Immanuel Velikovsky

Immanuel Velikovsky (1895-1979) was a Jewish cosmologist, historian and psychologist who in the 1950s proposed a radical new interpretation of ancient history and the evolution of the solar system in order to reconcile Biblical accounts with observed fact. In particular, he hypothesised that the planet Venus was originally a comet ejected from Jupiter around 1450 BC, and went careering around the solar system disrupting the orbits of both Mars and Earth before settling into its present orbit. These disruptions, he believed, could account for all the apparent impossible things described in the Bible, from the parting of the Red Sea to the sun standing still. To accompany his astronomical theories he devised a totally new chronology for Ancient Egypt, moving the end of the Middle Kingdom to 1450 BC and making it coincide with the Exodus.