Plasma Ball
Rock art: comet or eruption?
Alaskan muck beds
Catastrophism
Many scientists now believe that the age of the dinosaurs ended when the Earth was hit by a meteorite, the resulting blast and climatic changes consigning them to history. However, there is evidence to suggest that global catastrophes have occurred during mankind's history, caused by one or more large cosmic bodies.
Astronomy: Many of the planets and their moons show signs of upheaval or external damage. Uranus is tilted at 98-degrees; Venus rotates 'backwards'; Mars is deeply scarred; Saturn's moon, Mimas, shows a crater of Death-Star proportions, and the asteroid belt may indicate remnants of a lost planet.
Geology: The Earth, in particular, is littered with the evidence of devastation: in Siberia, entire forests are found uprooted intermingled with ash, fossilised charcoal, and animal skeletons. In Alaska, trees are found twisted and torn, together with the dismembered animal remains.
Evolution: It appears possible that the catastrophic devastation and severe changes in climate accelerated the evolutionary process.
Psychology: If mankind witnessed such catastrophic devastation, he could not have been unaffected by all the death and destruction - it must be ingrained in his very psyche. At the same time, the trauma involved would have been so great that, in denial, it would cause him to deal with it by means of rites and sacrifices to heavenly gods, etc.
Oral traditions: Survivors will have told their stories to their children, these stories forming the basis of legends. Later generations, lacking knowledge about earlier catastrophes, interpret them as myths.
Rock art: In pre-history, mankind recorded catastrophic events in drawings and rock engravings.
Linguistics: As language developed, it was influenced by memories of catastrophes. e.g. the word 'disaster' coming from 'evil star', echoing fears of catastrophe of cosmic origin.
Interdisciplinary: Taken together, the evidence is corroborative and extensive, even if it can be explained in other ways.
Chronology
Thutmose III, 18th Dyn.,
(Velikovsky's Shishak) Credit
Ramesses II, 19th Dyn.,
(David Rohl's Shishak)
Credit
Ramesses III, 20th Dyn.,
(Shishak of Peter James et al)
Credit
- If worldwide catastrophes occurred (caused cosmically or otherwise), we should expect to find mention of them in ancient texts of the people affected.
- We should also expect to find them in the records of a particular people who were known to be closely associated with them at that time.
It was found that 'The Admonitions of Ipuwer' (also known as the 'Papyrus Ipuwer'), a text generally considered to be from the end of the Middle Kingdom in Egypt, appeared to tell of the same events as the disasters and plagues that befell Egypt at the time of the Exodus - although the end of the Middle Kingdom was supposed to have existed several hundred years prior to the biblical date for the Exodus.
However, when events so similar in detail are found, but in each people's past they appear to be hundreds of years apart, then we should consider whether the orthodox dating is correct.
- The conclusion that Velikovsky came to was that the dates assigned to the New Kingdom (and earlier) pharaohs of Egypt were wrong and should be drastically reduced.
- This reduction in chronology affected neighbouring Mediterranean states which were dated archaeologically by their links with Egypt, by removing the enigmatic 'dark ages' which occur in Greek and Anatolian archaeology under orthodox dating.
- Egyptian dynasties were brought forward in time c. 500 years by Velikovsky, but by only c. 300 years or 200 years by other revisionists.
- Under three main revisions, the biblical 'Shishak', who sacked the temple of Solomon, has been identified respectively with either Thutmose III of the 18th Dynasty, Ramesses II of the 19th Dynasty, or Ramesses III of the 20th Dynasty. Others would alter, slightly, each of the above revisions and identifications, while some have suggested far more drastic revisions in Egyptian chronology than Velikovsky.
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One biblical archaeologist has shown that a great deal of evidence from the biblical record and archaeology in Palestine indicates that a lowering of Egyptian chronology is necessary and evidence from other disciplines show similarly.