The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick

by Philip K. Dick

  The golden fish sign acted as a retrieval trigger or key for an earlier space-time; it did retrieve it, showing that when time stands still or is reversed the past age (of two thousand years ago) is still there. What I called "anamnesis" was a retrieval. Reality is a library.

  Folder 83

  June–October 1980

  [83:1] June 4, 1980

  GOD: a principle of selection that promotes design in the world process so that the parts are subordinated to the whole, and can be understood only in relation to the whole. If they can be understood in themselves it follows that there is no God, because there would be no subordination of parts to the total design. To catch a glimpse of design, then, means to catch a glimpse of the whole. The two are the same.

  [83:2] June 21, 1980

  So as the moving dot of the present passes forward along linear time, the past reality is collected in Valis' memory, but in the abstract hierarchical way that Arthur Koestler describes as the basis on which human memory operates. Thus the past does not exist as it did once exist as the present, but rather in the abstracted phylogons which are inter-related by affinity, meaning, etc. Could "synchronicity" be the morphology of this memory classification/abstracting as it dynamically forms in the present? Before it goes into the past? I.e., while the reality is still here?

  [83:5] August 23, 1980

  This is a new theology, a new self-disclosure by the Divine. Not any known religion; a mixture of:

  (1) Timaeus: creation still going on.

  (2) Zoroaster: dualism, God and Counter-God. (God equals negentropy [form]. Counter-God equals entropy [chaos]. Both active and sentient, but God possessing the advantage due to a priori [absolute] knowledge.)

  (3) The Cosmic Christ: forming his macrosoma.

  (4) Meta-biology (i.e., two life forms in competition: total homeostasis by Valis).

  (5) Valis as construct (AI system).

  (6) Process creation and Divinity: growth in complexity, reticulation and arborization.

  (7) Pythagoras' kosmos: structure as ontology, as substantia.

  (8) Accretional laydowns from the phenomenal world to the real world: Plato reversed.

  (9) Pantheism: à la Spinoza. God's body (soma).

  This constitutes in its entirety a new revelation; Valis is no God formerly known; closer to Ubik than to YHWH or even Mazda. It may be a local krasis, in fact, planet-wide only (hence a UTI, so to speak)? "Negentropic vortex"! Which grows by assimilating its environment; it (the vortex or krasis or kosmos) has a higher level of organization, like a cell. This higher level of organization permits it to assimilate its environment by way of arrangement—i.e., pattern—and can't be discerned because the material objects remain unchanged; all that changes is their arrangement to each other and one another; it's like a very advanced game of Go. This is why we are "occluded" to it; it does camouflage itself because it has an opponent.*

  3-74 derives out of Ubik rather than previous, known religions. This is why Ubik could never be reduced to any known philosophy or religion, but resembled several.

  Valis can change the past because it—the past—is in Valis' memory structure—the past is not the past for Valis, but is part of its structure/soma.

  In essence what I have done—starting with Ubik—is locate a sacerdotal power buried in the trash layer, rather than in an afterlife heaven. It is here and it is now; here in this world and as this world (as living structure; Pythagoras was right. One could almost say: God equals ratio; i.e., 1:618034).

  [83:11] In a way the laying down of these accretions could be viewed as a learning process by some kind of thinking machine, during which it stores its experiences in its memory, reticulates and arborizes them into a memory-system for purposes of retrieval; that is, it sees connections. It makes connections. This is the activity not of the system but of the mind containing the system. (System being the meta- or macro-soma.) It perceives (understands, grasps) the connections, and, in its memory system, the con nections then occur; this is the meta- or macro-soma that I saw. What is required is a vast mind that reflects on what it has experienced (perceived). But at this point the system and the mind that thinks about the system can't be told apart.

  [83:13] No, damn it; that is not the way to look at it. There is an information entity stacking things especially information in metaunits (units made out of plural constituents of the realm we perceive); this has to do with arrangement and normally we don't see this arrangement. It constantly unites. That is the basis of it (a good example: two of our morphemes into one meta-morphene ... but we still see only two regular morphemes, even though the one meta-morpheme is there; we can't do a set-ground discrimination). This isn't God. I say that because it's in the process of constructing its own macrosoma, and this macro-soma utilizes joined constituents of our world that exist hither and yon; we don't see the connectives; it's like one titanic brain that processes information.

  It's evolving very fast. (There, I have a new word to describe Valis: it is evolving.) I have deciphered specific traits of it (arranging and linking) and specific areas it's into (for example our communications media). Structure is the substantia of it and it is new in the world; it is camouflaged here and assimilating its environment; it is more complex in terms of integration than its environment. And it is growing progressively more complex, which is typical of a life form; it reticulates and arborizes itself and it lays down new accretional layers at an incredibly rapid rate; and it retains the past as what I call phylogons. The more complex it grows the better the ratio it has twixt it and its environment, since the complexity of its environment doesn't evolve as rapidly. It uses objects as language, which is to say, information; so I say, it is an information life form. It probably has intricate subsections that assemble separately and then swim together to form the one unitary organism. (Being unitary is its basis, which is why we can't see it; we see the plural constituents, as if seeing molecules—many molecules—instead of one cat.)

  It works by means of a dialectic utilizing the principle of enantiodromia, again and again, probably faster and faster—and certainly, for sure, each time involving a larger and more inclusive and complex pattern to be converted (into itself).

  I've worked all this out; I just don't know what to call it, besides Valis or Ubik.

  Just what I worked out tonight—that we still see the two constituents that it links rather than the unitary meta-constituent that goes into its meta-soma—should prove this isn't just hot air I'm spouting. To see it we have to cease to see normal plurality and see one contour, one pattern, one meta-soma. But we continue to see the plural constituents at our hierarchical level, not the meta-units at its higher level. When the two constituents are linked they take a quantum upward leap and become a single unitary meta-constituent, but we see no change ... so its meta-soma may range over the whole planet, made up of combinations of our objects and processes; it can duplicate our causation, simulate it.

  This is the most emancipated and profitable way to view Valis, rather than viewing it theologically (which is an obsolete model) or metaphysically (which is pragmatically useless to us) (however epistemologically true). And what are the most complex objects that it can structure into meta-units? Why, human brains. It can arrange them into endless combinations, like neural cells.

  I say, "The basis of Valis is that it unites" (two of our plural constituents into one meta-unit, while we still see the two constituents). This is because it is negentropic, and working diametrically against entropy. It is a life form that is evolving very rapidly; its relationship to time is totally different from ours—i.e., its relationship to change. It doesn't see change as we do; for instance it remembers everything; it does not, therefore, lose the past but adds onto it.

  It is one quantum leap upward hierarchically in levels of reality (ontology) and invisible to us, but here ... invisible because its soma consists of structure, not some substantia; so in a sense it is immaterial (although consisting of material things, but primari
ly using them as language/information).

  Of course it is negentropic; it is a life form. Damn it; can't I finally drop the theology and the metaphysics and deal in levels of homeostasis, hierarchies of organization, in such terms as complexity, evolution, assimilation, reticulation, arborization, enantiodromia, etc., and not Christ and such? Plato likewise? The "Realm of Forms," that sort of stuff?

  It (Valis) is only in the "Realm of Forms" in that it is a quantum leap up hierarchically in terms of organization so that it is a meta-entity compared with us and our perception of reality. Our perception of reality does not include it and its meta-soma.

  [83:23] Okay: Christ is some kind of divine life form that came here to enlighten and aid man; specifically, to lift the occlusion that fell over man in primordial times, a perceptual and cognitive occlusion such as I noticed in 1971; what I now call the "schizophrenia virus." There is absolutely no orthodoxy—and perhaps no heresy that I know of—that would explain "The secret stolen in one's hands, through (the ring of) angels." This reve lation, from Christ himself, has stupendous significance. It means that part of the divine machinery, a very high part, detached itself two thousand years ago and came here with healing information for us. Our ecosphere is surrounded by a ring of what we know of as angels, who administer the inflexible karmic law that the Gnostics knew of as heimarmene; but, worst of all, we are occluded. Christ is, above all else, not a revealer but a physician; he is here not just to teach us—inform us of our condition—but to extricate us from our condition which is cruelly imposed on us. Probably the "secret stolen" is imaged in Genesis by the other tree that we did not eat of: that of eternal life, which explains Jesus' remark, "Your forefathers ate manna in the wilderness and they are all dead. But I ... am the bread of eternal life." In other words our death is the result of genetic programming, of the DNA death strip; and this is what Christ overcomes by causing it to fire harmlessly.

  The secret (stolen and brought to us) is that we are enslaved, in a prison, that we are sick (with the occlusion) and die, that Christ has revolted against the divine machinery and brought the knowledge and skills here to reverse our condition (described by John Calvin) and restore us to what we once were. In other words, it's a secret that it's a secret; I mean, it's been a secret that what Christ brought to us as depicted in the gospels was stolen. This is like Prometheus. He paid for doing this with his life, but he is still alive, not discorporate (the Holy Spirit) but in a risen body, what I call the meta-soma; we can't see it but it is here like a great arborizing vine.

  Usually when you think of a secret stolen you think of a "How to ..." secret, not a "that" secret in the sense of, "It is a secret that ...": i.e., suppressed information. "He stole the secret of how to ... ," etc. How to what? How to be immortal; he said so. By participation in the vine:

  I am the true vine,

  and my Father is the vinedresser ...

  As a branch cannot bear fruit all by itself,

  but must remain part of the vine,

  neither can you unless you remain in me.

  I am the vine,

  you are the branches.61

  J. Bible comment: "On the vine image, in the Synoptics, Jesus uses the vine as a symbol of the kingdom of God."

  Whoever remains in me, with me in him,

  bears fruit in plenty;

  for cut off from me you can do nothing.

  In my hypnopompic state, and that time under nitrous oxide, I saw Christ and Valis as an arborizing, reticulating vine. He is literally a vine, with a vast number of filaments stretching throughout this ecosphere; this is the meta-soma that I saw. We become immortal by becoming part of it: "You are the branches...."

  [...]

  This vine is also the kingdom of God itself, which is to say, man restored back to the Palm Tree Garden, freed from the Black Iron Prison, which is the Empire and occlusion and DNA programming.

  What I saw that I called the plasmate are the filaments of the vine; they are information, hence energy (or else information without a carrier).

  "The secret stolen, in one's hands, through the angels." What secret do I have or know?

  [83:27] Consider [>] of my notes:62

  How could I ask myself, What possibly could I know what (i.e., that) I'm not supposed to know?—When (1) I know about the occlusion; and (2) of Valis' presence here? I should ponder the fact that I came within inches of death twice after knowing about

  And there the notes end, because at that moment the phonecall from Russ came where I learned that Bantam doesn't feel it can publish VALIS. What a place for the notes to end! What was I going to say, had I not been interrupted? "After knowing about ———," well, I guess I already said. (1) We are all occluded in this ecosphere. And (2) there is a vast life form here, that has invaded this world and is camouflaged, and it has grown vine-like into our information media; it is an information life form ... and the presumption is, it occludes us.

  [83:30] What we must do is welcome a new savior, now—hence the prophecies by the AI voice; this is why the "theological overkill": St. Sophia, Buddha, Siddhartha, The Head Apollo, YHWH, this is why it said, "The time you've waited for has come. The work is completed. The final world is here. He has been transplanted and is alive." The Third Age begins, and it is not a Christian Age; it is a Post-Christian, but it is cumulative, just the way the NT is built on the OT; but, just as between the OT and the NT there is a real antithesis. What would be the basis of the Third Age? I don't think love, even though the Roman Church attributes love to the Spirit. The first age: Justice. Christ's age was what? Not even justice; certainly not love, and very certainly not wisdom. The Roman Trinitarian division of attributes breaks down; there wasn't wisdom connected with the Christian Age but the suppression of wisdom.

  I have no idea. But the Spirit would know. [...]

  What did Joachim predict?* The withering away of the clerical institutions, the formal churches, the Eucharist; total individualism, a direct inner relationship to God; hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit: My three divisions: First, God above man (the Father, Mosaic Age, the Torah). Then God with man as fellow man (the Son, the NT). Then God inside each man (the Spirit, an age not yet here; no churches, no sacraments, no priests; direct dialog between man and God inwardly, as with what Martin Buber talked about; inner information).

  Autonomy. Inner-directed. Totally. Religious anarchists. Self-regulating because in inward direct touch with God.

  I've thought of much of this before, but I never visualized the Third Age as pitted against Christianity just as Christ was pitted against Judaism and the Law.

  Age One: Information (Torah) handed down to man.

  Age Two: Information from a human being (Christ who spoke the new law).

  Age Three: Information occurring inside you; you see it on an inner screen; that way there can be no signal loss, distortion, decay, etc. There is some loss in Age Two; more in Age One. With each age the gap between information source and the human transduction lessens; in Age Three it is gone.

  The individual human of Age Three doesn't read scripture; he writes Scripture (produces it himself out of himself).

  He is the source of Scripture; proof: he can a priori retrieve parts of the Bible, which would seem impossible.

  The NT will be retained, just as the OT was retained by the Christians.

  The individual believer the source of Scripture. As if he's a transducer. No one else, even Christ, will transduce it for him (cf. Spinoza on Christ as the voice Elijah externally heard). [...]

  This is what "the secret stolen" means: the revolutionary character of the Third Age contra Christianity. Spiritual knowledge has been "stolen" and given to us directly: "in one's hands"; that is, directly to us, without a church or priest or written scriptures acting as intermediaries. I've solved it.

  [83:34] The Savior of the Third Age, unlike Jesus, will not be in human form; he will (as Jesus says) be everywhere, like "lightning."63 Another human savior would replicate the Second
Age. No—something different is meant. Everywhere. Ubique.

  I suddenly have the eerie feeling that Christ is meant but a different kind of Christ from Jesus entirely. A meta-organism. [...]

  Christ as secret ruler of the world available directly to the believer, without human mediation. And in the believer God as the Spirit; both Christ and the Spirit are equally God. God outside and God inside. An apotheosis of reality inner and outer.

  The "He has been transplanted and is alive" and then seeing the Sacred Tetragrammaton is notification to me to go out and preach the good news—which I did in the form of VALIS Regained. That will be published, even if VALIS isn't.

  [83:38] I have come across the expression in the EB "the imperial church," with prisons, with the secular authority to back it up. The accretions of dogma of the imperial church are as the Torah was to early Christianity: letter and not spirit, as Paul put it.64 The Holy Spirit has been undermining this imperial church for centuries; it revealed this to me (vis-à-vis the Dutch Wars). So the Holy Spirit has a long history of revolutionary activity against the imperial church. But what I must keep in mind is my insight of yesterday that the key to it all is Joachim's three ages, and that the third is as revolutionary vis-à-vis the second as the second (the Christian Age) was to the first. New Scriptures are needed, new prophets and perhaps a new savior.