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May 8, 2014
This week's theme
Biblical characters who became words

This week's words
ananias
solomon
samson
jeremiad
methuselah

Jeremiah
Jeremiah on the Sistine Chapel ceiling
Art: Michelangelo
Image: Wikipedia

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

jeremiad

PRONUNCIATION:
(jer-uh-MY-uhd)

MEANING:
noun: A long lamentation, mournful complaint, or a prophecy of doom.

ETYMOLOGY:
After Jeremiah, a Hebrew prophet during the seventh and sixth centuries BCE, who prophesied the fall of the kingdom of Judah and whose writings are collected in Lamentations in the Old Testament. Earliest documented use: 1780. Also see jeremiah.

USAGE:
"Once upon a time, the passing of population milestones might have been cause for celebration. Now it gives rise to jeremiads."
Welcome to Our World of Seven Billion People; The New Zealand Herald (Auckland); Oct 29, 2011.

See more usage examples of jeremiad in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers. -Thomas Pynchon, writer (b. 1937)

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