12.05.08
Bad, bad word
FIGURATIVELY SPEAKING
What could be worse than evil. Just the sound of this word gives a shiver, hits like a punch in the belly, brings darkness.
It’s no accident that a word like evil sounds so, well, evil. Often the sound of a word and its meaning develop hand in hand. As I have mentioned here before, often it’s the Germans who give us words whose meaning and sounds are related.
So with evil.
This word arises from the old English yfel which is of Germanic origin. It’s related to the Dutch euvel and the German Ubel (umlaut on the u).
Evil as an adjective means profoundly immoral and malevolent. It also refers to a force of spirit that embodies the forces of the devil, as well as something harmful or extremely unpleasant.
As a noun, evil means profound immorality, wickendenss and depravity, especially when regarded as a supernatural force.
There is a sense with evil that it is outside of us … a force embodied in the concept … almost a super-human being, a powerful ghost, a destructive phantom.
The dictionary also lists these uses… the best-selling phrases you might say:
the evil eye
the Evil One (Satan)
put off the evil day (or hour) (to postpone)
speak evil of (slander)
We also have the adverb evilly and noun evilness, along with evildoer and evil-minded.
You may think evil is somehow related to our words vile and villain — they’re not. Both are words of Latin origin via the French.
