And the mountains will be like wool, fluffed up

“and the mountains like tufts of wool,”

After describing people, Allah turns to mountains: “And the mountains will be like wool, fluffed up.”

The word ‎عِهۡن‎ literally means dyed, colored wool. It refers to something that appears solid from a distance but, when you actually touch it, proves soft, weak, and crumbling. It looks firm but disperses at the slightest shake—it has no real substance.

The Quran gives various descriptions of mountains on Judgment Day—being crushed, moving, scattered. But this might be the most graphic: mountains as soft as wool.

Not just any wool, but ‎مَنفُوش‎—torn, fluffed wool. The verb ‎نَفَشَ‎ means to tear apart, to scatter, to pull wool into tiny flakes that float weightlessly in the air.

First, Allah described people as weightless as moths. Now He describes mountains as equally weightless—mere flakes of wool floating away.

This parallel is crucial.

From a material standpoint, nothing is heavier than mountains. From a social standpoint, nothing carries more weight than the power and might of nations.

Civilizations throughout history have compared their strength to mountains—symbols of permanence, stability, unmovable power.

But look at what Allah does here. He takes what was once a symbol of human strength—people, nations, massive populations—and reduces them to the insignificance of scattered moths.

Then He takes the very material symbol of strength—mountains themselves—and strips them of all weight and value.

Things that used to carry weight in this life no longer have weight. Things that were heavy have become utterly light and insignificant. The reality of this world has fundamentally changed.

If the old measures of value have been reversed, then something else must have become significant. What used to be weightless must have become weighty.