dosnt mean you couldnt prove it, it just means god would stop you. If god dosnt exist, how could you prove he/she dosnt. I don't think you can! decartes could be right and all this is just one big dream, and nothing is real. where ever you go with or without god its a leap of faith. So I think you should go with your heart; after all your heart looks for happyness not sadness. And most people want to be happy.
We have evidence, we have no proof of error, so why do some believe and others do not? Does science offer an alternative to faith? Is Jesus unbelievable?