January 1977
Dick has evidently begun exploring outside of the Bible for answers. He is now convinced the divine entity which he encountered was Brahman from the ancient religion that was practiced in India during the Vedic period (1500—500 BC). Brahman (from my in depth study of the first line in its Wikipedia entry) is the ultimate reality in the universe. Dick compares Christ to Hindu’s Vishnu and calls Brahmanism his new religion.
The theme of all of Dick’s novels has been the idea that reality is not what it appears to be and he is not who or what he thinks he is. His 3-74 experience verified this. He believes what he saw when one world faded into the other may have been an alternate Earth. He tries to admit he may never be able to explain what happened to him. He consults the I Ching and interprets what it tells him to mean he escaped illusion and reached reality.
He thinks God may have tinkered with his past resulting in an alternate world for him. Where does this old world, the Black Iron world, exist? He examines different ways to model our world in relation to the Black Iron Prison.
Perhaps something has been mimicking the true world. Dick names this form-mimicker Deus Absconditus and speculates he was possessed by it in 3-74 due to his regimen of vitamins which allowed him to see the mimicry. Reinterpreting the Bible with this knowledge of the form-mimicker reveals a new way of understanding the puzzles of the Scripture.