Few here see debate itself as such a process. It's too bad. Reasoned argument betrays unsupported assumptions and provides the opportunity for undiscovered truths to synthesize from opposing, but flexible perspectives. Sometimes it is worth arguing a position one doesn't hold for the passion in its defence to betray a previously unperceived (and flawed) central tenet. To argue for one's enemies is to understand them and one's self on a level not otherwise achievable. Perhaps that's why Jesus told us to love our enemies, people usually find themselves in their worst insults.
The five catastrophic (I am going to rearrange the order) events were: 3195 BC(Stonehenge built), 2354BC (start of Bronze Age), 1628BC (Exodus, Stonehenge abandoned), 1159BC (David plague), two minor events at 207BC and 44BC, and 540AD (Dark Ages, Justinian plague).
I think it's worth fuddling numbers for purposes of play.
OK, so now that I'm done bitching, let's consider a well distributed, but misunderstood oral tradition: the Bible and pair it with that equally inscrutable Mayan calendar. Assume sol is part of a binary couple (or more) and Wormwood is a degenerate star (or planet) with a hellacious magnetic field. It might have moons and surely asteroids. If those orbits were fairly large, that plus the variation of the position of the earths obit at the point of nearest passage would explain some of the variation one sees in the periodicity of that series and severity of these events. If the point of impact was or wasn't volcanic, one might see that variation as well.
Thanks, good input. I have always viewed Wormwood as a ,(1.) large near-miss comet (that left many impacted fragments),(2.) a comet that impacted or (3.) something similar to what you described.