Is it prudent to help? The true meaning of the word

If you ask passers-by on the streets of any big city what charity is today, they will surely tell you that to look after is to disregard someone, to show him that this person has a low social status. However, people confuse two related concepts - charity and contempt.

Let's talk about them in more detail.

What happens when we despise ...

When we despise, we experience negative emotions towards a person, we are full of arrogance and pride, so let's not respect someone. We consider the deed of some person to be mean, vile, low and believe (deservedly or not) that the person himself is worthy of our contempt.

Thus, the prefix indicates that the speaker would like to distance himself from the phenomenon that he considers unseemly.

To be a man of grace is to show mercy

However, a completely different meaning for another word, this word is "ghost". As we can see, a completely different prefix is used here.

In this case, there is another meaning of the word. This expression comes from the verb "to look." It is priviled to provide help and care.

Therefore, long in Russia, charitable organizations were called homes of care and charity. In general, the very word "charity" appeared much later.

It turns out that only one letter in the console of the word depends so much. Distorted meaning. It's one thing to look at someone (for example, a homeless puppy or an orphan) or despise someone (a person whom you do not respect for one reason or another).

Note that these words are single-root. The root of them semantically goes back to the verb "to see" - that is, to see. Therefore, despise - not wanting to see someone, look at someone, is next to someone, and to look after is, on the contrary, to look after someone, giving him support and help. That is, to wish that the person you are looking after is close to you.

The value of charity

Despite the fact that this word has long been considered obsolete in dictionaries, its meaning is very important for society. After all, what is charity, how not the social support that is so necessary for all of us at any historical time ?!

And even if today not all our fellow citizens understand the true meaning of this expression, it still remains significant.

As a matter of fact, the task of each of us is to understand the meaning of each expression of our native language, because not only the character and way of thinking of an individual person is formed, but also the whole nation as a whole.