apocalypse
See also: Apocalypse
English
[edit]
Etymology
[edit]From Middle English apocalips, from Latin apocalypsis, from Ancient Greek ἀποκάλυψις (apokálupsis, “revelation”, literally “uncovering”), from ἀποκαλύπτω (apokalúptō, “to reveal”), from ἀπό (apó, “back, away from”) + καλύπτω (kalúptō, “I cover”), + -σις (-sis, suffix forming nouns). The sense evolution to "catastrophe, end of the world" stems from the depiction of such events in the biblical Book of Revelation, also called the Apocalypse of (i.e. Revelation to) John.
The verb is from the noun and, in sense 1, a semantic loan from the etymonic Ancient Greek verb ἀποκαλύπτω (apokalúptō, “to reveal”).
Pronunciation
[edit]- (UK) IPA(key): /əˈpɒkəlɪps/
Audio (Southern England): (file) - (US) IPA(key): /əˈpɑkəlɪps/
- Hyphenation: a‧poc‧a‧lypse
Noun
[edit]apocalypse (plural apocalypses)
- A revealing, especially a prophecy of, or the unfolding of, supernatural events. [from 14th c.]
- Synonym: revelation
- The early development of Perl 6 was punctuated by a series of apocalypses by Larry Wall.
- A huge disaster; a cataclysmic event; destruction or ruin of large scope and scale. [from 19th c.]
- Hyponyms: eco-apocalypse, snowpocalypse, retail apocalypse, replyallpocalypse; zombie apocalypse, zombocalypse; nuclear winter, volcanic winter
- Near-synonyms: cataclysm, catastrophe, holocaust; armageddon, doomsday, end times, eschaton, judgement day, judgment day
- A nuclear apocalypse would have been possible if tensions went out of control during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
- 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 180:
- Man has forgotten the soul and thus doomed his civilization to apocalypse.
- 2009, Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity, Penguin, published 2010, page 699:
- The Spanish mission in America soon became not so much crusade as apocalypse.
- 2025 January 10, Peter Thiel, quoting Barack Obama, “A time for truth and reconciliation”, in Financial Times[1]:
- In 2016, President Barack Obama told his staff that Donald Trump’s election victory was “not the apocalypse”. By any definition, he was correct. But understood in the original sense of the Greek word apokálypsis, meaning “unveiling”, Obama could not give the same reassurance in 2025.
- (Christianity) The unveiling of events prophesied in the Revelation; the second coming and the end of life on Earth; global destruction. [from 19th c.]
- Alternative form: Apocalypse
- Synonyms: armageddon, doomsday, end times, eschaton
- Meronyms: Final Judgment, Judgment Day, judgement day, judgment day
- Near-synonym: Ragnarok
- (Christianity) The Book of Revelation.
- Alternative form: Apocalypse
- Synonym: Revelation
Derived terms
[edit]Related terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]revealing or revelation
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end of the world
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cataclysmic event
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked
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Verb
[edit]apocalypse (third-person singular simple present apocalypses, present participle apocalypsing, simple past and past participle apocalypsed)
- (transitive, uncommon, chiefly Christianity) To reveal.
- 1832 March 17, Joseph D’Arcy Sirr, “Appendix”, in The First Resurrection Considered in a Series of Letters: […], Philadelphia, Pa.: Orrin Rogers, […] E. G. Dorsey, […], published 1841, →OCLC, page 155:
- The transitory sufferings of the present time can never be put in competition with the glory which shall be apocalypsed in us; for even the creation itself, which shall not possess the glory, shall nevertheless derive from them such real solid benefit, such true freedom from real ills, that she also is desirous of our apocalypse.
- 1869, John Thomas, “Who are the Servants of God”, in Eureka: An Exposition of the Apocalypse, in Harmony with “The Things of the Kingdom of the Deity, and the Name of Jesus Anointed”, 2nd edition, volume I, West Hoboken, N.J.: […] [T]he author, →OCLC, chapter I (The source from which the Apocalypse emanated; […]), section I, pages 24 and 26:
- For the information of the mere English reader we may remark that apocalupsis is derived from a verb which signifies “to uncover, bring to light what was hidden.” […] Now, when this shall be the order of the day, the nations will have been apocalypsed by him who will be “the glory of Israel.” […] Such is, and such will continue to be, the spiritual condition of the world until then. But when they have been apocalypsed, or illuminated, the change will be glorious. […] Having spoken peace to the nations, and being established in his glory, the day of Jehovah’s exaltation will have been apocalypsed, or revealed—that day in which, it is testified, “Jehovah alone shall be exalted”—Isaiah ii. 10, 11, 16, 17.
- 1895, J[ohn] S[axton] Mabie, “Prophetic Convention. […] The Man of Sin: A Personal Antichrist.—II.”, in R[obert] McKilliam, editor, The Morning Star: […], London: Alfred Holness, […]; Glasgow: R[obert] L[ightbody] Allan & Son, […], →OCLC, page 43, column 2:
- “And that man of sin be revealed—apocalypsed—the son of perdition; the opposing one who exalts himself against all that is called God.” […] “And then shall be apocalypsed the lawless one, whom the Lord Jesus will slay with the breath of His mouth, and will paralyse with the forth-shining of His arrival. […]”
- 1896 September, A. J. Nelson, “Art[icle] III.—Paul’s Psychology.”, in William V[alentine] Kelley, editor, The Methodist Review. […], volume LXXVIII (XII, Fifth Series), number 5 (421 overall), New York, N.Y.: Eaton & Mains; Cincinnati, Oh.: Curts & Jennings, →ISSN, →OCLC, pages 725–726:
- Jesus said to Peter, when he first realized the true character of the Messiah, “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed [ἀποκάλυψε] it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven [hath apocalypsed it unto thee].” […] Mind can know nothing by logical inference concerning God, the Trinity, incarnation, immortality, resurrection, and truths, of this class, for they lie beyond the logical powers of the natural man and, if known, must be apocalypsed.
- 2001, George Elliott Clarke, Blue, Kentville, N.S.: Gaspareau Press, published 2011, →ISBN, page 25:
- We chewed breaded blasphemy in our pews, / Then gulped Welch’s grape juice, bile, and venom, / While alabaster Christ carped like a cop, / His lips apocalypsing our asses.
- 2010, Richard Carlile, “A Plainsong for All Seasons”, in The Lives of Our Time: Six Sequences, Tarbert, Argyll: Triquetra Press, →ISBN, section III, page 91:
- Still and all, there’s hope, crushed underfoot but radical, that some unlikely spring the happenforce that heals may ply its therapy not only in the wintered world but in each wounded and degraded heart, apocalypsing us into whatever paradise is possible, all obscenity absolved, when only lovers in their greening time will come wandering over the hill.
- 2014 November 10, Jonathan R. Wilson, “Aesthetics of the Kingdom: Apocalypsis, Eschatos, and Vision for Christian Mission”, in Derek J[ohn] Tidball, Brian S. Harris, Jason S. Sexton, editors, Revisioning, Renewing, Rediscovering the Triune Center […], Eugene, Ore.: Cascade Books, →ISBN, section 3 (Eschatology), pages 161 and 166:
- In Jesus Christ, that new creation has apocalypsed the cosmic conflict between life and death. The question for us is simply the question of our participation in that apocalypse and the shape of that participation. ([…] Following others who write on this topic, I adopt this unfamiliar usage [of apocalypse] precisely to drive home the shock, the rupture, the newness, irrupting in the world through Jesus Christ.) […] Thus, as we will see in more detail below, “the Christian ethic” is the way of being in the world apocalypsed by the life, death, resurrection, ascension, and coming again of Jesus Christ.
- 2020 March 24, Daniel Oudshoorn, “Honor and Shame and Shame as Honor in the Household of God”, in Pauline Solidarity: Assembling the Gospel of Treasonous Life (Paul and the Uprising of the Dead; 3), Eugene, Ore.: Cascade Books, →ISBN, chapter 3 (Embracing Shame in the Company of the Crucified), page 62:
- Not only this but, as the Anointed, Paul and his coworkers believed that Jesus apocalypsed the character of God (just as the Caesars, as loyal and faithful children, would also reveal the character of their divine forefathers).
- 2021 February 11, Jeff Carter, “He Is Quite Singular”, in The Last Persecution, Eugene, Ore.: Resource Publications, →ISBN, chapter 2 (Even Now there Are Many AntiChrists):
- Then Doctor Tarrec turned to me again and said, “My boy, I would like to introduce you to Jumjuma.” And with that he flicked the crimson cloth away from the table, apocalypsing a tangle of electrical cables and medical tubing filled with oozing fluids all connected to a human head.
- (intransitive, informal, rare) To dwell on a huge disaster one expects to take place.
- 1995, Mary Willis Walker, chapter 6, in Under the Beetle’s Cellar (Molly Cates; 2), New York, N.Y.: Doubleday, →ISBN, page 73:
- “To Las Vegas? When was that?” “About four months before she died. When he was twenty-one. Just before he started in on all that preaching and apocalypsing business. […] Had him a vision, he said, and God told him to change his name to Sam-u-el Mor-de-cai. And ever since then he’s been apocalypsing and doing all them cult things you read about in the newspaper.”
- 2010, Teresa Griffith, “Perspective of Time”, in Love Your Skeletons, [Morrisville, N.C.]: [Lulu.com], published January 2012 (3rd printing), →ISBN, part 3 (Care and Maintenance of Your Skeletons), pages 200–201:
- This doesn’t mean that you pretend the tornado in Kansas didn’t happen. Perhaps it spurs you to think about emergency preparedness. But you’ll be planning proactively, in the present, not worrying or apocalypsing.
- 2017, Mark Lilla, “Anti-Politics”, in The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics, New York, N.Y.: Harper, →ISBN, page 53:
- In one respect only was Donald Trump indebted to the conservative movement that Ronald Reagan founded: it bequeathed to him an angry, fearful base, which he was even more adept at manipulating than movement leaders had been. He destroyed his Republican adversaries by out-apocalypsing them.
- 2024, Manjula Martin, “Smoke”, in The Last Fire Season: A Personal and Pyronatural History, New York, N.Y.: Pantheon Books, →ISBN, page 166:
- And it was definitely a white American fear, of losing my status, my power. The fear manifested in me as an amorphous foreboding, a discomfort with being subject to the planet and its miracles the same as everyone else was. […] How would my fear change if I stopped apocalypsing and tried to embody this moment in collapse?
- (ambitransitive, informal, rare) To bring about (a huge disaster).
- 2011, D.j.W., “REALMWOL”, in The Rockking (Realmwol; instalment 4, series 2), [Morrisville, N.C.]: Lulu.com, →ISBN, page 153:
- The fourth age of this Lunaeon is alive with povertous homage / For those whom[sic] chew upon the Rockking’s wealth / And worship his unlovable stone / Apocalypsing an end to this ever-there-be-day / Wear a cloak of benightly screaming / Banshees, eager to roam whence / Windrom releases their pent rage
- 2018, Andy McElfresh, “Anything to that Sci-Fi Trope?”, in The Edumacation Book: Amazing Cocktail-Party Science to Impress Your Friends, San Francisco, Calif.: Weldon Owen, →ISBN, page 282:
- ROBOT APOCALYPSE / Of all the apocalypses, this is my favorite. So much better than the zombie apocalypse, […] Instead of having some drooling, extremely gross-looking shuffling moron take a bite out of me and turn me into a drooling moron ([…]), I imagine C-3PO politely harvesting my organs for some terribly important reason that just happens to escape him at the moment. But really, it’s a Sophie’s choice, and I would actually prefer not to be apocalypsed on in the first place.
References
[edit]- Douglas Harper (2001–2025), “apocalypse”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
French
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From Latin apocalypsis, from Ancient Greek ἀποκάλυψις (apokálupsis).
Pronunciation
[edit]- IPA(key): /a.pɔ.ka.lips/
Audio (Switzerland (Valais)): (file) Audio (France (Vosges)): (file) Audio (France (Vosges)): (file) Audio (France (Saint-Étienne)): (file)
Noun
[edit]apocalypse f (plural apocalypses)
- apocalypse (disaster)
Related terms
[edit]Further reading
[edit]- “apocalypse”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
Latin
[edit]Noun
[edit]apocalypse
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