Word-Built World: lustration

May 3, 2025 Mike Zonta Leave a comment

Elephants lustrating Queen Maya (Sanchi, India) Photo: Anandajoti Bhikkhu

A.Word.A.Daywith Anu Garg

lustration

PRONUNCIATION:

(luhs-TRAY-shuhn)

MEANING:

noun:
1. An act of purification by means of rituals.
2. The purging of those associated with crimes committed under an earlier regime.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin lustrare (to make bright). Earliest documented use: 1614.

NOTES:

If you’ve ever tried to cleanse your browser history or remove the lingering influence of a previous group project gone wrong, congratulations — you’ve dabbled in lustration.

Originally used for religious or ceremonial purification, lustration was what you did when your crops failed, your city got a plague, or someone angered Jupiter by parking a chariot in a fire lane. Think of it as spring cleaning for your soul.

In modern political use, lustration took on a sharper edge. After the fall of totalitarian regimes (e.g., post-Communist Eastern Europe), it came to mean the act of cleansing the government of people tied to past abuses.

There’s something poetic in the root lustrare, “to make bright”. You’re not just wiping the slate clean, you’re polishing it until it gleams. Although some politicians subjected to lustration might prefer a dimmer switch.

Logo of the Ukrainian Lustration Committee Image: Ukrainian Lustration Committee / Wikimedia

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“. . . the only difference between you and God is that you have forgotten that you are divine.”
— Peter Solomon in The Lost Symbol

“Have an open-mind, but don’t let your brains fall out.”
— Jacob Needleman

“When thought races ahead of Being, a civilization is racing towards destruction.”
— Jacob Needleman in his new book What is God?

“A great man knows he is not God, and the greater he is the better he knows it.”
— G.K. Chesterton

“Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only at night.”
— Edgar Allan Poe

“Give thanks to unknown blessings already on their way.”
— Native American proverb at cafe in San Francisco

“To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.”
–e.e. cummings

Consciousness, sexuality, androgyny, futurism, space, the arts, science, astrology, democracy, humor, books, movies and more

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Consciousness, sexuality, androgyny, futurism, space, the arts, science, astrology, democracy, humor, books, movies and more