The Old Testament                                       449

And millions of years went by. And it came to pass that the continents drifted against and over the ocean plates of Panthalassa. Now the boundary between two such colliding plates was called convergent. At convergent boundaries, the subduction of the ocean plates produced a rise in continental shelves, as though the shelves were shovelled onto land. And as the shelves became incorporated into continents, the amount of continental crust on Earth increased.
     And subducting ocean plates slid into Earth’s asthenosphere, pulled by Nature’s force of gravity. They were like knives cutting flesh. They carried ocean water to the "wound" and rubbed it in. And the asthenosphere bled magma badly. And again it seemed as if Pluto, the Roman god that ruled the underworld, breathed fire through the rock. And when magma rich in calcium and alkalis bubbled up in chambers and solidified, plutonic rock was made.
     And faults formed along the Panthalassa coast. And earthquakes shook these coastal regions, while eruptions added much basaltic rock and ash.¹⁵⁴
     And as millions of years went by, the continents closed in on Panthalassa. And it shrank somewhat in size, and some deep waters disappeared. Now the spreading of the continents did open up the intercontinental seas. And these seas turned into shallow oceans. And water flowed through channels from Panthalassa to the newly fashioned shallow oceans. And sea-level subsequently rose.
     And the intercontinental volcanic-mountain chains, the remnants of the rifts of the old supercontinent, slipped below the sea and became mid-ocean ridges for the new-born oceans. And hot dense magma emerged through underwater cracks and fissures and manufactured new and heavy ocean crust. And it was heat beneath the Earth that fed the ridges.
     And the newly constituted ocean plates slid along the asthenosphere and ferried continents apart. Thus mid-ocean ridges marked the boundary between separating ocean plates. Now this boundary was divergent, for from this boundary did the sea-floor spread and ocean crust diverge.
     Now what were the forces causing ocean plates to move apart? The basic source was heat; its energy supplied the plates with motion. Now the weakest force was push: As heated magma flowed through the mid-ocean ridges, it pushed the plates apart a little. Another force was gravity: Heat had uplifted regions near mid-ocean ridges, causing plates to simply slide away. But the strongest force arose from heat convection: Some of the heat that rose beneath mid-ocean ridges curled over and flowed horizontally away. And the moving medium of heat did drag the plates along.

450                        The Bible According to Einstein

     And as millions of years went by, the continents were pushed¹⁵⁵ by intercontinental ocean plates, so that they drifted into Panthalassa. And the subduction of the ocean crust along the coast of Panthalassa produced a rise of land inland. And new mountains, similar to the Rocky Mountain Range of modern times, were made.
     And it came to pass that an island-arc in Panthalassa stood in the way of an approaching continent. And after several million years, the continent did strike the island-arc. And as more years went by, the island-arc was thrust into the land. And metamorphic rock and a mountain range were made.
     And it also came about that a continent drifted into a Panthalassan island. And after many million years, metamorphic rock and local coastal mountain peaks were made.
     And elsewhere along convergent boundaries, continents at random and from time to time collided into ocean island-arcs and islands. And many island-arcs and islands, made by Earth two hundred-million years before, were thus destroyed. They were buried in the crust of continental coastal regions. And mountains, like unto tombstones, towered over them.
     And at one interface, two plates slid by each other without converging or diverging. And this was a transform strike-slip boundary. And each time there was a sudden slip, a strong earthquake shook this region of the Earth.
     And throughout the rest of geo-history, plate tectonics would shape the surface of thy Earth. And the face of Earth would be determined by the motion of the plates. And divergent boundaries would cause lava flows. At mid-ocean ridges would they most frequently occur. But when a divergent boundary emerged upon a continent,¹⁵⁶ the continent would rift apart and open up, and then a sea would form. Now motions of the plates at transform boundaries would cause earthquakes. And at convergent boundaries would be both earthquakes and volcanos. Often would convergent boundaries occur at edges of a continent where ocean crust subducted. And sometimes a convergent boundary would draw two continents together, eventually causing them to bump into each other. And such a slow powerful collision would produce the highest and most rugged mountain ranges on the Earth.¹⁵⁷

Tectonic plates did cover Earth
like a mosaic of a dozen tiles.

     It was two-billion-and-three-hundred-million years BC. And it came to pass that the seven continents were well dispersed.

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¹⁵⁵ Later, continents would also be pulled by ocean plates.
¹⁵⁶ Most divergent boundaries originated within a continent.
¹⁵⁷ The Himalayan Range is a modern example.

The Old Testament                                       451

     And millions of years did pass and disappear. And the aging intercontinental oceans assumed a certain profile shape¹⁵⁸ determined by the dynamics of tectonics. Now a mid-ocean ridge was uplifted and buoyed by strong magma flows. And each year, out of the "womb" of a mid-ocean ridge, dense ocean crust was born. And as it moved outward from the ridge, it aged and cooled. And in cooling did it grow a little denser. And being dense and heavy caused it gradually to sink. Thus an intercontinental ocean was most shallow near its mid-ocean ridge,¹⁵⁹ and depth increased with distance. And for example, the ocean four-thousand kilometers from the ridge was twice as deep as the ocean one-thousand kilometers from it. And so ocean crust was oldest, densest and deepest just off the continental shelves. But at the continental margins, the ocean floor curved up and joined the continents. And from the ocean profile, it looked as if the continents were weighing down the ocean plates. But the opposite was true – the lighter continents were holding up the heavy ocean crust. And so geologic forces provided the ocean floors with profiles that were similar.
     And sea-floor spreading from mid-ocean ridges continued to ferry forth the continents. And Earth’s continents so very slowly moved apart.
     And several tens of million years went by. And larger did the intercontinental oceans grow. Likewise, the intercontinental ocean crust increased.
     And it so happened that a few hundred-million years had passed since the breakup of the supercontinent and the opening of the intercontinental seas. And at one continental shelf, old heavy ocean crust, which had been joined to continental crust deep below the sea, had broken off. Thus the oceanic lithosphere was severed from the continental lithosphere, as one tectonic plate broke into two. And as millions of years went by, the ocean crust drawn by the force of gravity slid beneath the continent, eventually piercing Earth’s asthenosphere. And a new subduction zone arose. And a new convergent boundary appeared. And the coastal region of the continent, which had been previously so quiet, began to "rumble." And volcanos rose and sputtered lava; and off-shore island-arcs appeared; and earthquakes shook the coast.
     And a new force began to act upon the fractured ocean plate. It was pull: At the subduction zone, Nature’s hand of gravity tugged at the heavy ocean plate. And the convection cycle was "completed," as the colder medium beneath the plate was recycled to Earth’s mantle, where it would sink, then turn, move horizontally through Earth, and after being heated finally rise up.
     Now the ocean plate no longer pushed the continent. But the continent continued drifting in the same direction.¹⁶⁰ And although the force behind the continent was gone, the momentum still was there.
     And as millions of years went by, the continent continued drifting, but it did so at a slower rate. And a trail of off-shore island-arcs was left behind it in its wake.
     And it came to pass that, in other places in the World, old heavy ocean crust broke off of continents and starting sinking down.

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¹⁵⁸ This is the height profile of the ocean floor, as viewed from the side.
¹⁵⁹ In places, the ridge even pushed above the sea and made islands.
¹⁶⁰ The situation was analogous to a speed boat that suddenly runs out of gas. Even without motor power, such a boat continues sliding forward over water.