Catching Up is Not Anathema, or Maranatha

I ran across the word anathema recently, and was surprised to find out that its origin is from the church concept of being excommunicated. It came to English in the 1520s from the Latin word spelled identically, which meant “an excommunicated person; the curse of excommunication.” Latin got the word from the Greek word transliterated anathema, which means “a thing that is accursed.” Originally it meant something devoted, and literally meant “a thing set up (to the gods).” Anathema was created by combining the Greek words for “up” (ana-) and “to place” (tithenai). 

Anathema has developed a broader meaning, although the usage I have heard most often is in the phrase “anathema to me”, meaning something to be avoided. It has gone beyond meaning just something worthy of divine punishment to something to be detested or hated, hence avoided.

An interesting biblical usage is found in I Cor. 16:22, where anathema is followed by the word maranatha. While in the King James Version it is rendered (untranslated) as Anathema Maranatha, in the New Internation Version it is translated as “…person be cursed! Come, Lord!” Maranatha, according to etymonline.com, “is a misreading of the Syriac maran etha, which means ‘the Lord hath come.’”

Maranatha has become an interjection used in English to mean “O Lord, come.” Etymonline.com suggests it could also be a false transliteration of the Hebrew words “mohoram atta,” which means “you are put under the ban.” While that fits the sense of I Cor. 16:22 better, it seems a bit of a stretch to me; I prefer the Aramaic maran atha, the Aramaic form of the Syriac phrase. Coming up with another source and meaning seems to be pushing it too far.

While I’m catching up on words encountered lately, one of those words is one I associate with William F. Buckley: athwart. One of his earliest and best known quotes was used in “Our Mission Statement” in National Review in 1955: “A conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it.”  Athwart History: Half a Century of Polemics, Animadversions, and Illuminations: A William F. Buckley, Jr. Omnibus.

Athwart is (not surprisingly if you know much about Mr. Buckley) a nautical term, referring to anything that is at a right angle to the line going from fore to aft (front to back), or to the wind. Think of it as standing crosswise to the direction or winds of history, in National Review’s case.

Of course, the Buckley Omnibus brings up a couple of other words (we’ve already discussed animadversion): omnibus and polemics.

Omnibus in the sense used in the title has an interesting history. In about 1820 Jacques Lafitte (the Parisian banker during the French Revolution, not the Formula One racer, and not related to the pirate Jean Lafitte) is credited with using the word to refer to the carriages that were available to everyone, which in French is voiture omnibus. Omnibuses came to London in 1829, and eventually we shortened the word for the public transportation vehicle to simply a bus.

The word was used in 1842 to describe legislation that contained many different items or objects (as in omnibus bill). From that sense came the idea of a collection of different works by one author or a group of works related in theme or interest.  

Polemics will have to wait until next week.