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•WORM (1.) Hebrews sas (Isaiah 51:8), denotes the caterpillar of the clothes-moth.
(2.) The manna bred worms (tola’im), but on the Sabbath there was not any worm (rimmah) therein (Exodus 16:20, 24). Here these words refer to caterpillars or larvae, which feed on corrupting matter.
These two Hebrew words appear to be interchangeable (Job 25:6; Isaiah 14:11). Tola’im in some places denotes the caterpillar (Deuteronomy 28:39; Jonah 4:7), and rimmah, the larvae, as bred from putridity (Job 17:14; 21:26; 24:20). In Micah 7:17, where it is said, “They shall move out of their holes like worms,” perhaps serpents or “creeping things,” or as in the Revised Version, “crawling things,” are meant.
The word is used figuratively in Job 25:6; Psalm 22:6; Isaiah 41:14; Mark 9:44, 46, 48; Isaiah 66:24.
•WORMWOOD Hebrews la’anah, the Artemisia absinthium of botanists. It is noted for its intense bitterness (Deuteronomy 29:18; Proverbs 5:4; Jeremiah 9:15; Amos 5:7). It is a type of bitterness, affliction, remorse, punitive suffering. In Amos 6:12 this Hebrew word is rendered “hemlock” (R.V., “wormwood”). In the symbolical language of the Apocalypse (Revelation 8:10, 11) a star is represented as falling on the waters of the earth, causing the third part of the water to turn wormwood.
The name by which the Greeks designated it, absinthion, means “undrinkable.” The absinthe of France is distilled from a species of this plant. The “southernwood” or “old man,” cultivated in cottage gardens on account of its fragrance, is another species of it.