Who is this idiot? This word is often heard in everyday life. Almost everyone knows that it has a negative character and is used as an insult, but not everyone knows its true meaning. We can assume that you, most likely, also belong to the number of such people. If this is true, then welcome! Especially for you, we have written a publication in which the meaning of the word "idiot" is revealed in detail. We recommend that you read to the end so as not to miss anything important!
Who are these idiots? Meaning of the word
Explanatory dictionaries of Ozhegov and Efremova give the following definitions of the word "idiot":
- Idiot - a person who does not have a high level of intelligence, a fool. As a rule, it is used as an insult to humiliate the opponent and point out his stupidity.
- An idiot is a person who is sick with idiocy.
Idiocy
When discussing the meaning of the word "idiot", it is impossible not to say a few words about idiocy.
Many people throwing the word "idiot" right and left do not even realize how offensive and inappropriate it can be. The fact is that idiocy is a serious disease. This is the name of the congenital form of dementia, which is expressed in the complete destruction of the normal mental activity of a person.
Idiot: what did this word mean a few millennia ago?
As we said earlier, the word "idiot" now has two meanings: offensive and medical. However, originally the word Idiōtēs had a completely different meaning. Translated from ancient Greek, it meant just a person who is not interested in politics. Due to the negative associations, the word "idiot" eventually took on the meaning that is the most common today.
A more detailed answer to the question "who are the idiots in Ancient Greece?" described in the Brockhaus and Efron dictionary:
"The word idiot originally meant an individual as opposed to the state. In ancient Greece, idiots were often called those who did not take part in the affairs of the state, that is, on the one hand, a private person as opposed to a statesman, on the other hand, an ignoramus and the layman as opposed to the intelligent, dedicated, uneducated person as opposed to the educated. The ancient Romans put a similar meaning into this word: in their interpretation, an idiot is an inexperienced, uneducated person,who understands nothing of art and science."
Fyodor Dostoevsky's "Idiot"
Since we are writing an article about what an idiot is, it would be unforgivable of us not to write about the novel of the same name by the famous Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Fyodor Mikhailovich created this work from 1867 to 1869. Initially, it was conceived as a continuation of another famous novel by Dostoevsky - "Crime and Punishment".
The Idiot is the second novel in Dostoevsky's so-called Great Pentateuch, which also includes Crime and Punishment, Demons, The Gambler, and The Brothers Karamazov.
The novel "Idiot" Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote abroad, where he went to get some medical treatment. With the money that he was supposed to be given for writing a novel, he wanted to pay off the loans. Work on the work was difficult: Dostoevsky's he alth did not improve, and in 1868 his three-month-old daughter died in Geneva.
When Fyodor Mikhailovich lived in Germany and Switzerland, he reflected on the moral and socio-political changes in the Russian Empire in the second half of the 19th century: revolutionary moods, raznochintsy circles, ideas of nihilists - all this somehow influenced his new novel.
For Dostoevsky, there was only one ideal - Jesus Christ. Those features that the Savior possessed, he tried to endowand the protagonist of the novel, Prince Myshkin.
According to Fyodor Mikhailovich, Don Quixote is closest to the ideal of Christ in fiction. The image of Prince Myshkin has much in common with the main character of the work of Cervantes. Like the author of Don Quixote, Dostoevsky asks the question: what will happen to a person endowed with the qualities of a saint if he gets into our time, what will be his relationship with the people around him and how will he influence them, and they - on him?
Who is this idiot? We think we have been able to answer this question. We hope that our article was interesting for you and you learned a lot of interesting information!
