“Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever” (Jude 13).

When Jude refers to false teachers, he likens them, among other things, to “wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever” (Jude 13). By “wandering stars,” Jude may be describing what we know today as comets. In any case, the analogy is evident: just as a false teacher sometimes appears as “an angel of light” (II Corinthians 11:14), so a comet in proximity to the sun has a brilliant tail of gas emanating from its icy head which is illuminated by the sun. The nearness of a comet to the sun is only temporary, for the comet soon departs to a remote region of the solar system where the diminished light of the sun cannot vaporize its icy mass. A comet far from the sun is invisible to even the most powerful telescope and can be described as residing in “outer darkness.”

This is probably the only reference in the Bible that could be applied to comets as such. Lack of mention of comets may be intentional. The shining, sword-like appearance of comets influenced pagan nations throughout history to regard them as omens of bad events (war, natural disasters, or death of kings). Comets were regarded as capable of influencing the lives of men on Earth. The Egyptians even worshipped them as celestial deities. The Bible affirms that the stars (and by inference, the comets) are not divine (Deuteronomy 4:19; 17:3) and do not disclose or control man’s destiny (Isaiah 47:13; Jeremiah 10:2; Daniel 4:7) as the nations of antiquity almost all believed. Perhaps because of their association with pagan practices, the subject of comets was best ignored by Bible authors. Scripture shows that the stars of the heavens are evidences of God’s handiwork in creation (Psalm 19:1–4), not as deities or omens influencing human life. SAA