Hasidic

Otherwise known as the guys with the really amazing, lustrous beards. Originally, Hasidism was a branch of Judaism founded by the Rabbi Baal Shem Tov—our buddy, the Besht—based around the more mystical tenets of Judaism and the spiritual aspects of day-to-day activities.

Transcend

A million-dollar word for rising above something. As in: one day, we'll transcend the endless cycle of Hollywood reviving franchises from the '80s and move on toward '90s reboots instead.

Tower of Babel

We get the word "babble" from this bad boy. The story goes that the world's leaders, thinking themselves hot stuff, decided to build a tower all the way up to God himself, to prove that they could and maybe to have a few words with the guy.

God, not thrilled with their hubris, cursed them to each speak a different language. Nobody could understand anybody else. The dead rising from the graves. Dogs and cats living together. Mass hysteria.

Well, some of that might have been from Ghostbusters, but the moral of the story was that humanity shouldn't play God…or we'll be rewarded with the agony of French pop quizzes for all eternity.

Processions

Not really the opposite of a concession; a procession is a group of people walking along in some kind of orderly fashion. You've probably heard the word thrown around the most when people are talking about "wedding processions."

Aberration

A deformity, a monstrosity, something warped and twisted that doesn't fit the character of something. For example: Highlander 2: The Quickening was an aberration of a once-promising sci-fi franchise.

Metamorphosis

Metamorphosis is a transformation into something else: caterpillar into butterfly, man into dung beetle, what have you.

Xenophobia

Xenophobia: the fear of anyone who isn't like you. It's a fancy word for racism, and much like homophobia it denotes hatred more than it does actual fear.

Abhorrence

Abhorrence is disgust and fear and all sorts of gross feelings toward something.

Inequity

A shorter, pithier version of the word inequality.

Anemic

Wiesel's not saying language literally has a case of anemia and needs to eat some spinach, stat; he means that it is sickly, weak, and otherwise not doing so hot.