God in the Equation : How Einstein Became the Prophet of the New Religious Era

by Corey Powell

We are living at a turning point in human spirituality -- akin to when Jesus or Buddha or Mohammed was alive -- and Einstein is its prophet. That is the audacious, provocative, and fascinating argument Corey Powell makes with dazzling eloquence in this extraordinary book. Powell dubs the new faith "sci/religion" and unmasks today's famous battle between science and religion as no more than a myth. Religion has always been where humanity looked to resolve the big issues -- be they everyday ones about morality or the overarching questions of the universe. Just a few decades ago, Pope Pius XII described the period explained by the scientific theory of the big bang as "the epoch when the cosmos came forth from the Hands of the Creator." Astronomers essentially agreed. This signified a very new relationship between scientists and priests. Indeed, Powell shows how science has completely taken over from theology in answering the overarching questions of the universe. Morality is a secular matter now determined by conversation rather than religious edict. Therefore, Powell contends, sci/religion is the only fully functioning religion now in operation. For the first time, Powell identifies Einstein as the prophet of this religious revolution. When the most popular genius of the century said "God does not play dice," he wasn't merely being cute, he was creating a new kind of religion. Einstein called God The Old One, and, as Powell shows, he put The Old One into his equations describing his theory of relativity and so bound together two spheres of human thought, the spiritual and the scientific, in a way that had never previously been accomplished. The symbol in the relativity equations that stands for God is Lambda. It is also called the cosmological constant. It was also called Einstein's biggest blunder for a little while. Powell tells the story of how this controversial factor got into the equations, how it was accepted by the scientific community, then rejected, and then accepted again. Recent reports about how the universe is accelerating in its expansion are all based on this same factor, God in the equation. Einstein and his followers' use of the God factor in science has never before been recognized for what it is. In a tour de force Powell has forever identified it as clear evidence of an entirely new gnostic era, a new step in the history of human spirituality.

277 pages, Hardcover

First published August 21, 2002