# anathema

Pronunciation: say "uh-NATH-uh-muh" /əˈnæθəmə/

## Noun

1. Something that a person dislikes intensely and cannot bear.
   - Simple: Something that a person dislikes very strongly and cannot stand.
   - _Raising taxes is anathema to most members of the party._
   - _For a chef trained in Paris, serving frozen vegetables would have been anathema._
2. A formal curse pronounced by a church, often with excommunication; more generally, any solemn curse.
   - Simple: A serious curse, especially an official one from a church, which may also shut someone out of the church.
   - _The council closed with an anathema against anyone who taught the condemned doctrine._
   - _Medieval popes sometimes used anathemas to bring rebellious rulers into line._

## Other meanings

- (noun) A person or thing formally cursed or condemned by church authority.

## Origin

Ancient Greek ἀνατίθημι (anatíthēmi), which meant "I set upon" or "offer as a votive gift," was built from ἀνά (aná, "upon") and τίθημι (títhēmi, "I put, place"). It gave ἀνάθεμα (anáthema, "something dedicated, especially to eternal damnation"). Late Latin borrowed this as anathema ("curse, person cursed, offering"), and English took it from there. Under the influence of Hebrew חרם (herem), the Greek word came to mean "accursed," especially in church writers.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/anathema (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).