The Biblical Hebrew word לענה (la'anah), translated into English as "wormwood", occurs eight times in the Hebrew Bible, always with the implication of bitterness.[2]
The Greek word apsinthos, which is rendered with the English "wormwood",[3] is mentioned only once in the New Testament, in the Book of Revelation:
The third angel blew his trumpet, and a great star fell from heaven, blazing like a torch, and it fell on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water. The name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters became wormwood, and many died from the water, because it was made bitter. (Rev 8:10–11)
Apsinthos is believed to refer to a plant of the genus Artemisia, used metaphorically to mean something with a bitter taste.[4] The English rendering "wormwood" refers to the dark green oil produced by the plant, which was used to kill intestinal worms.[4] In Revelation, it refers to the water being turned into wormwood, i.e. made bitter.[4]
Other Bible dictionaries and commentaries view the term as a reference to a celestial being; for example, A Dictionary of the Holy Bible states that "the star called Wormwood seems to denote a mighty prince, or power of the air, the instrument, in its fall".[6]
The Swedenborgian New Church follows a spiritual interpretation of the star Wormwood based on other passages of scripture which mention gall and wormwood. The star signifies self-derived intelligence which departs from God,[9] thus it falls from heaven. For the star to make the waters of rivers and fountains bitter signifies to falsify spiritual truths,[10] as waters signify truths derived from the Word.[11] In general, the Book of Revelation is seen as a prophecy of the corruption of the Christian churches in the End Times, which is followed by the New Church signified by the New Jerusalem.[12]
A number of Bible scholars consider the term Wormwood to be a purely symbolic representation of the bitterness that will fill the earth during troubled times, noting that the plant for which Wormwood is named, Artemisia absinthium, or Mugwort, Artemisia vulgaris, is a known biblical metaphor for things that are unpalatably bitter.[13][14][15][16]
Due to the Russian word for Artemisia vulgaris being chernobyl (Russian: чернобы́ль, romanized: chernobyl', lit. 'black herb'),[17] many[18] have used the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986 as definitive proof that the prophecy in the Book of Revelation is correct.[19] The verses referring to a "star falling down and turning the waters bitter" are interpreted as the radioactive fallout from the disaster poisoning the environment around Chernobyl, leaving it uninhabitable.[20]
In the town centre of Chernobyl, there is the Wormwood Star Memorial, which depicts an angel blowing a trumpet, recalling the biblical prophecy.[21]
^ abcDanker, Frederick W (2000). "ἀψίνθιον". A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (3rd ed.). University of Chicago Press. p. 161. ISBN0-226-03933-1.
^Rand, W. W. (1859), A Dictionary of the Holy Bible: for general use in the study of the scriptures; with engravings, maps, and tables, Entry: WORM WOODatInternet Archive
^Nichol, Francis D (1957), The Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary, Volume 7, Revelation, p. 789, Review and Herald Publishing Association, Washington, D.C.
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