A coworker and I got into it about smiting following a biblical conversation.
dictionary.com took care of the discussion about being smitten; it means the same thing, just used differently.
But I contend that she can’t go home and smite her children because she isn’t a god or a king.
She thinks anyone can smite anyone, and that if her kids don’t have the house clean by the time she gets there, there’s a gonna be some smiting.
I dunno, it sounds a bit extreme to smite someone for not washing the dishes. I think a whoopin’ might be in order, but a smiting, I think gets her jail time.
Not to mention that I’m a mandated reporter and I might have to call protective services if I found out that she smote her kids.
Perspectives on smiting? Who is allowed to smite and under what circumstances?
Not so much who’s allowed to, but are there degrees of smiting? Begin smited by God is pretty darn final. It would be important to determine whether or not smiting allowed room for permanent injury, a lengthy hospital stay, or the possibility of disfiguring scars, but even in those cases, it would still probably be something the layperson wouldn’t want to take into her own hands.
Now, on the other hand, if you could revoke somebody’s computer privileges and call it a smiting, then I’m all for it. My kids get smited like that all the time.
I’m on your side, greck. Smiting is one of those things that requires you to be very much In Charge. I mean, if just anyone could smite, what would be left for when God waxes sorely pissed? Smiting is only okay if you’re a Cosmic Entity. Or Cecil.
Now, as to when a smiter gets to smite a smitee, I think the answer to that is pretty obviously “whenever the smiter wants.” I mean, are you gonna tell God “nope, sorry, can’t smite me; it’s Thursday, and there’s no smiting on Thursdays, remember?”
I really don’t have an opinion on whether plain, ordinary folks can do some heavy simiting, but I would add one name to those who can clearly simite: Luuuuuuuuve
ummm? Just what idea did you take away from dictionary.com?
None of those definitions or examples require divine or royal authority. The definition 6 from Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary would seem to include parental authority.
(Of course, if you live in a locale where spankings are forbidden by law, you may have a case, but a swat on the butt certainly comes under one definition of smiting.)
Sorry, I should explain more, during our conversation we discussed whether or not “being smitten” with someone was the same as being smote by someone, like if they were the same word, of the same origin.
Anyway, one of the definitions stated something about being totally consumed with or by something.
I know the dictionary doesn’t present it this way, but it seems as if all literary references of people smiting or being smote involve a king or a god doing the smiting.
It just seems so permanent, like once you’ve been smote, that’s all.
I guess great warriors could smite.
But they smite with mighty weapons.
She’s a mom, and maybe she’ll hold aloft her wooden spoon and strike down with divine power. Nah, no matter how you slice it, that’s a whoopin, not a smiting, IMO.
When my kids were little I would threaten: " I am going to smite you and I am going to smite you mightily.
Years later I learned that my son thought I was saying “mildly”. No wonder it had no effect. sheesh.
From my childhood, I remember a lot of “smiting” and being “smote” from the great Persian fairy tale Rustem and Sohrab, wherein (IIRC) the father “smote” the son’s helmet so mightily that it “cleaved it in two”.
I agree that “smitten” carries a whole different meaning. A lad who gets stars in his eyes whenever a certain cutie walks by is smitten. Who smote him? Cupid, probably. Maybe the cutie herself. Obviously, though, this is a gentle kind of smiting.
