Firgun

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Dr. Goodword
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Firgun

Postby Dr. Goodword » Fri Dec 01, 2017 12:29 am

• firgun •


Pronunciation: feer-gun Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: 1. A genuinely unselfish delight or pride in the accomplishment of someone else; giving credit where it is due, generously and without jealousy; the antonym of schadenfreude. 2. A sincere compliment, a kind word, a proverbial pat on the back for someone.

Notes: Today's Good Word is not a word yet in English, but is a word English should borrow from Hebrew. It is the antonym of schadenfreude, reveling in the bad luck of others, an attitude exhibited daily this year in Washington. Firgun differs from simply giving compliments, since compliments may be given with ulterior motives. Firgun involves unselfish delight that is authentic and without an agenda.

In Play: The first, abstract sense of today's Good Word refers to an attitude: "Canby Allgood is a man of such firgun, he praises his kids for getting dressed in the morning." It may also be used to refer to an individual act of praise: "Dunham Wright gives everyone firguns, and everyone in the office loves him for it."

Word History: This word was originally discovered and recommended for borrowing by Mark Rice-Oxley in The Guardian. The word can be traced back to the Yiddish word farginen, the Yiddish rendition of the German verb vergönnen "to be happy/glad/delighted for someone". This word was initially used in the 1970s, gaining momentum in subsequent decades. Firgun differs from giving compliments, since compliments may be given with ulterior motives. Firgun is authentic, unselfish delight with no hidden agenda. In 2014, Made in JLM, an Israeli non-profit community organization, set out to create "International Firgun Day", a holiday celebrated annually on July 17, when people share compliments or express genuine pride in the accomplishment of others on social media. The organization set up an online automatic firgun-generating tool at the website Firgunator. (Today's exciting Good nonWord was suggested by Patricia Tancred back in July of this year—2017, an old friend who goes back to my yourDictionary.com days.)
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LukeJavan8
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Re: Firgun

Postby LukeJavan8 » Fri Dec 01, 2017 2:14 pm

I was there on "Your Dictionary.com" too.
-----please, draw me a sheep-----

gwray
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Re: Firgun

Postby gwray » Wed Mar 21, 2018 9:32 am

I love the meaning of this word, but I don't like its sound. I wanted to use it and tried looking it up on the internet and found this other word (mudita) that I like more—partly because of the way it sounds and partly because of its origins in a philosophy that gave us mantra, karma and nirvana
A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver Proverbs 25:11

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Macarism

Postby Slava » Thu Jun 23, 2022 6:26 pm

From a Dictionary of Early English:
macarism. The sharing, or state of sharing, another's happiness; taking pleasure in others' joy; (in religious reference) beatitude. Greek markarismos; makar, happy. Hence also macarize, to deem happy or blessed. Whately makes it clear in his COMMONPLACE BOOK (1864) : A man is admired for what he is, macarized for what he has, praised for what he does . . . The words 'felicitate" and 'congratulate' are used only in application to events, which are one branch only of 'macarism*... To admiration, contempt seems to be the direct contrary; censure, to commendation; pity, to macarism.
Life is like playing chess with chessmen who each have thoughts and feelings and motives of their own.

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Re: Firgun

Postby gwray » Sun Feb 05, 2023 6:39 am

Thanks Slava!
A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver Proverbs 25:11

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Re: Firgun

Postby Dr. Goodword » Sun Feb 05, 2023 5:56 pm

I think confelicity sounds even better than macarism. It is sort of English, too, "Englishish", as George Santos would put it.
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