… and, appropritately, the name of Calvin’s teacher in “Calvin and Hobbes”.
According to Baba (my great-grandmother, mom’s side of the family) - there was a demon in Russian folklore named Chernebog (Chernybog? not too sure on the spelling), a large demon who would torment those in hell - I believe Disney used this as the basis for the “Night on Bald Mountain” sequence for “Fantasia”.
I was only six when she used to tell me these and stories about ‘Baba Yaga’ (Grandmother Witch) and about life in the ‘old country’, but this was one of the ones that really stuck in my memory (and scared me as a kid).
Not sure about the Wormwood or Christian connection.
Two cents rendered. Receipt please.
According to a friend from Kiev, it means “Black/dark legend”.
I don’t have the issue number here, but this whole question was addressed seveal years ago in The Skeptical Inquirer. The bottom line was “No, ‘Chernobyl’ does not mean ‘wormwood’.” The fundamentalists are working overtime again to shoehorn world events into their interpretation.
This subject was brought up almost a year ago now, I believe in MPSIMS. I’ve tried looking for the thread and can’t seem to locate it; it may be older than Sept 1999 and therefore someplace I haven’t thought of looking yet.
The actual spelling of the location in Ukraine is Chernobyl’, i.e. a ‘soft’ sign at the end. (For all you non-Slavic language speakers, a soft sign is a silent letter, indicating a change in the pronunciation of the preceding consonant.) Hence it doesn’t mean “was black”, since that translates as cherno byl (no soft sign).
According to one online Russian>English dictionary, byl’ does in fact mean “true story or occurrence”, but I don’t think it takes that meaning as far as the name of the place is concerned. I have a Russian dictionary at home - i.e. one that defines the Russian words in Russian - and I’ll take a look there to see if it gives any other definitions to byl’. AFAIK Russian and Ukrainian are close enough to believe that the same definitions would apply in both languages.
I tried the online dictionary MEBuckner linked to, but since I don’t have this thing set up for Ukrainian keyboard support it won’t work with me. Oh well.
I found this thread in Great Debates in which is debated the wormwood/Chernobyl question: The Bible and aliens
Just to update this thread with what I’ve discovered in my tireless (not to say obsessive) quest for The Truth:
The Children of Chernobyl (a charity for victims of the accident) includes this statement on its front page:
A quick search for “chernobylnik” turns up this web page (which appears to be from the Department of Biology at Yaroslavl State University), which confirms that the plant known in English as mugwort, scientifically classified as Artemisia vulgaris L., and called in Russian “Polyn obyknovennaya” is apparently also named (or perhaps nicknamed) “chernobylnik”. Mugwort is a very close relative of the common wormwood plant (A. absinthium).
I must say the fundies have really milked this one for all it’s worth. For example, from this site (evidently from a conservative Catholic, just for a change) asserts that “In slavic Bibles (i.e. Ukrainian and Czech Bibles at least), the term Wormwood is translated as Chernobyl in our languages.” I didn’t find any Ukrainian Bibles on line, and didn’t feel like shelling out seven bucks to buy one, but I did find a Czech Bible, and after a certain amount of horsing around with the thing (I don’t speak Czech), I was able to get it to cough up the following:
I know the Russian word for “star” is “zvezda” (from the recent successful launch of the International Space Station’s Zvezda module) and as previously mentioned in this thread, the Russian word for “Wormwood” is “Polyn”, so I’m betting that “Ta hvìzda byla nazvána Pelynìk” corresponds to “the name of the star is Wormwood”, with “hvìzda”=“zvezda”=“star”, and “Pelynìk”=“Polyn”=“Wormwood”. So, the mugwort plant (a close relative of the wormwood plant) is named, or perhaps nicknamed, something which does in fact sound very much like Chernobyl. And in both English and the Slavic languages the common name of Artemisia absinthium–Wormwood or Polyn/Pelynìk–does crop up in Revelation 8:11. However, I don’t think the word “Chernobyl” actually appears in anyone’s Bible in any language.
…Obsessive? Who, me?
The supposed connection between Chernobyl and wormwood formed the basis of an episode of “Millenium.” I liked “Millenium” quite a bit – too bad it only lasted for three seasons.
Manchester, England, has a prison called Wormwood Scrubs. No strict connection to the question in hand, but piling the points on high for wormwood as synonymous with bad things. However, thinking on this a touch more, Wormwood Scrubs is also where they produce Boddington’s Bitter, the amber nectar of beers… is there anything in the bible concerning the destruction of all we know and then the God’s popping down to eat?
Alas, no. Wormwood Scrubs Prison is in West London. On the other hand “Boddington’s, The Cream of Manchester” is an anagram of “Boddington’s Stomach Ache Fermenter”.
- Say Ren, whatcha doin?
- You stuuupid fool, you’ve dropped your brain again you eeeediot! Here, get it away from me!
Sorry, it’s HMP Strangeways in Manchester, isn’t it? They do have great names/are built in unfortunately named areas though!
Wormwood Scrubs?
That clears up a line in the Jam song “Down In The Tube Station At Midnight” – “They smelt of pubs and Wormwood Scrubs and too many right-wing meetings” refers to the gang that attacks the narrator in the tube station.
I don’t know if anybody still cares, but I did stumble across a Ukrainian Bible resource (while looking for a Norwegian Bible). Go to the Unbound Bible . In the first drop-down menu choose Ukrainian (near the bottom), in the second choose Revelation (about 3/4 of the way down), and plug in the chapter and verse (8:10-8-11).
Not having the right fonts I can only approximate: Greek apsinthos is translated Polin in Ukrainian and Polyn’ in Russian.
Thanks, bibliophage. (I’m also gonna bookmark that site.)
Am I being ignorant and arrogant when I say that I think the one Revelations trumpet where something that looks like a mountain on fire gets thrown into the sea…sorta…ehh…sounds like the Gulf of Mexico issue two years ago? Lets be honest, that oil rig sorta looks like a mountain…on fire…to a guy 2000 years ago.
Atheist Shawn.
Wow…I thought this thread would be–I dunno–bigger maybe. It’s so small! Only one page! Oh, gosh, I remmber that post–oh hey–is that my old baseball glove?
The Deepwater Horizon spill was bad, but it certainly didn’t kill off one third of all the sea life in the world, and the only “ship” that was sunk was the Deepwater Horizon platform itself. A “huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea” sounds more like a major meteor impact event to me (and if it kills off one third of all the oceans, an asteroid or comet, not just a minor space rock); or maybe a big volcanic eruption.
Basically, I think a lot of Revelation is kind of like an inkblot. People read it, and see whatever is in their heads at the time.
Well, the dead do seem to be walking…
Hey! I’m not dead! I’m just–resting!
Thx for intelligent thoughtful debate!
I am a pastor who is teaching through the book of Revelation, and was doing research on the Chernobyl/wormwood connection. I too heard this explanation years ago, and was not content to simple repeat things without verifying them as facts. Sadly many ministers simply repeat things they hear another say because it “preaches good.” It would appear from the consensus of answers here that there is a Chernobyl/Polnik/apsinthos/wormwood connection.
However, I’d like to point out that purely from a biblical perspective, the event described in Revelation 8 translated “Wormwood” in futurist vs. preterist view is something that will yet occur during the prophetic “70th week” (7 years) of the book of Daniel. During this time according to scripture a future antichrist will arise as a man of peace and successfully broker a 7 year peace treaty in Israel during which the events of Rev 4-19 take place. So the event at Chernobyl while possibly showing on a small scale how waters can be poisoned, is not the event prophesied in scripture. Many in Hitlers day thought he was the antichrist due to the similarities to scriptural prophecy, but we must not make the mistake of trying to make the puzzle pieces fit. (And no, Barack Obama is not the antichrist either, although I feel his policies are greasing the pole.)
I do believe that events prophesied are literal except where self described as symbolic, and though spectacular on some measure, it only stands to reason that if God truly created the universe as He claims, He is of utmost ability to judge it in any way He sees fit. That being said, I believe there are many ministers who take a mindless approach to faith and thus turn scripture to fit their own paradigm leaving no room for valid questions, in much the same way modern science rules out the possibility of a supernatural God simply because it rocks their secular humanist boat. I suggest for thinkers who are willing to know truth to read “God’s Plan for Man” by Finnis Dake. His approach to scripture is both rational and scientific and yet allows God to be who He claims to be. He proves (as does science) that the earth is far older than 6,000 years, and yet that approximately that long ago the events of Genesis 1:2-31 (re-creation) were the beginnings of God’s dealing with modern man, all in a way that does not insult reason and common sense.
I believe true spirituality is totally rational once one discovers spiritual law, in the same sense that flight is completely rational once man discovered the law of lift. The fact that the law of lift existed long before man discovered it, lends a rational door through which seekers may leap when pondering that God may exist after all. I as a seeker of truth myself will be happy to meet you at that door, which I believe to be Jesus Christ.
Thank you to Straight Dope for allowing thinkers of all backgrounds to come together without bashing to follow free will and vet out ideas. You’re a credit to the human race!
Feel free to elaborate in a more appropriately-themed thread sometime about which policies specifically and where that pole leads.