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anathema - 6 dictionary results

a⋅nath⋅e⋅ma

[uh-nath-uh-muh]
–noun, plural -mas.
1. a person or thing detested or loathed: That subject is anathema to him.
2. a person or thing accursed or consigned to damnation or destruction.
3. a formal ecclesiastical curse involving excommunication.
4. any imprecation of divine punishment.
5. a curse; execration.

Origin:
1520–30; < L < Gk: a thing accursed, devoted to evil, orig. devoted, equiv. to ana(ti)thé(nai) to set up + -ma n. suffix
a·nath·e·ma   (ə-nāth'ə-mə)   
n.   pl. a·nath·e·mas
  1. A formal ecclesiastical ban, curse, or excommunication.
  2. A vehement denunciation; a curse: "the sound of a witch's anathemas in some unknown tongue" (Nathaniel Hawthorne).
  3. One that is cursed or damned.
  4. One that is greatly reviled, loathed, or shunned: "Essentialism—a belief in natural, immutable sex differences—is anathema to postmodernists, for whom sexuality itself, along with gender, is a 'social construct'" (Wendy Kaminer).

[Late Latin anathema, doomed offering, accursed thing, from Greek, from anatithenai, anathe-, to dedicate : ana-, ana- + tithenai, to put; see dhē- in Indo-European roots.]

Anathema

A*nath"e*ma\, n.; pl. Anathemas. [L. anath?ma, fr. Gr. ? anything devoted, esp. to evil, a curse; also L. anath?ma, fr. Gr. ? a votive offering; all fr. ? to set up as a votive gift, dedicate; ? up + ? to set. See Thesis.]

1. A ban or curse pronounced with religious solemnity by ecclesiastical authority, and accompanied by excommunication. Hence: Denunciation of anything as accursed.

[They] denounce anathemas against unbelievers. --Priestley.

2. An imprecation; a curse; a malediction.

Finally she fled to London followed by the anathemas of both [families]. --Thackeray.

3. Any person or thing anathematized, or cursed by ecclesiastical authority.

The Jewish nation were an anathema destined to destruction. St. Paul . . . says he could wish, to save them from it, to become an anathema, and be destroyed himself. --Locke.

Anathema Maranatha(see --1 Cor. xvi. 22), an expression commonly considered as a highly intensified form of anathema. Maran atha is now considered as a separate sentence, meaning, "Our Lord cometh."

anathema 
1526, from L. anathema "an excommunicated person, the curse of excommunication," from Gk. anathema "a thing accursed," originally "a thing devoted," lit. "a thing set up (to the gods)," from ana- "up" + tithenai "to place," from PIE base *dhe- "to put, to do" (see factitious). Originally simply a votive offering, by the time it reached L. the meaning had progressed through "thing devoted to evil," to "thing accursed or damned." Later applied to persons and the Divine Curse. Anathema maranatha, taken as an intensified form, is a misreading of the Syriac maran etha "the Lord hath come," which follows anathema in I Cor. xvi.22, but is not connected with it.

Anathema

anything laid up or suspended; hence anything laid up in a temple or set apart as sacred. In this sense the form of the word is _anath(ee)ma_, once in plural used in the Greek New Testament, in Luke 21:5, where it is rendered "gifts." In the LXX. the form _anathema_ is generally used as the rendering of the Hebrew word _herem_, derived from a verb which means (1) to consecrate or devote; and (2) to exterminate. Any object so devoted to the Lord could not be redeemed (Num. 18:14; Lev. 27:28, 29); and hence the idea of exterminating connected with the word. The Hebrew verb (haram) is frequently used of the extermination of idolatrous nations. It had a wide range of application. The _anathema_ or _herem_ was a person or thing irrevocably devoted to God (Lev. 27:21, 28); and "none devoted shall be ransomed. He shall surely be put to death" (27:29). The word therefore carried the idea of devoted to destruction (Num. 21:2, 3; Josh. 6:17); and hence generally it meant a thing accursed. In Deut. 7:26 an idol is called a _herem_ = _anathema_, a thing accursed. In the New Testament this word always implies execration. In some cases an individual denounces an anathema on himself unless certain conditions are fulfilled (Acts 23:12, 14, 21). "To call Jesus accursed" [anathema] (1 Cor. 12:3) is to pronounce him execrated or accursed. If any one preached another gospel, the apostle says, "let him be accursed" (Gal. 1:8, 9); i.e., let his conduct in so doing be accounted accursed. In Rom. 9:3, the expression "accursed" (anathema) from Christ, i.e., excluded from fellowship or alliance with Christ, has occasioned much difficulty. The apostle here does not speak of his wish as a possible thing. It is simply a vehement expression of feeling, showing how strong was his desire for the salvation of his people. The anathema in 1 Cor. 16:22 denotes simply that they who love not the Lord are rightly objects of loathing and execration to all holy beings; they are guilty of a crime that merits the severest condemnation; they are exposed to the just sentence of "everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord."

anathema

(from Greek anatithenai: "to set up," or "to dedicate"), in the Old Testament, a creature or object set apart for sacrificial offering. Its return to profane use was strictly banned, and such objects, destined for destruction, thus became effectively accursed as well as consecrated. Old Testament descriptions of religious wars call both the enemy and their besieged city anathema inasmuch as they were destined for destruction

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