shibboleth
英['??b?leθ]
美['??b?l?θ]
- n. 口令；（基督教《圣經(jīng)》）考驗用的詞；特殊的習慣
詞態(tài)變化
復數(shù):?shibboleths;
中文詞源
shibboleth 口音，習慣，準則，教條，行話
來自希伯來語 shibboleth,麥穗。 現(xiàn)詞義來自圣經(jīng)中記載的小故事，兩民族 Gileadites 和 Ephraimites 打戰(zhàn)，Ephraimites 人打敗了逃跑，但由于這兩個民族人長得一樣，從長相上無 法辨別，但是口音有差別，Ephraimites 人無法發(fā)-sh-音，于是，Gileadites 人在關卡上讓所有 通過的人念 shibboleth 這個詞，不能正確的發(fā)-sh-的人就抓起來。因而引申諸相關詞義。類 似于中國南北東西口音差異。
英文詞源
- shibboleth
- shibboleth: [14] Hebrew shibbōleth meant ‘stream’. According to the Bible, the Gileadites used it as a password, for they knew their enemies the Ephraimites could not pronounce the sh properly (‘And it was so, that when those Ephraimites which were escaped said, Let me go over; that the men of Gilead said unto him, Art thou an Ephraimite? If he said, Nay, then they said unto him, Say now Shibboleth: and he said Sibboleth: for he could not frame to pronounce it right’, Judges 12:5–6).
In 17th-century English it came to be applied generically to any word used as a test of pronunciation, particularly as a sign of belonging to a group, and hence by extension to any catchword or slogan adopted by a group, and this eventually evolved into the modern sense ‘outmoded slogan, practice, etc still adhered to’. - shibboleth (n.)
- late 14c., the Hebrew word shibboleth, meaning "flood, stream," also "ear of corn;" in Judges xii:4-6. It was the password used by the Gileadites to distinguish their own men from fleeing Ephraimites, because Ephraimites could not pronounce the -sh- sound. Hence the figurative sense of "watchword" (first recorded 1630s), which evolved by 1862 to "outmoded slogan still adhered to." A similar test-word was cicera "chick pease," used by the Italians to identify the French (who could not pronounce it correctly) during the massacre called the Sicilian Vespers (1282).
雙語例句
- 1. It is time to go beyond the shibboleth that conventional forces cannot deter.
- 是時候擺脫那些傳統(tǒng)力量無法遏制的陳規(guī)陋習了。
來自辭典例句
- 2. They would say to him, Then say, Shibboleth.
- 6就對他說, 你說示播列.
來自互聯(lián)網(wǎng)
- 3. Maritime nations still respond automatically to the shibboleth of the freedom of the seas.
- 海洋國家依然聽從[四海自由]的口令.
來自互聯(lián)網(wǎng)