Immanuel Velikovsky and his Worlds in Collision, 50 years after… by Emilio Spedicato
Introduction alf a century a!o "more precisely in #$50 published by %c%illan, in #$5# by &oubleday, the house to 'hich the publications ri!hts 'ere transferred after boycott threats to %c%illan by the astronomical academia( a book 'as published of substantial si)e and very rich in references, titled Worlds in Collision* It 'as a bestseller in +S in #$5 and appeared in condensed form in -eaders &i!est, includin! the Italian version Sele)ione* .t that time the present 'riter 'as a schoolboy of seven, an avid reader of everythin! printed* I read the article in Sele)ione 'ith utmost fascination, bein! particularly impressed by the e/planation provided of the miracle of the Sun stoppin! in the sky durin! the sie!e of 1ericho* 2hen I for!ot both the name of the author and the book* 2hese I recalled suddenly over 30 years later, 'hen I 'as discussin! 'ith an Irish collea!ue some ideas I had developed about a possible catastrophic ori!in of ice a!es and e/planation 'ithin this conte/t of the ori!in of the .tlantis myth* Velikovsky had been for!otten at the conscious level, but had left a seed in the deep that 'as !oin! to !erminate* When his book 'as published, Velikovsky "later on referred to as V*( 'as unkno'n for most people, albeit he 'as 'ell kno'n to a limited number of scientists* Indeed, in addition to several papers in psychiatry, in the 2hirties V* had edited in collaboration 'ith .lbert Einstein the 4ournal Scripta +niversitatis atue 6ibliothecae ierosolymitarum, that 'as instrumental in leadin! to the establishment of the ebre' +niversity in 1erusalem* 2he !reat success of his book 'ith the public 'as due to several factors, partly related to a post'ar rea'akenin! of interests in reli!ious traditions and 'idespread critical sentiments a!ainst a science that had led to the atomic 'eapon and to the risk of a nuclear obliteration of humankind* .lso a factor 'as the publicity provided by the opposition to the book by the astronomical academia led by Shapley and 7ayne 8aposhkin, 'ho forced %c%illan to discontinue the publication of the book* 2here are not many authors 'ho incur the attacks of the academia, 'ho tends to simply i!nore those 'ho propose alternative points of vie' from the outside* Worlds in Collision 'as mainly devoted to a nonstandard presentation of events in the recent life of the solar system* In the follo'in! years V* published several other books 'ith no less revolutionary content in the field of !eolo!y, chronolo!y and ancient history* e !ave moreover talks in several countries and inspired a number of 4ournals and study !roups, 'ho further developed his ideas, some of these bein! still uite active* %any of the ideas of V* have by no' been accepted by academia, albeit uite often his precursor role is simply i!nored* &ebate and influence of V* have been uite si!nificant in the an!losa/on 'orld "+S, Canada, En!land, .ustralia and 9e' :ealand(* %uch less the attention in the ;atin 'orld, perhaps due to the less interest in these countries for biblical topics* Concernin! Italy, 'e should recall that V* !ot positive attention by the !reat mathematician 6runo de
'ith information on a forthcomin! symposium on V* or!ani)ed by the +niversity of 6er!amo* Immanuel Velikovsky= a bio!raphical sketch Velikovsky 'as born in #>$5 in Vitebsk, city of 'estern -ussia, then countin! about ?0*000 inhabitants, many of them 1e's, native city also of Cha!all* 2hird son, his name 'as chosen by father durin! a solitary promenade in the nearby 'oods* We read in his autobio!raphy &ays and @ears available in the internet site due to 1an Sammer "'''*varchive*or!( my name 'as chosen from a verse of the seventh chapter of IsaiahA there 'as no Immanuel amon! the ancestors kno'n to him… he e/pected from me a !reat role concernin! the tra!ic story of our nation…'e should see the personality of my father, a 1e' 'ith a vision of national rea'akenin!…* When I 'as seven my father sho'ed m the chapter of Isaiah 'ith the name Immanuel**** #>$5 'as the year 'hen
2he idea 'as reinforced 'hen he found a description of similar events in an E!yptian source, i*e* the Ipu'er papyrus of the ;eiden collection* e therefore abandoned his profitable profession of psychiatrist for a full time study lastin! many years of ancient and modern documents useful for his thesis* Worlds in Collision 'as the outcome of ten years of research in the !reat libraries of 9e' @ork and 7rinceton "he had moved to 7rinceton at the be!innin! of second 'orld 'ar(* Several other books follo'ed in a short time dealin! 'ith !eolo!ical issues "Earth in +pheaval( and especially 'ith chronolo!ical issues and correspondin! revision of ancient history of the eastern %editerranean countries* In 7rinceton V* reestablished freuent and friendly contacts 'ith Einstein, 'ith lon! discussions on astronomical and historical topics* Einstein freuently visited him at his home 'here his violin playin! 'as accompanied by the piano playin! of V* 'ife Elisheva* 2he story of his contacts 'ith Einstein in these years is available in another of the still unpublished books, 6efore the &ay 6reaks, available in the uoted internet site* &urin! the
D in 7rinceton, in #$?$* 2he archive of his 'orks H includin! several still unpublished mono!raphs H is under care of his survivin! t'o dau!hters, -uth, a psychanalist in 7rinceton, and Shulamit, 'ho lives in a kibbut) near aifa, married 'ith the 'ell kno'n mathematician .braham o!an* Worlds in Collision Worlds in Collision 'as published in +S by %c%illan in #$50 and from #$5# by &oubleday, that !ot the publications ri!hts from %c%illan, after Shapley let %c%illan kno' that its role of important publisher of academic 'orks in astronomy 'as threatened by the presence of V* book in its catalo!ue* 2he story of this censorship episode and of other events about the difficult relation of V* 'ith .merican academia is available in the book Star!a)ers and 8ravedi!!ers, published in #$>3 after V* death, copyri!ht of Elisheva V* Worlds in Collision had immediate !reat success 'ith the readers, albeit it had been re4ected by several publishers previously contacted "a similar story happened around that time 'ith 2hor eyerdahl on 2iki( and 'as defined by 9e' @ork 2imes . literary earthuake* In the preface to the paperback edition V* 'rote=
oyle one has any'ay to observe that he later became an advocate of radical ne' theories and has been in particular a stron! opponent of the bi! ban! theory, albeit this name 'as invented by him* oyle has uoted V* in his autobio!raphy "they met at a seminar !iven by oyle( 'ithout any of the usual heavy criticism by most people in the academia* 2he book Worlds in Collision is based upon the hypothesis that the events of clearly catastrophic nature described in ancient literature, particularly in the 6ible, are phenomena that really happened, 'hose e/planation cannot be !iven in a purely terrestrial conte/t and must therefore be found in interactions bet'een Earth and e/traterrestrial bodies* 2he book deals in particular 'ith t'o catastrophes= the first one associated 'ith E/odus, the second one 'ith the sie!e of 1erusalem by Sennacherib "that is dated some 0 years after Sar!on II had conuered and deported the 2en 2ribes of Israel, to a place that has been sub4ect of much discussion and that this 'riter have identified 'ith eastern .f!hanistan…(* V* claimed that the a!ents of the catastrophe 'ere not ordinary comets or asteroids but t'o planets, namely Venus in the first case, %ars in the second case* .ccordin! to him these planets had at that time orbits 'ith different shape, more elliptical than no', as conseuence of previous interactions 'ith other planets in the solar system "the story of the previous events in the solar system is partly !iven in the book .t the 6e!innin!, another of the unpublished 'orks available in the cited internet site(* 2he orbits of the t'o planets 'ould have been circulari)ed after the last catastrophe, thereby terminatin! for our planet the catastrophic era, 'here planets 'ere a real threat and 'here astrolo!y 'as a real science based upon the study of planetary interactions in a differently or!ani)ed solar system* 2he book is based mainly on the analysis of a hu!e number of classical and mytholo!ical references "about a thousand uotations, of te/ts in many lan!ua!es or of difficult access(* While the analysis is never uantitative H and a uantitative analysis of the scenarios proposed by V* 'ould even 'ith present computer po'er be beyond modelin! and computation possibilities JHV* is 'ell a'are of 'here modern science stood and has a number of pointed criticism to the traditional scenarios, in particular 'here they only consider !ravitational effects in the astronomical relations, ne!lectin! the electroma!netic effects, both on lar!e scale and in the study of close flybys of lar!e bodies* Worlds in Collision is 'ritten 'ith a very clear albeit synthetic lan!ua!e* We cannot here !ive a detailed presentation of the e/tremely rich content of this book, thus 'e only revie' some of the main theses* K V* stresses the information value of ancient te/ts, based accordin! to him on real e/periences lived in a different astronomical conte/t than no'* 2he idea that the events described in ancient te/ts pertained to real e/periences used to be accepted 'ithout difficulty in 'estern 'orld until Illuminism= this included in particular the idea of catastrophes 'ithin human memory, includin! the +niversal &elu!e described in the 6ible and in other traditions "&eucalion,…(* 2hese ideas 'ere accepted by 9e'ton and Cuvier* Illuminism started criticism of 6ible openin! the 'ay to the so called uniformitarism approach that became dominant in the #$th century thanks in particular to the 'orks of ;yell in !eolo!y and of &ar'in in biolo!y= the present is the key of the past, there are no celestial catastrophes today, there 'ere none in %oses time* 9o stones fall from the sky today, no stones could have fallen in the past "this e/treme statement dominated astronomy 'ell into the second half of #$th century, 'hen a heavy fall of meteorites in
and oceanic sediments, analysis of or!anic and inor!anic materials in lon! ice carrots e/tracted in 8reenland or .ntarctica, dendrochronolo!ical series e/tendin! no' to about #0*000 years in some cases* de!rees, a conclusion 'ith Velikovskian flavor* 2hey have moreover found that the body interactin! 'ith Earth at its perihelium 'ould be heated so much by the Sun that it 'ould move a'ay from the Sun as a !iant comet, surrounded by bluish hot !as over one million km diameter… a!ain a 'holly Velikovskian scenario* Futstandin! is ho'ever still the problem of provin! that the proposed roundin! of
orbits of Venus and %ars can be achieved in a fe' centuries, i* e a fe' hundred revolutions, albeit 'e are also not a'are of a ri!orous proof that it cannot* In conclusion, fifty years after Worlds in Collision 'e are facin! very open scenarios about the structural and dynamical confi!uration of planetary systems* 2his confirms the importance of the idea of V* to use the testimonial information from ancient people about the evolution of our o'n planetary system* K V* has also stressed the importance of electroma!netic interactions in astronomy, 'ith particular re!ard to close flybys of lar!e bodies* 8ravity still remains the only force considered by the ma4ority of cosmolo!ists for the evolution of the +niverse and smaller structures as planetary systems, despite the authoritative alternative ideas of 9obel 7ri)e .lfven "uoted in several papers by V*( on the role of lar!e scale plasma structures in the +niverse* Several problems have ho'ever arisen by usin! the classical 9e'tonian la' of inverse suare dependence on distance 'hen used on structures "!lobular clusters, !ala/ies, clusters of !ala/ies…( havin! much !reater si)e than the solar system si)e 'here epler derived his la's* 2hus the need of introducin! dark matter or even more e/otic structures and particles or to hypothesi)e a different functional relation to distance or to introduce ne' forces* V* had len!thy discussion 'ith Einstein on the role of electroma!netism in the +niverse, see his book in internet on his meetin!s 'ith Einstein* &evelopments of V* ideas on electroma!netism role are due to scholars inspired by V*, amon! them 1uer!ens, 2hornhill, 8inenthal, &e 8ra)ia, %ilton, :ysman* K V* predicted emission of radio 'aves from 1upiter, a hi!h temperature of Venus surface "'hen it 'as believed it should be a little above Earth temperatures( and that Earth 'as surrounded by a ma!netic field* 2hese forecasts 'ere confirmed 'ithin a fe' years and V* had his forecast reco!ni)ed in a letter sent to Science "# &ecember #$G( by the 7rinceton physicist 6ar!mann and the Columbia +niversity astronomer %ot)* V* had moreover often insisted 'ith Einstein to the purpose that durin! one of the first space missions his predicted radio emissions from 1upiter should be looked for* Einstein failed to obtain this e/periment and later sent a letter to V* e/cusin! himself for not havin! supported his proposal* K 2he detailed pictures obtained in the last years of the surfaces of %ars and Venus have sho'n uite surprisin! !eolo!ical features* Venus surface seems to have been recently melted or covered by ma!ma emissionsA erosion structures are essentially lackin!* %ars surface sho's evidence of very recent catastrophic sculpturin! events, includin! une/pected evidence of subterranean 'ater* .!ain there is a remarkable lack of the erosion phenomena that should have smoothed the planet surface in the course of the billion years of life in the standard model* . detailed analysis of %ars morpholo!y at the li!ht of V* hypotheses has been presented in a paper by 8inenthal at the 9e' @ork #$$5 conference for the centennial of V* .!es in Chaos 2he book .!es in Chaos 'as published in #$5, the first of a number of historical mono!raphs, follo'ed by Fedipus and .khnaton "#$G0(, 7eoples of the Sea "#$??( and -amses II and his 2ime "#$??(* 9ot yet published by available in the uoted internet site are the 'orks 2he .ssyrian Conuest and 2he &ark .!es of 8reece* 2he basic idea of V* is that the official chronolo!y of the first and second millennium 6C of E!yptian and other civili)ations dated by anchorin! them to the E!yptian one "%icenean, Cananean, +!aritic, Cretese, .natolian…( is affected by a substantial error* 2his is for V* the main reason 'hy scholars have essentially been unable to fit the events described in the 6ible 'ith the events described in
E!yptian or other histories* V* claims that the fundamental error lies in the absolute anchorin! of the E!yptian chronolo!y that 'as made about t'o hundred years a!o, at the be!innin! of E!yptolo!y "the times of ;epsius and Champollion(* . conseuence of this error has also been the introduction of so called dark centuries for the %icenean and .natolian civili)ations* one year after his death, has been recently reprinted but very fe' people have read itA his bio!rapher Westfall has defined readin! that book the 'orst penitence one can think of for a person*
sources 'as considered a si!n of unreliability of the 6ible as a historical document or at least of a tendency of the 6ible to amplify the importance of events relatin! the ebre's* 2he datin! proposed by V* redefines completely the historical settin! 'ith important conseuences on the follo'in! history, till the time of .le/ander, 'hen use can be made of the 'ork of the 8reek and ;atin historians* 9o' 'e select some statements from .!es in Chaos= K 2he .muLyksos controlled their territory from the city of .varis, that accordin! to V* 'as located near El .rish, in present 8a)a strip* In this area recent archeolo!ical findin!s have discovered ellenistic and E!yptian ruins under over ten meters of sand, 'hich means that a search for the ruins of .varis 'ould imply a hu!e and very e/pensive e/cavation 'ork K 2he .muLyksos 'ere e/pelled by a coalition of E!yptians that had taken refu!e in the south of E!ypt, and of ebre's led by Saul K 2he ueen of Sheba 'as the 'oman pharaoh atshepsut K 2he pharaoh 'ho invaded the land that had been the !reat kin!dom of Solomon 'as 2uthmosis III K .menophis III and .menophis IV ".khnaton( lived in the ninth century 6C, hence after Solomon "this eliminates any possibility of interpretin! .khnaton as the inspirer of %oses monotheism(* 2he El .marna archive of their letters, to be dated to the period >?0J>D0 6C, includes letters sent to the ebre' kin!s of the kin!dom of Samaria "capital city of the territory of the 2en 2ribes of Israel( and of 1erusalem "capital of the territory of the tribes of 1udah and 6en4amin(* In three recent mono!raphs the ;ebanese historian amal Salibi, professor at the .merican +niversity of 6eirut and director of the Interfaith Study Center in .mman, has claimed that the land of milk and honey 'here .braham settled "at a time that 'ithin the V* chronolo!y may be set at about #>50 6C, probably the time also of pharaoh Sesostris I the 8reat( 'as not 7alestine but the re!ion of southJ 'estern .rabia that is no' called .sir, rich of 'ater, pastures and forests* 2he present 'riter is of the opinion that the approach of Salibi can be blended 'ith that of V* contributin! to a further resolution of many pu))les of antiuity*
