Planet Earth lined up directly with Mars and the Sun on Wednesday, a rare cosmic event that happens once in every 778 days which some Christians believe could herald the "End of Days."
NASA announced that Mars and Earth are traveling toward one another on their orbits around the sun. Next week, Earth and Mars will be the closest they ever get, about 57 million miles from one another.
But on Wednesday, those on Earth gets a special treat called the “Opposition of Mars,” which occurs when Mars is on the opposite side of Earth from the sun.
It is interesting to note that Mars completes an orbit around the sun in 687 days as compared to the Earth, which is closer to the sun and takes 365 days.
To casual observers, Mars will be visible all night as it rises in the east and sets in the west.
Oppositions between Earth and Mars take place about every 26 months. The celestial treat comes just seven days ahead of the Red Planet's closest approach to Earth on the night of April 14. There will also be a total lunar eclipse occurring on the same day.
Some Christians have said the event could herald the ‘End of Days’.
The "Opposition of Mars" comes six days before a full lunar eclipse occurs when the entirety of the moon is shaded by Earth and appears as an eerie reddish colour.
Interestingly, this month’s total eclipse is the first of four consecutive total eclipses dubbed ‘blood moons’ occurring at approximately six-month intervals — a phenomenon called a tetrad.
In addition to the two totalities occurring this year, there will be two more in 2015, on April 4 and September 28.
Some Christians believe the phenomenon represents the End of Days and the second coming of Christ.
The King James Bible predicts: “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD comes,” [Joel 2:31].
Pastor and author John Hagee, from San Antonio, Texas, has written a book on the phenomenon. He believes today marks the dawn of a ‘hugely significant event’ for the world.
He says: “This is not something that some religious think tank has put together.
“NASA has confirmed that the Tetrad has only happened three times in more than 500 years — and that it’s going to happen now.”
The first Tetrad since the Middle Ages, in 1493, saw the expulsion of Jews by the Catholic Spanish Inquisition, which rocked western Europe.
The second coincided with the establishment of the State of Israel - after thousands of years of struggle - in 1949.
The last one occurred in 1967 - far earlier than expected - precisely at the time of the Six-Day Arab–Israeli War.--Source: ABC news/News.com.au/Zee News