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The Divine Invasion
(VALIS Trilogy #2)
by
In The Divine Invasion, Philip K. Dick asks: What if God — or a being called Yah — were alive and in exile on a distant planet? How could a second coming succeed against the high technology and finely tuned rationalized evil of the modern police state?
The Divine Invasion "blends Judaism, Kabalah, Zoroastrianism, and Christianity into a fascinating fable of human existence" ...more
The Divine Invasion "blends Judaism, Kabalah, Zoroastrianism, and Christianity into a fascinating fable of human existence" ...more
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Paperback, 238 pages
Published
July 2nd 1991
by Vintage
(first published June 1981)
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Philip K. Dick - image from the LA Times
There is the usual time-tripping here. Pay attention. It is like a LOST episode, and indeed probably inspired some of the concepts used in that estimable show. You need to keep track not only of where you are in space, but in time. The Divine Invasion (no, not a John Waters film) posits a scenario in which god, Yahweh, was essentially booted off planet Earth after the unfortunate events at Masada. Now resident in an alien hill and renamed Yah, (so much c ...more

Lest God Forget
One of the central issues in Christian theology is the way in which the divine and the human can plausibly be combined in Christ. Once it was decided dogmatically that Christ was divine, the theological discussion turned to his two ’natures’ existing in one person. The resolution of this then raised the question of whether the two natures implied two ‘wills’. The controversy subsequently cascades into a series of doctrines and heresies. Monotheism was supposed to simplify things. ...more
One of the central issues in Christian theology is the way in which the divine and the human can plausibly be combined in Christ. Once it was decided dogmatically that Christ was divine, the theological discussion turned to his two ’natures’ existing in one person. The resolution of this then raised the question of whether the two natures implied two ‘wills’. The controversy subsequently cascades into a series of doctrines and heresies. Monotheism was supposed to simplify things. ...more

The Divine Invasion is a sci-fi alternate reality version of the second coming of Christ, told as only Philip K. Dick could.
More serious than VALIS and one his more serious works overall, PKD demonstrates his deep erudition of the Bible. Fundamentalists may be put off, and the reader looking for pure science fiction may be overwhelmed with his frequent references and quotes from the Bible, but this is an important work and one that must be read by a true student of PKD.
Dick also weaves a firm ...more
More serious than VALIS and one his more serious works overall, PKD demonstrates his deep erudition of the Bible. Fundamentalists may be put off, and the reader looking for pure science fiction may be overwhelmed with his frequent references and quotes from the Bible, but this is an important work and one that must be read by a true student of PKD.
Dick also weaves a firm ...more

This is kind of like when an old friend calls up and says he wants to see you, and you're like ‘Great! Come round!’ because he's smart and interesting and funny, and you sit around the table and open a bottle of wine, looking forward to an evening catching up, and he looks at you all excited and says he's got something absolutely amazing to tell you – and you're all, ‘Oh yeah? What is it?’ and he leans forward with his eyes shining and says:
‘I've found Jesus!’
And you kind of grin, but then you r ...more
‘I've found Jesus!’
And you kind of grin, but then you r ...more

This happens to be my third read and like the one that immediately precedes it, it's well worth the extra effort.
Absolutely amazing is only a part of what it is. It's also a complicated exploration of comparative religions, a roaring tale of a battle between God and the Devil, and it's also about totally re-writing reality because it's all a hologram... or is it?
It has the Living Torah, it has the Kabbalah, it has Zoroastrianism and Maat and the Fairy Queen and Palas Athena. It has a brain dama ...more
Absolutely amazing is only a part of what it is. It's also a complicated exploration of comparative religions, a roaring tale of a battle between God and the Devil, and it's also about totally re-writing reality because it's all a hologram... or is it?
It has the Living Torah, it has the Kabbalah, it has Zoroastrianism and Maat and the Fairy Queen and Palas Athena. It has a brain dama ...more

"Is there essentially one matrix world from which people derive differing perceptions? So that the world you see is not the world I see?"

synopsis: the Earth that is under the shadow of Satan, religion and government its twin rulers; the father who is not His father lies dreaming, of a singer; the mother who was a virgin is dead, assassinated; the Father who is God has lost the battle, driven from Earth; He who is the son of God, conceived on a planet far away, He who shall become God, fo ...more

The Divine Invasion: A dense gnostic allegory about salvation
Originally posted at Fantasy Literature
Before his death, Philip K. Dick wrote several books about suffering, redemption, and the divine in the contexts of Christian Gnosticism, Jewish Kabbalism, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, anamnesis, and the dualistic nature of the ultimate divine being. After writing two books that explored his personal religious experiences in 1974, Radio Free Albemuth (written in 1976 but not published until 1985) ...more
Originally posted at Fantasy Literature
Before his death, Philip K. Dick wrote several books about suffering, redemption, and the divine in the contexts of Christian Gnosticism, Jewish Kabbalism, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, anamnesis, and the dualistic nature of the ultimate divine being. After writing two books that explored his personal religious experiences in 1974, Radio Free Albemuth (written in 1976 but not published until 1985) ...more

“I chose God over the material universe.”
― Philip K. Dick, The Divine Invasion

Book 2 of Philip K Dick's VALIS Trilogy (Gnostic Trilogy [God Trilogy]), 'The Divine Invasion' is a funky PKDesque exploration of good and evil, God and Belial, gnostic truth, etc. In this short novel, Emmanuel (God) is smuggled back to Earth via the womb of a Jewish woman with MS. She is accompanied by Herb Asher, a DJ protagonist of sorts (Jesus as a DJ's son) who marries Rybys (read Mary) to assist getting her and ...more
― Philip K. Dick, The Divine Invasion

Book 2 of Philip K Dick's VALIS Trilogy (Gnostic Trilogy [God Trilogy]), 'The Divine Invasion' is a funky PKDesque exploration of good and evil, God and Belial, gnostic truth, etc. In this short novel, Emmanuel (God) is smuggled back to Earth via the womb of a Jewish woman with MS. She is accompanied by Herb Asher, a DJ protagonist of sorts (Jesus as a DJ's son) who marries Rybys (read Mary) to assist getting her and ...more

DAMN Philip K. Dick you have got some PROBLEMS, a great many of them with women. And you're so fucking brilliant and so messed up and weird. Did you realize there is ZERO feminist criticism of you? That's about to change, my new dead crazy fucked-up friend.
...more

I liked it, although I was confused a good part of the time and a stronger background in religious matters would have helped. But still, great classic PKD scenes and dialogue.
I'm enjoying the audio of the PKD novels I've listened to so far, and Dick Hill did a great job with this one. ...more
I'm enjoying the audio of the PKD novels I've listened to so far, and Dick Hill did a great job with this one. ...more

Feb 16, 2016
Wakizashi
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
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"When has the government ever told anyone the truth?” (p.76)
The Divine Invasion was published in the same year as VALIS. It is the second book in the VALIS Trilogy, although there is only a brief mention of VALIS in the story. Like VALIS it addresses religion and philosophy, but it’s not as tightly structured or plotted as the first book. In fact, some parts of The Divine Invasion feel like they belong to a completely different story. According to Jonathan Lethem, one of the editors of Dick’s Ex ...more
The Divine Invasion was published in the same year as VALIS. It is the second book in the VALIS Trilogy, although there is only a brief mention of VALIS in the story. Like VALIS it addresses religion and philosophy, but it’s not as tightly structured or plotted as the first book. In fact, some parts of The Divine Invasion feel like they belong to a completely different story. According to Jonathan Lethem, one of the editors of Dick’s Ex ...more

I feel sorry for Philip K Dick. I mean, before he died. It's probably a good thing he didn't live to see Hollywood steal all of his ideas and completely debase and dumb them down to make crappy forgettable movies, not mentioning his name anywhere for their inspiration.
But really, the guy didn't get the credit he deserved. He ate dog food and he only had time to write 200 pagers rather than the Infinite Jest-sized mega-beast I know he wanted to write. And then just as he was getting some money an ...more
But really, the guy didn't get the credit he deserved. He ate dog food and he only had time to write 200 pagers rather than the Infinite Jest-sized mega-beast I know he wanted to write. And then just as he was getting some money an ...more

Philip K. Dick did exactly the right thing with his encounter with the divine (or psychotic break, depending on who you ask). He /kept writing/. Divine Invasion is the second of the VALIS tetralogy, which includes VALIS, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer, The Divine Invasion, and Radio Free Albemuth. (RFA was published posthumously, but it still addresses the same themes. The Divine Invasion is probably the most coherent of the "VALIS series". VALIS was groundbreaking, and it shattered any pr
...more

Now my favorite book in the so-called "Valis Trilogy," The Divine Invasion takes the heady gnostic concepts of Valis and truly presents them in an unabashedly "sci-fi" context - the infant Christ has been reborn on mars to a woman with M.S. after a divine conception, and must be smuggled back onto earth, which is completely under Satan's control via artificial intelligence and totalitarian government. And that's merely the setup for a book that ends up in a completely different place than you'd
...more

... Dick can do better. While Valis was an incredible novel that fully explored Dick's enlightenment/mental collapse via a lifelong addiction to uppers and his views of the divine, electronic music and pink lasers, this book seems to be more os a scifi thriller that really fails to go anywhere, despite the fact that it's set on both intergalactic exploration outposts, as well as parts of NY and LA. The climax was weak, the whole concept of the divine as an illegal "alien" being aided by the phys
...more

What utter crap. The first 100 pages or so of the book were somewhat coherent while the last 140 were nearly unreadable. This is a book about how God manages to reincarnate himself again through a new virgin birth. And then Philip K. Dick goes off the crazy end and starts writing in his sleep or something. Kudos to those who loved this book and thought it was great ... but were you high when you were freaking reading it?

It's baffling to me that this is considered to be part of a trilogy with Valis and The Transmigration of Timothy Archer. Sure, they all contain religious themes, and underlying each of them you can see the struggle of Dick to interpret his mystical experiences. But beyond that they have very little, if anything, to do with each other.
I consider The Divine Invasion to be much less satisfying than Valis. None of the characters come alive on the page. Emmanuel and Zina are profundity-spouting cip ...more
I consider The Divine Invasion to be much less satisfying than Valis. None of the characters come alive on the page. Emmanuel and Zina are profundity-spouting cip ...more

This story is an amalgamation of various religions and philosophies, along with a bit of science fiction and fantasy. God finds that he needs to be smuggled back to earth, in the womb of a virgin woman, Rybys. God's mission in returning to Earth is to battle against Belial, a sort of Satan in the guise of a caged animal at the zoo. Rybys is very sick, and is granted permission to return to Earth for medical treatments. However, Earth is ruled by tyrannical religious leaders who try their best to
...more

One of my favorite Philip K. Dick books. It explores the theme of parallel universes that sneaks into most of his work, and gives a nail-biting account of Yahweh's, and creation at large's, struggle to survive in a world with harmful religious leaders and stifling bureaucracy. All of the characters really come to life for me, from the strong and grounded Rybys Rommey to the Scared-of-the-World Herbert Asher, who would prefer to live in his fantasies than reality, to the eerie and truly scary Bel
...more

A potent and heady stew of Judaism, Kabalah, Zoroastrianism, and Christianity...all cooked-up from Phil's bizarre 1974 religious experience. Of the thirteen PKD novels I've read to date, THE DIVINE INVASION was the most difficult and least humorous. It is the second book in the Valis trilogy. Heavy on theologic and apostolic ruminations, it's an alternate reality version of Jesus Christ's return to Earth. Three stars for my favorite character Herb Asher and his zany wife Rybys Rommey and preache
...more

This book is great for the dialogue between the characters. PKD takes a little bit from the various religions of the world and creates a science fiction story based very loosely on the second coming of Jesus Christ (Peace Be Upon Him). The novel is brilliant in it's depiction of two alternating realities (or worlds) at the same time. One world being more real than the next, and in the end creating a sort of amalgamation of both. The book is very epic in its prose and dialogue as mentioned before
...more

As with the previous book in the Valis trilogy, I give this one five stars with a big ol' asterisk next to it. There are people who are going to hate this book and throw it across the room, and I totally get it. It is weird, not much makes total sense at first glance, and the plot is all over the place. If you know and care who Philip K. Dick was and if you are into the weird ravings of crazy people (Grant Morrison and Robert Anton Wilson come to mind as other examples), however, then you just m
...more

Sci Fi meets the absurdity of religious thinking. This book, to my mind, exposes the ridiculous logic that religion imposes on humankind. It is full of magical thinking and contradiction and meandering reality set in a futuristic space drama. The story follows Herb Asher a recluse living in isolation on a distant planet and Rybys a woman neighbor. They have been chosen to be the parents for the second coming. They must return to Earth for the birth of the child but then complications arise from
...more

This novel was a difficult read. It contains a lot of profound meditation on theological issues like divine omnipotence and the reality of evil. It is so abstract though and there is not much of a plot, just a lot of wordy and artificial dialogue. It is based on a mystical experience that Dick had and it seems like he didn't spend much time integrating these experiences into a novel. Part of the problem could be that this novel is a part of a trilogy, which I did not know before I started readin
...more

"The Evil One in a cage at the zoo- what, with his own temperature and gravity and atmosphere, and imported food? An exotic life form?'
'He's angry as hell about it.'"
"You beguile me. You lead me from the path with sparks of light, dancing, singing, and the sound of bells; always the sound of bells."
"Do not make war on it but bring flowers." ...more
'He's angry as hell about it.'"
"You beguile me. You lead me from the path with sparks of light, dancing, singing, and the sound of bells; always the sound of bells."
"Do not make war on it but bring flowers." ...more

Apparently this is the follow-up to Valis. It didn't, for me, have the same impact and internal cohesiveness as Valis, but was nonetheless compelling in its own way. Dick is very much concerned with the eschaton, and this interest is given flavour by preoccupations with alternate realities and the effects of psychosis. What Dick really desires, it would seem, is to penetrate the multi-layered fog of paranoia and reach the truth. The troubling question is this: is the multi-layered fog actually t
...more

I'm not sure if the Divine Invasion is a good book or not, but I like it just the same. I like it because I have a taste for the bizarre and the out-there, and conceptually, this novel is as out-there as they come. This is the one where Philip K. Dick swan dives off the deep end, building on the metaphysical, theological, and philosophical mind-warp VALIS. I guess you can say it explains the events, what with the Empire and the pink dot and all, but it's the sort of explanation that might leave
...more
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Philip K. Dick was born in Chicago in 1928 and lived most of his life in California. In 1952, he began writing professionally and proceeded to write numerous novels and short-story collections. He won the Hugo Award for the best novel in 1962 for The Man in the High Castle and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for best novel of the year in 1974 for Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said. Philip K. Di
...more
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