A.Word.A.Day --golgotha

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Jun 20, 2011

This week's theme
Biblical places that became words in English

This week's words
golgotha
laodicean
calvary
babel
aceldama

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A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

To mark the 400 years of translation of the King James Version of the Bible this year. Earlier we featured five people from the Bible who have become words in the English language.

This week we feature another set of five words. Now it's the turn of five places that have taken root as metaphors in the language.

What's in the Bible may surprise most people, even those who believe they know it. In a recent item on CNN, Rabbi Rami Shapiro says, "Most people who profess a deep love of the Bible have never actually read the book." How much do you know about the "Good Book"? Try this Bible quiz.

Golgotha

PRONUNCIATION:

(GOL-guh-thuh)

MEANING:

noun:
1. A place or occasion of great suffering.
2. A burial place.

ETYMOLOGY:

After Golgotha, the hill near Jerusalem believed to be the site of Jesus's crucifixion. From Latin, from Greek golgotha, from Aramaic gulgulta, from Hebrew gulgolet (skull). The hill was perhaps named from the resemblance of its shape to a skull. Earliest documented use: 1597.

USAGE:

"The attack has turned the once peaceful serenity of a plateau state to a Golgotha."
Chris Agbiti; How Not to Govern a Volatile State; Vanguard (Apapa, Nigeria); Apr 1, 2011.

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

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

It is the certainty that they possess the truth that makes men cruel. -Anatole France, novelist, essayist, Nobel laureate (1844-1924)

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