einstein

“I cannot tell my government that you phoned me and said no,” Eban replied. “I have to go through the motions and present the offer officially.”
Eban ended up sending a deputy, who handed Einstein a formal letter asking if he would take on the presidency. “Acceptance would entail
moving to Israel and taking its citizenship,” Eban’s letter noted (presumably in case Einstein harbored any fantasy that he could preside over Israel
from Princeton). Eban hastened to reassure Einstein, however: “Freedom to pursue your great scientific work would be afforded by a government
and people who are fully conscious of the supreme significance of your labors.” In other words, it was a job that would require his presence, but not
much else.
Even though the offer seemed somewhat strange, it was a powerful testament to Einstein’s unsurpassed standing as a hero of world Jewry. It
“embodies the deepest respect which the Jewish people can repose in any of its sons,” Eban said.
Einstein had already prepared his note of rejection, which he handed to Eban’s envoy as soon as he arrived. “I have been a lawyer all my life,” the
visitor joked, “and I have never gotten a rebuttal before I have stated my case.”
He was “deeply moved” by the offer, Einstein said in his prepared response, and “at once saddened and ashamed” that he would not accept it.
“All my life I have dealt with objective matters, hence I lack both the natural aptitude and the experience to deal properly with people and to exercise
official function,” he explained. “I am the more distressed over these circumstances because my relationship with the Jewish people became my
strongest human tie once I achieved complete clarity about our precarious position among the nations of the world.” 45
Offering Einstein the presidency of Israel was a clever idea, but Einstein was right to realize that sometimes a brilliant idea is also a very bad
one. As he noted with his usual wry self-awareness, he did not have the natural aptitude to deal with people in the way the role would require, nor
did he have the temperament to be an official functionary. He was not cut out to be either a statesman or a figurehead.
He liked to speak his mind, and he had no patience for the compromises necessary to manage, or even symbolically lead, complex
organizations. Back when he was involved as a figurehead leader in the establishing of Hebrew University, he had not possessed the talent to
handle, nor the temperament to ignore, all of the maneuverings involved. Likewise, he had more recently had the same unpleasant experiences with
a group creating Brandeis University near Boston, which caused him to resign from that endeavor. 46
In addition, he had never displayed a discernible ability to run anything. The only formal administrative duty he had ever undertaken was to head a
new physics institute at the University of Berlin. He did little other than hire his stepdaughter to handle some clerical tasks and give a job to the
astronomer trying to confirm his theories.
Einstein’s brilliance sprang from being a rebel and nonconformist who recoiled at any attempt to restrain his free expression. Are there any
worse traits for someone who is supposed to be a political conciliator? As he explained in a polite letter to the Jerusalem newspaper that had been
campaigning for him, he did not want to face the chance that he would have to go along with a government decision that “might create a conflict with
my conscience.”
In society as in science, he was better off remaining a nonconformist. “It is true that many a rebel has in the end become a figure of
responsibility,” Einstein conceded to a friend that week, “but I cannot bring myself to do so.” 47
Ben-Gurion was secretly relieved. He had begun to realize that the idea was a bad one. “Tell me what to do if he says yes!” he joked to his
assistant. “I’ve had to offer the post to him because it’s impossible not to. But if he accepts, we are in for trouble.” Two days later, when
Ambassador Eban ran into Einstein at a black-tie reception in New York, he was happy that the issue was behind them. Einstein was not wearing
socks. 48