Like Sitchin's Genesis Revisited, this "companion volume" is basically a rehash of the first five Earth Chronicles books with a few things added in. This book focuses on "divine encounters" between "gods," aliens, and men. Prophets, kabbalah, lots of other stuff make their appearance here. If you squint your eyes, it makes sense. If you think about it a little, like all Sitchin's theories, it doesn't make much sense. At the end, Sitchin tries to determine who YHWH is. Although the evidence points a lot to Enki/Ea (Ea could be pronounced close to Yah), Sitchin says YHWH was the god of the Annunaki from Nibiru. Good only for completists. Or, if you don't want to read all the Sitchin books, read Genesis Revisited and then Divine Encounters. ( )

The interaction between the Divine and man are considered some of the most important and inspiring moments within each of the Abrahamic faiths, yet the question always is who was the Divine? Zecharia Sitchin reviews Divine Encounters throughout the ancient Near East whether recorded in the Bible or on cuneiform tablets in this companion volume to his series, The Earth Chronicles.

Through the first three-quarters of the book, Sitchin reviews numerous encounters that he has previously written about. Among these topics are the Creation of Man (the “first encounter”) and the Fall, the sexual encounters between the divine and man, the Flood, and man’s search for immortality all with their own specific chapters. Sitchin also covers visions, oracle dreams, and angels which he has previous mentioned and written about in his books, but never dedicated time to looking into them before. Where Sitchin really covers new material is the theophany at Mount Sinai, discussing the Prophets of the Old Testament, and finally an essay in which Sitchin examines which Annunaki was the God of the Old Testament.

For those that have read most of Sitchin’s books before, the majority of this book is a review of the previous five books he had written at the time of the publication. The only new ground that Sitchin covered was in the last quarter of the book in which he really examines Exodus, the Old Testament Prophets, and he examination of which Annunaki was the God of the Old Testament which resulted in a surprising conclusion especially for those reading this book for the first time.

Divine Encounters is a book geared for people who have never read any of Zecharia Sitchin’s work, but included material at the very end that was new for long time readers. While I liked the new material, the fact I had to reread nearly 300 pages of topics I’ve read over the course of five books was annoying. So if you’re a longtime read of Sitchin’s, get this book to complete your collection but read it last. If you’re a first time reader of Sitchin, the vast majority of the book will give insight into Sitchin’s theories which are fully fleshed out—except what is covered in the last quarter of the book—in The Earth Chronicles series. ( )