2. THE CONCEPT OF MONOTHEISM

~ 20 ~ that the heavens and the earth were one piece joined together, then we cleaved them asunder?’ (21:30). It has been estimated that the present radius of the universe is at least ten thousand million light years. Cosmology has revealed that the universe is not static, but is expanding at an even speed on all sides in an ever-continuing process. It has been deduced from this that the universe must at some stage in the past have been in an embryonic stage. According to certain cosmologists, the entire universe was initially in the form of a ‘super atom’, all of whose elements were pulled inwards by irresistible forces. About fifteen billion years ago, this primary matter underwent an explosion, or ‘energy release,’ as a result of which the particles of the ‘super atom’ broke away from their centre and started expanding on all sides in such a way that the present universe was brought into being. The forces operating inside the super atom before the ‘energy release were consistently those of pulling and shrinking inwards. The outward