Einstein was asked by a New York rabbi if he believed in God. Einstein’s famous answer: ‘I believe in Spinoza’s God, who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings.’ By that answer, Einstein introduced me to Spinoza and I have been an amateur Spinozist ever since.

Like Einstein, Spinoza is not easy to comprehend. Both were accused of being atheists, pantheists, or even something else. I do not pretend to fully appreciate either man, but I do think that Einstein understood Spinoza, and that’s good enough for me. Einstein reportedly said that his favorite book was Spinoza’s famous ‘Ethics,’ an incredibly dense read. What I can glean from myriad commentaries on Spinoza is that his thinking was most akin to some synthesis of panentheism and acosmism, but definitely not atheism or pantheism.

I think that Einstein and Spinoza should be studied and assessed in conjunction on this topic. Both men, even though separated by three centuries, shared similar rational thought processes and came to similar sublimely inexorable conclusions. I believe that Einstein looking outward into the universe of space and Spinoza looking inward into the universe of the mind ultimately understood the true nature, the essence of what God is, and what God is not.