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“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.”<br />
Eban ended up sending a deputy, who handed Einstein a formal letter asking if he would take on the presidency. “Acceptance would entail<br />
moving to Israel and taking its citizenship,” Eban’s letter noted (presumably in case Einstein harbored any fantasy that he could preside over Israel<br />
from Princeton). Eban hastened to reassure Einstein, however: “Freedom to pursue your great scientific work would be afforded by a government<br />
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<br />
much else.<br />
Even though the offer seemed somewhat strange, it was a powerful testament to Einstein’s unsurpassed standing as a hero of world Jewry. It<br />
“embodies the deepest respect which the Jewish people can repose in any of its sons,” Eban said.<br />
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<br />
visitor joked, “and I have never gotten a rebuttal before I have stated my case.”<br />
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.<br />
“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<br />
official function,” he explained. “I am the more distressed over these circumstances because my relationship with the Jewish people became my<br />
strongest human tie once I achieved complete clarity about our precarious position among the nations of the world.” 45<br />
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<br />
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<br />
did he have the temperament to be an official functionary. He was not cut out to be either a statesman or a figurehead.<br />
He liked to speak his mind, and he had no patience for the compromises necessary to manage, or even symbolically lead, complex<br />
organizations. Back when he was involved as a figurehead leader in the establishing of Hebrew University, he had not possessed the talent to<br />
handle, nor the temperament to ignore, all of the maneuverings involved. Likewise, he had more recently had the same unpleasant experiences with<br />
a group creating Brandeis University near Boston, which caused him to resign from that endeavor. 46<br />
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<br />
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<br />
astronomer trying to confirm his theories.<br />
Einstein’s brilliance sprang from being a rebel and nonconformist who recoiled at any attempt to restrain his free expression. Are there any<br />
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<br />
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<br />
my conscience.”<br />
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<br />
responsibility,” Einstein conceded to a friend that week, “but I cannot bring myself to do so.” 47<br />
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<br />
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<br />
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<br />
socks. 48