Philosophy & ThoughtGreek → English
Dogma
/ˈdɒɡmə/noun
A principle laid down by an authority as unquestionably true.
The Greek roots
δόγμα
dógma
opinion, decree
δοκεῖν
dokeîn
to seem, to think fit
Literally: “what seems right”
The story of the word
Δόγμα comes from the verb for seeming, and in Athens it named a decree passed because it seemed good to the assembly, the formula ἔδοξε τῇ βουλῇ. Philosophers used it for a school's settled tenet. The Church took it for defined doctrine, and English inherited the hardness rather than the seeming, which is why a dogmatic person is the opposite of one who says a thing merely appears so.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 16th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
dogmaticorthodoxparadoxdoxology
In a sentence
He treated the department's style guide as dogma and refused every edit.