Question about "Blood Moons"

I received an email today with this question:

Do you know anything about these two 'blood moons' this year, at the spring and autumn equinoxes? Supposedly the last time this occurred was 2,000 yrs ago when the Romans destroyed the Jewish temple.

I decided to post my reply here, since there may be others who are also wondering about these lunations:

Thanks for your question!

In astronomical terminology, there are lots of different "kinds" of Full Moons -- the Hunter's Moon, the Harvest Moon, etc. It looks like "Blood Moon" is another name for a Hunter's Moon.

It also looks like the two Lunar Eclipses in 2014 and the two Lunar Eclipses in 2015 are all "Blood Moons" -- but the dates of those eclipses are not on the equinoxes in either year.

There's a great article on the EarthSky website called "What Is a Blood Moon?" that gives a lot of good information about the upcoming Blood Moons, and how they coincide with Biblical prophecy -- which I'm sure is why there's some trepidation around their occurrence.

Astrologically speaking, the eclipse this April is most powerful because it occurs the same week that the Cardinal Grand Cross is exact. From my perspective, the fact that it could be called a Hunter's Moon or a Blood Moon is not as important as the planetary configurations at that time.

I hope this EarthSky article provides some of the clarification you are looking for.