Jeremiad

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Dr. Goodword
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Jeremiad

Postby Dr. Goodword » Sun May 07, 2023 6:43 pm

• jeremiad •


Pronunciation: je-rê-mai-êd • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: An extended lamentation. a long, drawn-out complaining tirade, often accompanied by a prophecy or insinuation of imminent doom.

Notes: One could write a jeremiad about this word itself, a poor lexical orphan without siblings or offspring, whose parentage lies far away in the Middle East. However, the Word History will show its lineage to be heavenly and presents no cause for lament.

In Play: Today's heavenly word works even in down-to-earth situations: "Every time I ask you to clean the garage, all I hear is a jeremiad about how much easier your sister's chores are than yours!" However, the word itself may be more at home in conversations on more elevated topics: "I grow a bit weary of the jeremiads against progress and modernity that constitute the core of contemporary literature."

Word History: Today's Good Word comes from Jeremiah + -ad (as in Iliad) in reference to the lamentations of Jeremiah in the Old Testament. Jeremiah comes from Late Latin Ieremias borrowed from Hebrew yirmêyahu "Yahweh has established", based on yirm "he has raised" + yah(u), a shortening of Yahweh. Yirm is an old form of ramâ "to establish, raise up", based on the root *rmy. Yahweh "God, The Lord" is based on the root *ywh, which meant "to be or become", perhaps originally meaning "he who brings into being". Shortenings of Yahweh occur in many Hebrew names: Matthew is from mattayyah "gift of Yahweh", and Elijah, from Hebrew oeliyahu "my God (is) Yahweh". John, Jean, Johann, Giovanni, and Ivan are all from yohanan "Yahweh has been gracious". Jesus in Hebrew is yeshua, a shortening of yehoshua "Joshua", also akin to Hosea, the Biblical king. (Now an gracious e-ovation for Barbara Kelly for spotting today's somber yet clever Good Word in her local newspaper and sharing it with us.)
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George Kovac
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Re: Jeremiad

Postby George Kovac » Mon May 08, 2023 10:57 am

Jeremiad is a wonderful word: its sound, meaning, history and sense of outré all combing to pull it toward the top of GoodWords.

In my own (highly idiosyncratic) lexicological taxonomy, I group “jeremiad” right next to “philippic.” But “jeremiad” is named for the speaker of the original jeremiads, whereas “philippic” is named for King Phillip of Macedon, the object of Demosthenes’ philippics.

I guess the ancient arbiters of vocabulary decided (correctly, IMHO) that the clunky sounding “demosthenetic” would never catch on. Think of how clumsy it would have been if, 2300 years later, Paul Simon had to title his 1960’s era song the tongue-twisting “A Simple Desultory Demosthenetic”.
"Every battle of ideas is fought on the terrain of language." Zia Haider Rahman, New York Times 4/8/2016


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