Einstein’s Lifetime Pacifism

One of the consistent threads in Einstein’s views on war and peace was pacifism. Einstein’s pacifist predispositions, shaped by his Jewish identity and his aversion to the authoritarian German educational milieu of the late nineteenth century, would attain public articulation with the advent of World War I. This chapter explicates pacifism and the various paths it took by examining specific biographical highlights and the documentary record of his published writings and speeches and his private correspondence. By investigating how his pacifism responded to socio-historical circumstances, the emotional, ethical, and ideological components of Einstein’s pacifism will be elucidated.