It is undeniable that some heavenly bodies directly affect us. The gravity of the sun, and to a lesser extent, the moon, keep earth in orbit, keep seasons and climate what they are, and cause the endless dance of ocean tides, air and water currents, and storms. In a way not fully explained by science but easily observed, the fertility cycles of women correlate with the cycles of the moon. Scientists spend plenty of time theorizing what would happen if a comet crashed into the earth or simply passed very, very close, and some speculate that this may have happened before, with drastic effects.

Folklore and superstition regarding heavenly bodies and celestial events, such as eclipses, abound the world over. Sometimes, the lore in diverse cultures is uncannily similar. In almost all known cultures, the Pleiades are seven sisters, or, for some, seven brothers. The Latin names for the Big and Little Dippers, Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, are echoed in Asian and Native American names for the same constellations: Big and Little Bear. And worldwide, ancient fears of comets and eclipses can be found.

In every culture, a comet is taken as an omen of doom, or once was. Why this should be so, no one knows. Since scientific observation and charting of comets began, the coming of a comet has never been correlated with any greater disaster than ordinarily happens. In 1997, a relatively small cult took the appearance of the Halle-Bopp comet as signal to commit mass suicide, but that was not an incident on the scale of a major war or natural disaster. No such large scale disasters have been connected with comets at any time in recent memory.

It has been speculated that perhaps this superstition is a trace memory of a time when earth was hit by a comet, or passed through the tail of one. Scientists run the gamut from those who say such an event would have little effect to those who say it could mean a large scale disaster, perhaps a complete change in the world’s climate. Stories about destructive renegade stars or fire raining down from heaven appear in many cultures. Perhaps the most familiar to Westerners are the Biblical story of the fiery destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the Greek myth in which Phaeton, son of the sun god, Apollo, tries to drive his father’s perpetually burning chariot across the sky, loses control, and scorches the earth.

Immanuel Velikovsky, a controversial scholar and close friend of Albert Einstein, posited that these stories are connected not with a comet, but with a time when several planets changed their orbits and Venus passed dangerously close to earth. He argued that many common descriptions of comets in the ancient world, such as bearded star, long haired star, and fiery star, were descriptions of how Venus looked from so close by. In later times, the same descriptions were used for the much tamer comets, causing them to be confused with a long ago cause of major disaster.

Whether or not Velikovsky was right, the planet Venus is now an object of benign superstition. Named for the Roman goddess of love and beauty, Venus is the brightest thing in the night sky after the moon. It is usually the first “star” to appear after sunset, often showing while the sky is still light, and the last to disappear after sunrise. Venus is thus called both the evening star and the morning star. Generations of children have been told that if they make a wish on the first star they see at night - which is, more often than not, Venus - it will come true.

Probably no celestial event feels more monumental than a lunar or solar eclipse. During a complete solar eclipse, the moon passes between the sun and the earth. If this happens during daylight hours, the sun gradually disappears behind the moon until it is completely covered - though some light can still be seen - and the world becomes much darker. Lunar eclipses, which can only happen during a full moon, are a spectacular sight in their own right. Earth passes directly between the sun and the moon, preventing the moon from reflecting the sun’s light and making it look as if it’s being swallowed up. Both kinds of eclipse have been described as a dragon eating the sun (or moon).

Monumental events call for ritual and give rise to superstition, so it is no surprise that eclipses do. Given the moon’s connection with fertility, superstitions surrounding a lunar eclipse tend to concern reproduction and fertility. Several cultures hold a belief that a pregnant woman should stay indoors during an eclipse, on pain of her child being born with a birth defect. A Mexican superstition says that if she touches her belly, the baby will have a very noticeable birthmark. Likewise, a superstition from Europe holds that couples should abstain from marital relations, because if they conceive during an eclipse, the baby is likely to be deformed.

Interestingly, the same are held to be true of solar eclipses. The July 2009 solar eclipse, visible in India, saw a sharp increase in scheduled C-sections, as women wanted to avoid giving birth during the eclipse. Many people stayed indoors the whole time and kept their children home from school, for fear of the eclipse.

The ways heavenly bodies affect us are little understood, even by science. It is no wonder that as much of it is the province of folklore as of astronomy. Superstitions surrounding heavenly bodies and events are perhaps more culturally universal than any other kind. They are literally a global phenomenon.

Sources:

http://www.plasmacosmology.net/cat.html#

http://www.thunderbolts.info/velikovsky-ghost.htm

http://www.epcc.edu/nwlibrary/borderlands/11_cultural_superstitions.htm

http://bemusedmused.blogspot.com/2007/03/ss-49-lunar-eclipse-and-superstition.html