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INTRODUCTION

Does our solar system contain a tenth planet on an extremely long and ellipticalorbit? Does an elusive tenth planet still lurk undiscovered in the distant darkdepths of space?

Astronomers are indeed sufficiently certain of such a planet's existence that they have already given it a name - 'Planet X', i.e. the Tenth Planet.But does this mysterious planet still exist or was it long ago ejected from our solar systemor else destroyed?

And what possible connection might there be between Planet X and ancient legendsof a god named Marduk or Nibiru?THE SEARCH FOR PLANET X

In 1978, the theory of Planet X took a giant leap forward when Robert Harringtonand Tom Van Flandern from the US Naval Observatory in Washington DC began to study new scientific data on the mass of Pluto and its satellite Charon. With thisnew data, the two astronomers were able to determine that the orbits of Uranusand Neptune had been disturbed by the gravitational pull of an as yet unidentified celestial body. In short, the two scientists had found new evidence for the old idea of the Tenth Planet.

Harrington and Van Flandern went on to use sophisticated computer modelling to propose that the Tenth Planet, named Planet X, had somehow ejected Pluto and Charon from their previous positions as satellites of Neptune.[2] They proposed thatPlanet X might have been an 'intruder planet' which had been captured in orbitaround the Sun 'in a highly eccentric and inclined solar orbit with a long perio

d'. Harrington and Van Flandern's calculations suggested that Planet X would have been 3-4 times the size of the Earth

In 1982, NASA themselves officially recognised the possibility of Planet X, withan announcement that 'some kind of mystery object is really there - far beyondthe outermost planets'.

One year later, the newly launched IRAS (Infrared Astronomical Satellite) spotted a large mysterious object in the depths of space. The Washington Post summarised an interview with the chief IRAS scientist from JPL, California, as follows:

A heavenly body possibly as large as the giant planet Jupiter and possibly so cl

ose to Earth that it would be part of this solar system has been found in the direction of the constellation Orion by an orbiting telescope... 'All I can tell you is that we don't know what it is', said Gerry Neugebauer, chief IRAS scientist.

Subsequent years saw little new information in the search for Planet X. Scientists, however, continued to carry out mathematical modelling of its characteristics. Their experiments suggested that Planet X was three to four times the size ofEarth and had an orbit inclined to the ecliptic by a massive 30 degrees; also that its position was three times farther from the Sun than Pluto.

In 1987, NASA made an official announcement to recognise the possible existenceof Planet X. The American journal 'Newsweek' reported that: NASA held a press co

nference at its Ames Research Center in California last week to make a rather strange announcement: an eccentric 10th planet may - or may not - be orbiting theSun. John Anderson, a NASA research scientist who was the principal speaker, has

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a hunch Planet X is out there, though nowhere near the other nine. If he is right, two of the most intriguing puzzles of space science might be solved: what caused mysterious irregularities in the orbits of Uranus and Neptune during the nineteenth century? And what killed off the dinosaurs 26 million years ago ?

But as the 1980s drew to a close, the scientific journals began to witness a Planet X debunking campaign and now, as we enter the new millennium, few astronomer

s are willing to admit the possibility that a tenth planet might have existed ormight still exist. They prefer to think that the old records of the deviationsin the orbits of Uranus and Neptune were somehow incorrect.

MY OWN SEARCH FOR PLANET XIt was in 1989 that I was first made aware of the Planet X theory, thanks to theAmerican author Zecharia Sitchin and his book 'The Twelfth Planet'.

In 'The Twelfth Planet', Sitchin cited the modern search for Planet X in order to provide scientific backing for his interpretation of certain Mesopotamian legends. According to Sitchin's interpretation of these legends, Earth had been visited long ago by a race of extraterrestrial gods known as the Anunnaki, whose hom

e planet had been involved in a catastrophic encounter with the proto-Earth billions of years ago. In Sitchin's opinion, the home planet of these gods was noneother than the elusive Planet X which was being sought by modern astronomers.Intrigued by Sitchin's research, I devoted an entire chapter to Planet X in my 1996 book 'Gods of the New Millennium' and I suggested that the planet was currently at the most distant point (the apogee) in its highly elliptical orbit. The big question was when Planet X would return. It was a question made all the moreimportant by Sitchin's claim that the planet was populated by an intelligent, human-like race of 'gods'.

With hindsight, many of my comments in 'Gods of the New Millennium' (1996) wereill-conceived. More pertinent by far are my remarks in 'The Phoenix Solution' (1998), which benefit substantially from the input of the American astronomer Tom

Van Flandern - the man at the heart of the search for Planet X.

IS 'PLANET X' A 'PLANET EX'?According to Tom Van Flandern, it is entirely possible that Planet X began its career in our solar system as a distant outer planet, which was disturbed from its orbit by the force of a passing dwarf star. This interaction would have causedPlanet X to veer into the heart of the solar system, towards a fateful encounter with one of the inner planets.

In his book 'Dark Matter, Missing Planets & New Comets', Van Flandern wroteas follows: 'Statistically, a few passing stars would approach within 40 times Pluto's distance of the Sun over the life of the solar system. They would tend toperturb the outermost planets... into planet-crossing orbits. Eventually the crossings would result in close encounters between planets.'

According to Van Flandern, this perturbation process was not only feasible but inevitable, given the existence of planets in such distant orbits.

Van Flandern noted, however, that once Planet X had been forced inwards, it would suffer repeated encounters with the other planets, eventually leading to its ejection from the solar system. Van Flandern confirmed that such a planet-crossing orbit was highly unstable and unlikely to last for more than 100,000 years, mainly due to the powerful influence of Jupiter, by far the largest planet of thesolar system:

If Planet X crosses Jupiter's orbit, it is a goner, either by collision with Jupiter or ejection from the solar system, within 100,000 years... The encounters with Jupiter are not merely potential, but inevitable, because of forced precessi

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on of the orbit by Jupiter... Jupiter's gravity is so strong that it can eliminate another body in a single close approach.

Might it be the case, then, that Planet X is no longer part of our solar systembut was long ago ejected into the depths of space?

But there is yet a further twist to the Planet X story. In his 1995 paper 'Origi

ns of Trans-Neptunian Asteroids', Van Flandern reacted to the recent discovery of a new asteroid belt lying deep in space beyond the planet Neptune by suggesting that Planet X might have exploded - the asteroids being its fragments.

Four years later, in the September 1999 edition of 'Meta Research Bulletin', VanFlandern reacted to the discovery of yet more Trans-Neptunian asteroids by issuing the following statement:'[The discovery of] Three more trans-Neptunian objects confirm the presence of asecond asteroid belt in the region beyond Neptune. This probably indicates thatthe hypothetical Planet X is now an asteroid belt rather than an intact planet.'Might Planet X now be a 'Planet Ex'?

MARDUK AND PLANET XIn his book 'The Twelfth Planet' (1976), Zecharia Sitchin added a new dimensionto the Planet X debate with his contention that ancient astronomers had referredto the intruder planet using the names 'Marduk' and 'Nibiru'.

To deal with Marduk first, Sitchin rested his case upon the ancient Babylonian Epic of Creation known as 'Enuma Elish'. In Sitchin's view, the Epic has Marduk originate from the abyss of space as an intruder planet. This planet Marduk thenunderwent various encounters with the outer planets of our solar system, followed by a climactic and catastrophic encounter with a planet named Tiamat. According to Sitchin's interpretation of the Enuma Elish, the scarred planet Tiamat wasshifted by the impact of Marduk's satellites into a new orbit to become the Eart

h, acquiring in the process a Moon (named 'Kingu' in the Epic) which was previously the moon of Tiamat. Marduk, meanwhile, sailed off into space to begin a vastelliptical orbit which would bring it back to the site of the celestial battleevery 3,600 years.

In 1997, I wrote to Tom Van Flandern in an attempt to correlate Sitchin's theorywith what appeared to be a similar myth in the ancient Egyptian texts. But VanFlandern stopped me in my tracks by informing me that Sitchin's interpretation of Enuma Elish was in total discord with the laws of celestial dynamics.

In response to Sitchin's proposal that the Earth had had its orbit changed physically as a result of a collision with another planet in the vicinity of the asteroid belt, Van Flandern pointed out to me that:A major collision must change theorbit because it changes the momentum of the planet. The new and old orbits must share a common point at the site of the encounter. So a collision cannot takea planet from one circular orbit to another because such orbits have no points in common.

In other words, it was impossible according to the laws of celestial dynamics for Planet X to have shunted Earth from an orbit in the asteroid belt to her present orbit,because the new orbit does not share a common point with an old orbit in the asteroid belt. Van Flandern also commented that:

The least probable orbit to result from a random momentum change [i.e. a collision] is the circular orbit, which in a sense is the most relaxed, least energetic

orbit for that distance from the Sun.

Since the Earth's orbit was almost perfectly circular, Van Flandern ruled out an

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y possibility that Earth had suffered a major catastrophic collision. And thus he negated the idea that the Babylonian Epic of Creation, as decoded by Sitchin,was a historical record of events in our solar system.

There is, of course, no law which requires an ancient cosmogony to be scientifically valid. Nevertheless it is appropriate to reconsider what Enuma Elish actually says about Marduk and Tiamat. Was Tiamat a planet which gave rise to the main

asteroid belt? And was Marduk an intruder planet which emerged from the outer region of our solar system?

In my book 'When The Gods Came Down' (2000), I put forward a new interpretationof Enuma Elish which differs significantly from Sitchin's scenario of Marduk asan intruder planet. The following paragraphs summarise my new understanding of the Babylonian Epic.

The opening lines of Enuma Elish describe a sacred marriage between Apsu and Tiamat in the heavens. The waters of Apsu and Tiamat are joined together (line 4),and gods are formed inside their collective body (line 8). These gods are Lahmu,Lahamu, Anshar, Kishar, Anu and Ea. The Epic describes these gods causing a tre

mendous noise in the heavenly abode and upsetting the belly of Tiamat as they surged back and forth within her. Apsu then decided to destroy these gods, but Ea,catching wind of the plan, made a pre-emptive strike and destroyed Apsu. Tiamat, it would seem, stood idly by while her consort Apsu was vanquished, and henceshe became the target for revenge by Marduk - a theme which dominates the remainder of the Epic.

Several further points now need to be made to clarify our understanding of the Epic of Creation. Firstly, there is no basis whatsoever for supposing that Apsu was the Sun, as Sitchin suggested. In fact, Apsu was a planet, and the first section of Enuma Elish describes how this planet was vanquished and cast down to theEarth by Ea.

Secondly, there is no basis whatsoever for supposing that the gods produced by Apsu were planets of the solar system, as Sitchin suggested. These gods were in fact produced from within Apsu himself (Tablet I, lines 3 & 9 of the Epic); in other words, the planet of Apsu exploded. Therefore, there is no basis whatsoever for supposing that Lahmu and Lahamu were Mars and Venus, or that Anshar andKishar were Saturn and Jupiter, or that Anu and Ea were Uranus and Neptune. These are all false premises.

Thirdly, Marduk did not appear from the cosmic abyss, as Sitchin suggested, butwas born in the Earth in the same manner as the Greek Titan-gods. This is evident from lines 73-84 of the Epic, which describe Marduk's mother and father as Damkina and Ea (incidentally, the Assyrian version of the Epic suggests that Marduk's mother and father were Lahmu and Lahamu). But Ea, we are told, resided in a 'sacred chamber', otherwise known as 'the chamber of fates' (lines 75 & 79).Where was this chamber and dwelling place of Ea? We know from line 71 that it was 'established upon the Apsu'. Where was the Apsu? It was the underworld of theEarth, for it had earlier been cast down from Heaven (lines 60-70). In summary,then, Marduk was created in the heart of the holy Apsu (line 82), which was theunderworld of the Earth, and he then soared up into the heavens metaphysically to do battle against the planet of Tiamat.

(This, incidentally, is the same scheme as found in the legends of ancient Egyptand Greece, and Marduk was described in typically Titan-like terms, with four eyes, four ears, four winds, and fire blazing forth from his lips.).Fourthly, there is no basis whatsoever for suggesting (as Sitchin did) that Mard

uk encountered the other planets of the solar system en route to his battle withTiamat. These other 'planets' (Ea and Anu) were in fact the gods which had emanated from the interior of the exploded planet Apsu.

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Fifthly, the battle between Marduk and Tiamat was not a collision between two planetary systems. Yes, Tiamat was a physical planet, but Marduk was a metaphysical avenger-god who rose up from the Earth. The result of the battle was the deathof Tiamat - a planetary explosion (and incidentally the second of two planetaryexplosions which are described in the Epic).

Sixthly, it is incorrect to suggest (as Sitchin did) a break in the battle, pending a future orbital return of Marduk. What the Epic actually says is that 'Valiant Marduk... turned back to Tiamat' (Tablet IV line 128). This could be read inmany different ways, but in any event Marduk did not take the form of a physical planet with a conventional orbit.

Seventhly, where ancient texts referred to Marduk as travelling between the locations AN.UR and E.NUN, it must be understood that these were not the perigee andapogee of an orbiting planet . On the contrary, AN.UR was simply the Earth, whilst E.NUN was simply the Deep, i.e. Heaven. By the same token, when Marduk saw 'all the quarters of the universe', this meant that his realm spanned the twin planets of Heaven and Earth, for the Sumerian term for 'universe' was AN.KI, meani

ng 'Heaven and Earth'. (Virtually all of the activities of the gods in Sumerianlegends occurred between these two planets, which were at the heart of the exploded planet mythos.)

In summary, it must be emphasised that Enuma Elish does not refer to the role ofan intruder planet and it is entirely incorrect to associate Marduk with the Planet X which has been sought by modern astronomers.

NIBIRU AND PLANET XSo much for Marduk, but what about the Babylonian god Nibiru? Might he be identical to Planet X as Zecharia Sitchin suggested? In 'The Twelfth Planet', Sitchinpresented little or no evidence to support his case that Nibiru was Planet X. Having presented his theory of Marduk as the intruder planet, Sitchin just baldly

stated that: 'the Sumerians called the planet [of Marduk] NIBIRU'. He then wenton to translate every reference to 'the star' Nibiru as 'the planet' Nibiru.

But was Nibiru really identical to Marduk as Sitchin assumed? In Enuma Elish, following Marduk's battle with Tiamat, we find the first mention of Nibiru in Tablet V line 6, which reads:Marduk founded the station of Nibiru to determine the heavenly bands.

So, if Marduk founded the station of Nibiru, how could Marduk actually be Nibiru?Mesopotamian texts contain very few references to Nibiru and it is not at all clear what Nibiru actually was. Scholars generally suppose that Nibiru was Jupiter, but this identification is by no means certain. In 'Hamlet's Mill', the writers de Santillana and von Dechend covered the various theories of Nibiru - that itwas the planet Jupiter, the star Canopus, or even a comet - but they ended up by concluding that Nibiru was 'an unknown factor'.Who or what, then, was Nibiru? The best description appears in Tablet VII of theEnuma Elish, where Nibiru was listed as the forty-ninth of Marduk's fifty names:

Nibiru shall hold the crossings of Heaven and Earth,So that the gods cannot cross above and below; they must wait upon him.Nibiru is the star which is brilliantin the skies.Verily he holds the central position; they shall bow down to him.Saying: "He who restlessly crosses the midst of the Sea,Let Crossing be his name,he who controls its midst...May he shepherd all the gods like sheep.May he vanq

uish Tiamat...Because he created the spaces and fashioned the firm ground,Father Enlil calledhis [Nibiru's] name 'Lord of the Lands'."

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On the one hand, the reference to vanquishing Tiamat suggests that Nibiru was Marduk after all. This would imply that Nibiru, like Marduk, was a mythical Titan-like god, born in the Earth, who crossed metaphysically over the celestial 'Sea'between Earth and Heaven. But ancient mythology just aint this simple, becausegods often borrowed some of their attributes from other gods.

What kind of celestial body can 'cross the midst of the (celestial) Sea'? Thereare two possibilities, a planet or a comet, and both could be described as 'a brilliant star'. But how was it that either of these bodies managed to 'vanquish Tiamat' and 'fashion the firm ground', thus warranting the title 'Lord of the Lands'?

The answer, I suggest, is that Nibiru was not any planet or comet that is knownto us today but a manifestation of the exploded planet, which was at the heart of all religions in the ancient Near East. According to the beliefs of the ancient Egyptians and Sumerians, the exploded planet (God) had laid the foundations ofthe Earth at the beginning of time. It would thus follow that Nibiru 'controlled the crossings' in the same way that the Sumerian god Utu controlled the crossi

ngs between Heaven and Earth.

Nibiru, then, would have been an invisible, metaphysical, ghost-like god. And, like all exploded planet gods, the invisible Nibiru would have been worshipped inthe form of visible symbols . This would explain why Mesopotamian texts often referred to Nibiru in the manner of a visible star or a comet as, for example, inthe following passage:

The great star:At his appearance, dark red.The Heaven he divides in two,And stands as Nibiru.This reference to Nibiru dividing the Heaven in two echoes the Enuma Elish where Marduk attacked Tiamat and 'split her like a shellfish into two parts'. Furthermore, the imagery of Nibiru standing between the two halves of thedivided planet echoes the cylinder seal depictions (1) of Marduk standing in the

midst of Tiamat and (2) Utu - the fiery god of the exploded planet - emerging from his twin-peaked mountain in the eastern Sky.

The exploded planet hypothesis also explains why Marduk/Nibiru was said to havea weapon called 'Deluge' and 'Flooding Storm', for it was a common belief that the exploded planet had unleashed a huge flood of waters which fell to the Earth.Consider, for example, the following passage which refers to Marduk by variousnames including SHILIG.LU.DIG, SHUL.PA.KUN.E and, ultimately, Nibiru:

His weapon is the deluge...Supreme, Supreme, Anointed . . .Who like the Sun crosses the [two] lands...He who split the occupier [Tiamat] in two, poured her out,Lord who at Akiti time within Tiamat's battle place reposes,He whose seed are the sons of Babylon...He who shall create by his glow...Hero Supervising Lord, Whocollects together the waters,Who with gushing waters,Cleanses the righteous andthe wicked.He who in the twin-peaked mountain,Arrested the . . . When the savant shall call out 'Flooding',It is the god Nibiru,It is the Hero, the god with four heads.The god whose weapon is the Flooding Storm shall turn back;To his resting place he shall lower himself.

CONCLUSIONSIn summary, it is my view that neither Marduk nor Nibiru was a planet akin to the hypothetical intruder planet known as Planet X.Marduk, for his part, was a Titan-god, born of the Earth, who ascended to the heavens metaphysically in order to vanquish Tiamat. Admittedly he was then elevated to the status of a planetaryhero, but there is nothing in the Mesopotamian texts to suggest that this conque

ring planet came forth like an intruder planet from the outer realms of our solar system. Unfortunately the various Mesopotamian texts which deal with 'the battle of the gods' are very vague concerning the origin of the two combatants in th

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e original physical battle of the planets.

Nibiru, for his part, appears to be very similar to the Sumerian god Utu (aliasthe Akkadian god Shamash). In other words, he was a god of the exploded planet,but only in the sense of personifying the physical explosion and the subsequentmetaphysical resurrection of the planet. Hence Nibiru, like Utu, controlled thecrossings between Heaven and Earth.

Both Marduk and Nibiru, then, personified - each in their own way - key aspectsof the Babylonian exploded planet cult. They were not, I repeat not, physical intruder planets. Hence there is not a single ancient text which speaks of the gods coming down to Earth 'from Nibiru' or 'from Marduk'.

As for the real Planet X, there are scientific clues to suggest that it did onceexist, although it is unlikely to still be attached to our solar system. Furthermore, there is every possibility that Planet X has been discovered - not as anintact planet but rather in the form of the asteroids of an exploded planet, which now circulate in the mysterious depths of trans-Neptunian space.

Does our Solar System include an additional - as yet undiscovered - planet?By Alan F. Alford http://WWW.ERIDU.CO.UKAuthor of 'Gods of the New Millennium', 'The Phoenix Solution' and 'When The Gods Came Down'.