anathema

noun anath·e·ma \ ə-ˈna-thə-mə \

|Updated on: 25 Jun 2018

Examples: anathema in a Sentence

Editor's Note: Word History of anathema

Definition of anathema

1 a : one that is cursed by ecclesiastical authority

b : someone or something intensely disliked or loathed —usually used as a predicate nominative

… this notion was anathema to most of his countrymen.
—Stephen Jay Gould

2 a : a ban or curse solemnly pronounced by ecclesiastical authority and accompanied by excommunication

b : the denunciation of something as accursed

c : a vigorous denunciation : curse

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Examples of anathema in a Sentence

Maugham was not only prolific but also a best-seller, though snobs dismissed his work as middlebrow (a category that few people worry about in our day but that once was anathema). —Edmund White, New York Review of Books, 12 Feb. 2009
While everything pointed to an immense flood, Bretz knew such a notion would be anathema to his fellow geologists. In part that was because the quantity of water needed for such a flood would exceed the flow of all the world's modern rivers combined. —Richard Lovett, New Scientist, 21-27 Apr. 2007
Big Jeff was devoted to Purcell. He haunted his room and patiently endured his abuse just to sit in the corner and watch him shave or do push-ups or dress for dinner, and listen to him pronounce his opinions and anathemas. —Tobias Wolff, Old School, 2003
For all the artistic wonders it has preserved, the Holy Mountain is not a museum, and the idea of playing host to sightseers is anathema to the monks. Male visitors of all faiths are welcome, but they come as pilgrims, not tourists, and only 110 "residence permits" are issued each day by patristic officials in Ouranoupolis. —Nicholas Basbanes, Smithsonian, August 1999
a politician who is anathema to conservatives
ideas that are an anathema to me

Recent Examples of anathema from the Web

This is a very small group—basically, hippie cultures and ideas have always been anathema to the world of soccer.

— corey seymour, Vogue, "Simon Doonan's New Book, Soccer Style, Is The World Cup Guide for Off-Pitch Excellence," 15 June 2018
The idea that modesty can be a secular and feminist option, an individual’s woman’s choice to show less rather than more an act of empowerment, has been anathema.

— rafia zakaria, The New Republic, "The Feminist Future of Modesty," 12 June 2018
That's led a scramble to take down candidates such as Chavez, even with messages that are seemingly anathema to the party's priorities.

— CBS News, "Stage is set for California's "jungle primary" Tuesday," 2 June 2018
But now they are being linked to the Trump administration, notably DeVos — anathema in Democratic circles.

— ryan menezes, latimes.com, "A few rich charter school supporters are spending millions to elect Antonio Villaraigosa governor," 14 May 2018
An important misconception is the notion that armed groups are always a product of state failure and, secondly, that their existence will always be anathema to the state’s recovery.

— ranj alaaldin, Washington Post, "What Iraq’s election means for its Shiite militias," 12 May 2018
Such a notion is anathema in Columbia, where economic and racial diversity is a founding principle.

— jean marbella, baltimoresun.com, "Columbia faces losing some of its neighborhood centers, and some say, its heart," 16 Apr. 2018
Boeheim is also synonymous with a 2–3 zone defense that’s anathema to some observers and occupies the opposite pole of the aesthetic spectrum as the surgical offense played by the Golden State Warriors.

— chris johnson, SI.com, "Syracuse's Run Is Too Ugly to Be Called a Cinderella Story," 23 Mar. 2018
Both President Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, revel in a form of nuclear braggadocio that would have been anathema to their predecessors.

— The Economist, "Old deals to limit nuclear weapons are fraying. They may not be repaired," 5 May 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'anathema.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Word History of anathema

The Greek root of anathema originally meant simply “a thing devoted” or “an offering,” and in the Old Testament it could refer to either revered objects or objects representing destruction brought about in the name of the Lord, such as the weapons of an enemy. Since the enemy’s objects therefore became symbols of what was reviled or unholy, the neutral meaning of “a thing devoted” became “a thing devoted to evil” or “curse.”

In Latin, it could refer to both an excommunication and the person who has been excommunicated.

In the early Church, anathema was used interchangeably with excommunication and to refer to unrepentant heretics. It then came to mean the severest form of excommunication in official church writings. When the authority of Rome was split in the Great Schism between Eastern and Western churches in 1054, an anathema was issued by Rome against the Eastern Patriarch who then issued another one against the cardinal who delivered it.

The History of anathema Is Contradictory

Historically, anathema can be considered a one-word oxymoron. When it first appeared in English in 1526, it was used to refer to something accursed. Shortly thereafter, however, people also began to use it to refer to something consecrated to divine use—generally a good thing. Why the contradiction? Anathema comes from Greek, where it initially meant "anything devoted" and later "anything devoted to evil." The "consecrated to divine use" sense of anathema comes from that earlier Greek use but is not widely used today.

Origin and Etymology of anathema

Late Latin anathemat-, anathema, from Greek, thing devoted to evil, curse, from anatithenai to set up, dedicate, from ana- + tithenai to place, set — more at do

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: 1582

in the meaning defined at sense 1a

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