Worlds in Collision

Revolutionary, world-changing discoveries are often initially greeted with suspicion, rejection and hostility and in the 20th century, perhaps no one experienced this principle more harshly than the psychologist, astronomer and historian Immanuel Velikovsky. Dr. Velikovsky hypothesized, based upon his readings of the Old Testament, that some sort of catastrophe affected the Earth in the days of the Exodus. After ten years of research, Velikovsky published "Worlds In Collision" in 1950, which not only confirmed the catastrophe but advanced the Catastrophic Theory of the solar system with unprecedented elaboration. The book was very popular among the general public but was savagely attacked by the Scientific Establishment of his time, including boycotts of the book's publisher and the firing of astronomers who dared to defend the book.One of the reasons "Worlds In Collision" was scathingly denounced was because it challenged the then-prevailing Uniformist view, the view that everything in the solar system was formed at the same time, billions of years ago, and that it has remained static ever since. Velikovsky's work shows that our solar system is actually dynamic, quickly evolving, and that it has probably only been in its current form about 2,700 years. Velikovsky knew that the ancient solar system is understood best by the people who observed it firsthand and he is committed to learning their story. He proves to be an excellent researcher, pulling a large number of documents (some of them deeply obscured) from the historical record in order to make the case for catastrophe.Around 1500 B.C., a comet of unfathomable size approached the Earth as it revolved around the sun. It assaulted the Earth with red dust, meteorites and liquid hydrocarbons. Venturing closer, the comet slowed down the rotation of the Earth, causing prolonged periods of day and night, a phenomenon mentioned in both the Book Of Exodus and the Book Of Joshua. The comet's influence caused earthquakes and hurricanes to form. It pulled the Earth's tides miles into the sky and blasted our planet with discharges of celestial lightning. At its most extreme, the comet caused the Earth to tilt on its axis so that the sun rose in the West. Entirely new mountain ranges were formed and islands (including possibly Atlantis) sank into the sea. The entire human race was affected and countless people died. Accounts of this interstellar chaos appear in the historical and religious traditions of peoples all over the world: the Hebrews, the Greeks, the Mayans, the Chinese and Japanese, the Finns and Slavs, the tribes of Africa and the Maoris of New Zealand.What was this terrible comet? It was nothing less than the planet Venus itself. The earliest astronomical tablets from Babylon and India do not mention Venus at all, convincing Velikovsky that the planet is a newcomer to the solar system and that it erupted from deep inside Jupiter. Curiously, various mythologies concern themselves with the birth of Venus, but not the births of any other deities.After several centuries of silence, Venus' reign of terror reawakened in the 7th century B.C., when it managed to throw Mars out of its orbit, an orbit that was originally closer to the Sun than Earth's. Mars waged a brutal war with Venus before it was hurled towards the Earth to further affect life here. Some time after this second act, both Mars and Venus settled down into their current orbits."Worlds In Collision" is an incredible book, a profound, exciting epic, staggering in its implications. It explains that the Bible basically is historically accurate. It solves the mystery of when Homer wrote "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" and the genesis of stories like Zeus' battle with Typhon. It sheds light on why comets have been regarded as dark omens throughout history. It laid the groundwork for current theories of dinosaur extinction and emphasized the important role of electromagnetism in celestial mechanics. It touches upon every aspect of human existence and describes how the cosmos is something far more fantastic and dangerous than we were expecting.Velikovsky began to receive acceptance after he used his theory to make several remarkable predictions about the solar system: the existence of radio waves eminating from Jupiter, the strange rotation and scorching hot temperature of Venus, the scarring of Mars' surface, the intense magnetism of the moon's rocks...and yet the attacks from Scientific Orthodoxy continued, culminating in the kangaroo court that was the American Association For The Advancement Of Science symposium of 1974, in which a cadre of disgraceful "scientists" (including Carl Sagan) lined up to take their shot at "refuting" Velikovsky while misrepresenting his basic ideas! Such is the dogmatism of the mind that is incapable of reconsidering its premises, a dogmatism that is pervasive within the mainstream intelligentsia, witness the attacks on anti-vaccinists, World War II revisionists and critics of manmade climate change today.While his major thesis is probably undeniable, some more minor elements in the mix are doubtful, such as his reliance on suspect Freudian theories of repression and unconsciousness to explain human reaction to the catastrophes. Several of his interpretations of phenomena may also need reworking but these problems can easily be forgiven in light of the book's tremendous strengths.Truth cannot remain submerged forever and sooner or later, the world will know that in eras past, there were catastrophes upon the Earth. Immanuel Velikovsky will be vindicated someday. 250 years from now, his name will be spoken with the same reverence given to Galileo and Kepler today. Until that time comes, read "Worlds In Collision" and appreciate it for what it is: Velikovsky's transformation of the legendary into reality.

I have two copies of this book and at last count I have probably read it cover to cover 4 times. First I was fortunate to get an original hardcover copy (1950) passed on to me by my stepmother some thirty years ago as a young man in his twenties. I read the book with much interest and was fascinated by the cultural cross-referencing of significant celestial events as observed by ancient races, and how much of these same cataclysmic and 'ultra-natural' events may have found their way into religious texts on both sides of the world. Not the least of which was the Torah or the Hebrew 'Old Testament.' This in turn gave me a new understanding of what exactly might have taken place in biblical times. For me it was no less than a new lens with which to glean insight into the true nature of these often bizarre events (i.e. the Plagues and Exodus, The Sun standing still, the mythology surrounding Mars as the warrior god and Venus as the "Light-Bringer," et al, etc. etc.) and to see them in another light, one much different from the divine nature that has been traditionally touted. Ironically reading "Worlds in Collision," had me re-reading the "Old Testament" with a renewed interest and a much deeper appreciation of what those unfortunate souls had to cope with.After shelving this book for some thirty years, I decided to re-read it and did so in 2007. Now older and much more skeptical, I next decided to do a quick Google search on Velikovsky to see what I could find out about the man; I was appalled to find the self-righteous vitriol that was and still is leveled at this remarkable scholar. To get a sense of that, just take a look at the 'one-star' reviews on this site.For a time, I decided that if the world was against this man in such a vehement way, then maybe we had all been fooled and he was nothing more than a charlatan and hack. So I started reading books about him, and found it strange that many things he had posited about the planets in the solar system, this years before we had the ability to send space probes, were slowly coming to light and proving him right, as the science and exploration finally caught up with his claims. So much so that toward the end of his time on this dangerous little globe, major institutions of higher learning were glad to invite him come and speak to packed auditoriums of students and faculty. Let's just say that this man was - like so many great intellectuals throughout history - way ahead of his time.Perhaps not everything that he postulated is spot-on or even scientifically viable, but neither was Darwin's; as much as his theory of evolution has been accepted by mainstream science; even Darwin would admit that the fossil record has not been as forthcoming or cooperative as he had hoped it would be some 150 years into the future. But that's not what we are told, so I think we should try to keep an open mind when it comes to Velikovsky's unique brand of insight; especially his insight into the arcane and mysterious world of the past. Someone else (in one of those scathing 1 star reviews) questioned Velikovsky's scholarship due to the fact that he wasn't a geologist or astronomer or physicist, or a whatever. I think this is blatantly unfair and simple-minded. It is perhaps our good fortune that he was not hamstringed by these disciplines, and that he was able to 'think outside the box.' Can you imagine the grief one would have to suffer at the hands of 'peer review' for each scientific discipline involved. His book would never have been published in the first place, and oh how the academic powers to be, did not want this book published in 1950; sight-unseen and unread! However after a change of publishers, it was, and it then went on to be a number one best-seller for some 50 weeks (as I recall reading) running. Obviously he had struck a chord with the common person on the street; people fascinated and intrigued, people ready for something beyond the traditional "Sunday School Paradigm."I'm glad I did my homework, I now have this, 'New, unchanged edition (2009)' to read and I have read it with a new insight to this remarkable individual. I've also read "Ages in Chaos," which was intended to come out before "Worlds in Collision;" it too is controversial and captivating, more historical in content than the 'far-out' nature of 'Worlds.' There are also numerous books that discuss this man's life and the cross he had to bear. I would recommend "Carl Sagan & Immanuel Velikovsky" by Charles Ginentha, its fairly in-depth and revealing, and puts Dr. Sagan in a whole new light.Scholars the likes of Velikovsky or Zecharia Sitchin, were unfortunately never destined to be fully appreciated in their own time, and yet I would like to believe that future generations will recognize their accomplishments and their contributions to knowledge and ancient history, even though they might not might be mainstream now.

It is rare to come in contact with a real genius. "Worlds In Collision" will change the way you view the world. One reviewer wrote something like "this is either really profound or nonsense. If it's nonsense then it is the cleverest nonsense I've ever read..." I agree...Velikovsky is astonishingly thorough when comparing source from different cultures. He comes to several conclusions: the solar system has been subject to greater change than current thinking allows for. ~1500 BC a comet came close to the Earth. This "comet" was and is Venus. It sounds crazy when you first hear about it but makes sense when the sci fi notion of the "sun standing still" as attributed to the time of Joshua; plagues, floods, and so on are mentioned. (Clearly, survivors for political reasons attributed this cataclysms to God going into bat for them.)Homer's Iliad describing the Trojan Wars and the aerial conflict between Venus and Mars, ~700BC, are attributed as not being metaphorical but actual. Venus still not having achieved stable orbits has drags Mars into a unstable orbit.Velikovksy draws some other useful pieces of information: Venus didn't appear in mythology before the time of Joshua. Since it is inferred the orbit of Earth and thereby the length of the year has changed, it is observed by the author's research that prior to the time of the Trojan Wars all calendars around the world recorded 360 days in the year and not 365. There is evidence of the Earth's axis flipping; accounts of the "East" once being the "West" and vice versa,Emmanuel Velikovksy infers that ice ages are actually the moving of the poles as the Earth's tilt has changed to other cometry interactions; so therefore "ice ages" are not generic cooling periods at all but relocation of polar areas. Case in point; thousands of woolly mammoths died suddenly and with vegetable matter in their stomachs. Siberia cannot sustain such large mammals. Yet it seems that some turmoil caused rapid cooling along with floods and freezing.I first heard about Velikovksy when encountering the Electric Universe paradigm. (See The Thunderbolts Project on YouTube. ) I was very sceptical when I first heard despite almost immediately recognising the Electric Universe idea. I'm not a sceptic anymore. Read this book. You won't regret it !(Simon Smith - author of "Fake Aliens And The Phony Nuke World Order")

As the years roll and roll by since i first found Immanuel through the aether i just smile broader and broader and thank this wonderful man more and more.If you are reading this review then you have already tumbled down the rabbit hole or the universe has directed you with it's beautiful signs to the rabbit hole, this is the most sublime slide down (or up) the caduceus, enjoy your trip to Thoth/Mercury and Hermes.Oh and remember dearest heart "there is no religion higher than truth"... much love!Namaste

One of the most fascinating books I have ever read. Still controversial 60 years after it first appeared, "Worlds in Collision" is an alternative history of the inner solar system, suggesting that Venus entered the solar system as a large comet & was responsible for the events described in Exodus. Whether Velikhovsky is right or not, his description of the events of Exodus put in the context of this planetary near-miss is very powerful & moving. The whole book is superbly well written & is completely engaging from start to finish. If Velikhovsky is right, then this book is a most elegant expression of his theories; if Velikhovsky is wrong & the book is a load of rubbish, then it is the best written load of rubbish you could read. Either way, well worth reading. Velikhovsky was so convinced that he was right that he refused to alter any text in later editions, so whatever imprint you buy, the text will be the same, only the prefaces could be changed.

A very thought provoking book, that started me off on my trip down the "rabbit hole". Of questioning everything that did not fit right in our rather questionable existence. Of how subjects we are taught as kids is so very wrong. For me I see things as being patched up, a case of make do and mend. Excellent book.

Still as powerful as it was when I first read it back in the 60's. Catastrophism was young then. The current confusion between catastrophism and uniformitarian thinking illustrates how humans look for support for ideas they already believe. Velikovsky cuts through all that thinking and draws conclusions that many will reject purely because the implications put their current ideas into terminal decline. No wonder Velikovsky still speaks so long after his death.