EPPH - Every Painter Paints Himself

Science, Religion and Art: Einstein on the Inner Tradition

Perhaps the most difficult part of understanding art is the Inner Tradition, the path that links not only all the world’s major religions but science, literature and music too. Religious believers strongly attached to a particular creed are unlikely to accept this; committed atheists like Richard Dawkins, the evolutionary biologist, are just as unlikely to agree. To grasp why the Inner Tradition is so important - and even to understand what it is - requires creative imagination, which is the ability to construct mental options free from institutional bias. Few have it. Most just follow a pre-existing paradigm vouchsafed by earlier authorities. Those that turn their disciplines inside out, like Einstein in science, are a different breed. They imagine creatively (in other words, independently) and are thus likely to recognize the importance of the Inner Tradition. Einstein did; Dawkins doesn’t.

Unfortunately science is full of minds like Dawkins. When the Dalai Lama was asked to address a conference on science, hundreds of American scientists walked out complaining that religion has no place in their discipline. I can’t imagine then that they would approve of Einstein’s comment below, a forceful statement in support of the Inner Tradition:

'I affirm that the cosmic religiosity is the strongest and more powerful among all tools of scientific research. Science without religion is blind. All religions, arts or sciences are fruits from the same tree, the only aspiration of which is to turn the life of humans more dignified: that is, allow individuals to rise beyond the simple physical existence and be free.'