A letter handwritten by physicist Albert Einstein expressing his views on religion, will be sold on eBay with an opening bid of Rs 5.6 crore
An earlier iPad app allowed users an in-depth look into Albert Einstein’s brain. This new auction will allow users a similar opportunity but on a more metaphysical level.
A letter, written by the Nobel Prize-winning physicist in 1954, a year before his death, voicing his views on religion and God, is set to go under the auctioneer’s hammer on October 8.
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A piece of Einstein: The letter that outlines Albert Einstein’s views on religion, God and tribalism will be going under the hammer from October 8. file Pic/Getty Images
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The bidding for the document, widely known as the God Letter, will start at approximately $3 million (Rs 15.6 crore) and run till October 18, according to a tweet by Auction Cause, a California-based agency.
In his mind
The correspondence offers insights into the private thoughts about religion, God and tribalism of one of the world’s most brilliant minds.u00a0“This letter, in my opinion, is really of historical and cultural significance as these are the personal and private thoughts of arguably the smartest man of the 20th century,” said Eric Gazin, the president of Auction Cause, a Los Angeles-based premier auction agency, which will handle the sale on eBay.
“The letter was written near the end of his life, after a lifetime of learning and thought,” he added.u00a0Einstein wrote the letter in German on January 3, 1954, on Princeton University letterhead to philosopher Erik Gutkind after he read Gutkind’s book Choose Life: The Biblical Call to Revolt.u00a0“The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation, no matter how subtle, can (for me) change this,” wrote the German-born scientist, who in 1921 was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics.u00a0
The anonymous seller of the letter, which will be auctioned with the original envelope, stamp and postmark, purchased it from Bloomsbury Auctions in London in 2008 for $404,000 (Rs 2.10 crore).u00a0Since that time the letter has been stored in a temperature-controlled vault at a public institution.
Although the opening bid of the eBay auction is $3 million, Gazin said he expects it will fetch double or triple that amount during the Oct 8-18 auction at www.einsteinletter.comu00a0“eBay has the widest possible audience and it is so global and so accessible,” he explained, adding that 10 years ago the last major Einstein letter sold for more than $2 million. u00a0“We feel this is a reasonable starting price given the historic importance and the interest in Einstein,” Gazin added. u00a0 u00a0 u00a0 u00a0 u00a0 u00a0 u00a0 u00a0 u00a0u00a0
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