A Sympathetic View of Immanuel Velikovsky’s Theory
When I discussed Immanuel Velikovski’s book, Worlds in Collision, I promised to provide two videos that discuss his theory. The first video discussed and criticized Velikovski’s theory about a comet coming into contact with Earth. The present video is more sympathetic to Velikovski’s theory.
Other Posts on Immanuel Velikovsky:
Immanuel Velikovsky and the Old Testament
Immanuel Velikovsky and the History of Israel
Video: Immanuel Velikovski: Worlds in Collision
Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary
Tags: Immanuel Velikovski, Worlds in Collision
Labels: Immanuel Velikovski, Worlds in Collision
posted by Dr. Claude Mariottini @ 8/21/2009 01:06:00 PM
8 comments
links to this post
8 Comments:
My dad knew Velikovsky, liked his theories, and had him speak at his synagogue in NYC.
Tzvee,
Velikovski's theory about the comet and the plagues is very attractive, but it seems to lack scientific evidence. This theory is more attractive than his reconstruction of history.
Your dad liked Velikovsky's theory; how about you?
Claude Mariottini
Some of the works of Charles Ginenthal, editor-in-chief of the journal ‘The Velikovskian’, that I have found impressive include the articles “The Nature of Venus’ Heat”, “A Tale of Two Venuses”, and his book ‘The Extinction of the Mammoth’. This latter book is discussed at the below webpage, and the two articles are listed.
http://www.velikovskian.com/backissu.htm
I am not an astronomer or professional scientist but the above three publications seem to provide some support for the main thesis of Velikovsky’s ‘Worlds in Collision’. Although I am not claiming that the main thesis is correct, I do think that it should be seriously considered by scientists. Also, Ginenthal’s book ‘The Extinction of the Mammoth’ seems to do an excellent job debunking the idea that man was mainly responsible for the extinction of the mammoth.
Adam Stuart
I wonder if much of the criticism concerning V. was that he was not an expert in these areas, but decided to comment on everything.
He sinned against specialization, so to speak. Not that this proved him right of course.
It seems that Velikovsky wrote on various academic fields because his search for truth led him into those fields. It is important to remember that many important discoveries in the history of science and technology have been made by non-specialists.
Here is an interesting webpage on Velikovsky’s ‘Oedipus and Akhnaton’ and other works. The postscript is also interesting.
http://www.datasync.com/~rsf1/vel/oedipus.htm
Adam Stuart
Neil,
Velikovski was a brilliant man, a man whose erudition is expressed in his work.
It is unfortunate that he developed a theory that has been rejected by mainstream scholarship. Only a small group of faithful still defend Velikovski's theory but in the end Velikovski's theory will not prevail.
Claude Mariottini
Dr. Mariottini,
Thank you very much for your four posts regarding Velikovsky including the two with documentaries, and thanks for taking the time to read and write them. I have appreciated your efforts greatly and so have hesitated to mention this, but I have noticed more and more misspellings of Immanuel Velikovsky’s last name at your blog. And so I hope you don’t mind my clarifying that his last name was ‘Velikovsky’, not ‘Velikovski’.
As for the link relating to ‘Oedipus and Akhnaton’ that I provided above, I was hoping that you would find the postscript about Pope John Paul II interesting.
In another comment I mentioned Egyptologist David Rohl and recommended his book ‘Pharaohs and Kings’ which discusses some ideas of Velikovsky on the Exodus and Hyksos. For interested readers I am providing the below link which is to an announcement about the Saturday 19 September 2009 Autumn Meeting of the Society for Interdisciplinary Studies (SIS). The scheduled meeting with lectures by David Rohl is to be in England. Although I do not think that Ramses II was Shishak and although I support Velikovsky’s dating of Ramses III, I think this event would be very interesting to attend.
http://www.sis-group.org.uk/david.rohl.sis.talk.htm
Adam Stuart
A "New Chronology Group" was created on Facebook. Check it out, join, and leave a comment.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/group.php?gid=184188839207&ref=ts
Jon Clark
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home