The Great Christ Comet (61 page)

In addition, it should be noted that within the large population of near-Earth asteroids are an unknown number that are cometary in nature (like Apollo asteroid 4015 Wilson-Harrington = Comet 107P/Wilson-Harrington) or are remnants of comets. It is therefore perhaps worth pointing out that some objects classified as Apollo asteroids have orbits that are similar to possible orbits of the meteoroid stream that caused the Hydrid meteor storm of 6 BC. Of course, we must remember that 2,000 years of orbital evolution may mean that the orbit of the Hydrid meteoroid stream is no longer recognizably similar to the orbits of these asteroids.

The orbit of Apollo asteroid 2009 HU58 (magnitude 19) is reminiscent of the orbit of the meteoroid stream responsible for the 6 BC meteor storm if the latter's meteors radiated from one-third of the way from
γ
Hydrae to HIP59373 (
table 14.3
).

The orbit of the Apollo asteroid 2000 UR16 (magnitude 23) is reminiscent of the orbit of the meteoroid stream responsible for the 6 BC meteor storm if the latter's meteors radiated from two-thirds of the way from
γ
Hydrae to HIP59373 (
table 14.4
).

The orbit of Apollo asteroid 2004 WK1 (magnitude 21) is reminiscent of the orbit of the meteoroid stream responsible for the 6 BC meteor storm if the latter's meteors radiated from HIP59373 (
table 14.5
).

If the meteoroid stream had a Jupiter-family orbit and its radiant was one-third of the way from
γ
(Gamma) Hydrae to HIP59373, it would have had a relatively small perihelion distance (q=0.173 AU), although larger than 96P/Machholz 1 (q=0.124 AU). It is interesting to compare the Hydrid meteoroid stream's orbit with this comet's (
table 14.6
).

Could it have been a Halley-type meteoroid stream? Since Halley-type meteoroids tend to peak just before dawn, whereas Jupiter-family meteoroids tend to peak just after midnight,
28
and since the velocity and inclination of the meteoroid stream responsible for the Hydrid meteor storm are on or over the upper threshold of typical Jupiter-family meteoroid streams (approximately 11–35 km/second
29
and 0–30 degrees respectively),
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a good case for the parent being a Halley-type comet, like C/1917 F1 (Mellish), can be made. Actually, the orbit of the Hydrid meteoroid stream, assuming that the radiant of the meteors was two-thirds of the way from
γ
(Gamma) Hydrae to HIP59373 or from
γ
(Gamma) Hydrae itself, is reminiscent of Comet Mellish in perihelion distance and eccentricity (
table 14.7
). David Asher, perceiving the similarity, backtracked the orbit of this comet to see if it matched, but found that Mellish's argument of perihelion and ascending node did not evolve in a way that realistically permitted it itself to be the parent of the meteoroid stream.
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Whether the meteoroid stream or its parent comet (or cometary asteroid) has already been recorded, will be recorded in the near future, or no longer exists, we do not know. If the original stream remains intact and crosses Earth's orbital path, and if the parent body, or even a part of it, still survives after two millennia, by means of orbital backtracking we might well be able to identify or associate them. I must leave this task to specialists in solar system dynamics.

Assuming that there was one horn for each of the seven heads of the sea-dragon, we are presumably to envision that the 8th, 9th, and 10th heads have been cut off, but that the three horns nevertheless remain. Each of the seven heads has a crown, but there are no crowns to go with the three headless horns. The scene is strongly reminiscent of Daniel 7's fourth beast, which has ten horns, three of which are plucked up by the roots, leaving only seven (Dan. 7:7–8), although Daniel's 10-3=7 horns have become Revelation's 10-3=7 heads. This concurs with the fact that the dragon's throwing of many stars to the earth in Revelation 12:4a is reminiscent of Daniel 8:10, where the little horn, representing the latter-day tyrant, threw down to the ground “some of the host and some of the stars . . . and trampled on them.” In other words, in Revelation 12:3–4a Hydra is introduced in such a way as to identify him with the eschatological rebellion of humanity against Yahweh, which is led by a blasphemous world ruler.
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How might the meteor activity of Revelation 12:4 elucidate the description of verse 3?

First, the fire color of Hydra is explicable astronomically with reference to the intense meteor activity in that part of the sky. The high frequency of meteors, fireballs, and bolides would have caused the constellation to look like it was on fire from its heads to its tail. A Macon, Georgia, newspaper described what it was like during the 1833 Leonid meteor storm: “We do not jest when we say that stubborn hearts were bent and flinty hearts melted into deep contrition at the alarming prospect of ‘the heavens on fire.'”
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So bright were the many thousands of meteors that copious witnesses spoke of the scene as one in which everything seemed to be on fire.
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One observer of the storm from Bowling Green, Missouri, wrote,

Forcibly we were reminded of that remarkable passage in Revelations [
sic
] which speaks of the great red dragon, as drawing the third part of the stars of heaven and casting them to the earth; and if it be a figurative expression, that figure appeared to be fully painted on the broad canopy of the sky,—spread over with sheets of light, and thick with streams of rolling fire. There was scarcely a space in the firmament which was not filled at every instant with these falling stars. . . .
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