By Tuqa Khalid

DUBAI -- The Secretary General of the Muslim World League (MWL) Sheikh Dr. Mohammed Bin Abdulkarim Al-Issa said that German-born theoretical physicist Albert Einstein was “not an atheist” but rather believed in a higher power that controlled the universe.

Al-Issa said in an interview with MBC that Einstein appeared not be a text-book atheist, and did not conform to the way atheists talk.

“Einstein, based on the papers he wrote and what I personally heard from scientists, believed that there is a power that manages this universe,” he said.

However, Al-Issa added that Einstein did not believe in the specifics of the different prophets preached or the heavenly messages. “He didn’t believe in that, but he believed that there is a power that manages the universe.”

“Therefore, atheists’ claim that Einstein didn’t believe in the existence of a creator or a manager of this universe is not true.”

Einstein’s faith or lack thereof has been the subject of much heated debate over the years.

Both sides of the debate cite some of his famous quotes on the topic of religion to support their argument.

Those who believe that Einstein didn’t believe there was any conflict between rational thought and religious sentiment highlight this quote: “Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

Others who believe he was an atheist refer to the quote: “I do not believe in a personal God and have never denied this but have expressed it clearly.”

The 20th century’s most renowned scientist had also written in a 1954 letter: “The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends.”

A year before his death in 1955, Einstein wrote a letter to a philosopher in which he said that while he “gladly” belonged to the Jewish people, he believed that the Jewish religion “like all other religions is an incarnation of the most childish superstitions.”

Walter Isaacson, the author of the 2007 biography “Einstein: His Life and Universe,” had said: “Einstein generally avoided giving simple answers, and like most human beings his feelings about spirituality varied over time... Sometimes he expressed himself in more spiritual terms and sometimes he was more of a debunker of religion.” -- Al Arabiya English and Agencies