Worm

Scripture references: Exodus 16:20; Job 7:5; 17:14; 21:26; 24:20; 25:6; Psalm 22:6; Isaiah 14:11; 41:14; 51:8; 66:24; Jonah 4:7; Mark 9:44–48

The Hebrew terms, The worm appears under two primary Hebrew words in the Old Testament. תֹּלֵעָה (tola'ah) is the worm or scarlet-worm (the crimson dye from which scarlet was made, from the Kermes scale insect and related creatures). רִמָּה (rimmah) is the maggot or worm of decay, the creature of putrefaction. Both appear in the worm-imagery of Job and the prophets. The Greek σκώληξ (skolex) is the worm of Mark 9 and Isaiah 66:24 (LXX).

I am a worm, Psalm 22:6, "But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads." The worm is the nadir of the creaturely scale, below humanity, below the animals, the creature that lives in the ground and feeds on death. Psalm 22's sufferer has descended below the human category in the judgment of the crowd. The Psalm is the one Jesus quotes from the cross: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" The worm-identity of the sufferer is the extreme of humiliation before the vindication the Psalm also promises.

Job and the worm, Job 7:5; 17:14; 21:26; 24:20; 25:6, The worm appears throughout Job's speeches. "My flesh is clothed with worms and dirt" (7:5). "To the pit I cry, 'You are my father,' and to the worm, 'My mother and my sister'" (17:14). "They lie down alike in the dust, and worms cover them" (21:26). "The worm feeds sweetly on him; he is no longer remembered" (24:20). "How much less man, who is a maggot, and the son of man, who is a worm!" (25:6). The worm in Job is the creature of death and decomposition, the one that receives the body and consumes what was once alive. Job's identification with the worm's world is part of his descent into suffering.

Fear not, you worm Jacob, Isaiah 41:14, "Fear not, you worm Jacob, you men of Israel! I am the one who helps you, declares the LORD; your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel." YHWH calls Jacob a worm, not as an insult standing alone but as an acknowledgment of Jacob's self-perception and actual condition (small, vulnerable, alone in the nations) immediately before the declaration of redemption. The worm-Jacob and the Redeemer-God are the two poles of the verse: the creature of the lowest estate and the Holy One of Israel who redeems it. The worm-name makes the redemption more, not less, extraordinary.

Jonah's worm, Jonah 4:7, "But when dawn came up the next day, God appointed a worm that attacked the plant, so that it withered." YHWH appoints a worm to destroy the plant that shaded Jonah. The worm is one of YHWH's instruments in the Jonah narrative, the great fish, the wind, the plant, the worm, the scorching east wind, each appointed precisely. The worm's work on the plant is used to argue with Jonah about the proportionality of his compassion.

Their worm does not die, Isaiah 66:24, "And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh." The final verse of Isaiah describes the aftermath of YHWH's judgment on the rebellious: the worm that does not die, the fire that is not quenched. The worm of decay, which normally finishes its work and the remains are consumed, here continues without end. Jesus quotes this passage three times in Mark 9:44, 46, and 48 in his teaching on Gehenna: "where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched." The Isaiah 66:24 worm becomes Jesus's description of Gehenna, the place of unending judgment.

The worm is the creature at the base of the creaturely scale, whose identity the Psalm 22 sufferer has fallen to, whose name YHWH gives Jacob before calling him redeemed, who eats Jonah's shade-plant by divine appointment, and whose undying continuation Jesus takes from Isaiah 66:24 as the image of Gehenna. The Sanctum holds it as Canon-tier: from "Fear not, you worm Jacob" to "where their worm does not die."