Wormwood
Wormwood, also known as Encke, Apsinthos, and the Red Star, is a comet or a star that is said to appear during the Apocalypse. Despite its significance in the Book of Revelation, there is not much known about this celestial object.
Overview[]
Its only clear reference as a named entity occurs in the New Testament book of Revelation: "And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter."
Wormwood is also said to play a role in the Blackest Night. Wormwood is depicted as a red star that will be summoned by God and will loom over the Earth in the midst of the End of Times while further stating that only the Two Witnesses will be the first to see it. Wormwood will be used as a means to destroy Gog and Magog by expelling a great gaseous cloud upon the Earth that will envelope the planet and cause the armies of Gog and Magog to erode and be utterly eviscerated.
Description[]
Commentators favoring a naturalistic interpretation of Revelation 8:10 relate it to the last days, seeing Wormwood as a meteor fated to strike the Earth and cause environmental calamities. Others, while not specifying a precise method, see in the verse a "personification of something God threatens to do to His people when they allow themselves to be deceived by false prophets."
Various scientific scenarios have been theorized on the effects of an asteroid or comet's collision with Earth. An applicable scenario theorizes a chemical change in the atmosphere due to "heat shock" during entry and/or impact of a large asteroid or comet, reacting oxygen and nitrogen in the atmosphere to produce nitric-acid rain. The bitterness produced by the Wormwood Star upon a third of the Earth's potable water could be the Biblical prediction of acid rain from the heat shock of a large comet or asteroid's impact with Earth.