:salam2:
A book entitled Earth is a basic reference textbook is many universities around the world. One of its two authors is professor Emeritus Frank Press. He was the Science Advisor to former US President Jimmy Carter, and for 12 years was the President of the National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC. His book says that mountains have underlying roots (Earth, Press and Siever, Page 435. Also Earth Science, Tarbuk and Lutgens, Page 157). These roots are deeply embedded in the ground, thus, mountains have a shape like a peg. This is how the Qur’an has described mountains. Allah SWT said in the Qur’an:
Have we not made the earth as a bed, and the mountains as pegs? - 78:6-7
Modern earth sciences have proven that mountains have deep roots under the surface of the ground and that these roots can reach several times their elevations above the surface of the ground (The Geological Concept of Mountains in the Qur’an, El-Naggar Page 5). So the most suitable word to describe mountains on the basis of this information is the word ‘peg’, since most of a properly set peg is hidden under the surface of the ground.
The history of science tells us that the theroy of mountains having deep roots was introduced only in 1865 by the Astronomer Royal, Sir George Airy (Earth, Press and Siever, Page 435. Also see The Geological Concept of Mountains in the Qur’an Page 5).
Mountains also play an important role in stabilizing the crust of the earth (The Gelogical Concept of Mountains in the Qur’an 44-45). They hinder the shaking of the earth. Allah SWT has said in the Qur’an:
And He has set firm mountains in the earth so that it would not shake with you… (16:15)
Likewaise, the modern theory of plate tectonics holds that mountains work as stablilizers for the earth. This knowledge about the role of mountains as stabilizers for the earth has just begun to the understood in the framework of plate tectonics since the late 1960’s (The Geological Concept of Mountains in the Qur’an P.5).
