Oath
personal affirmation of a statement
Traditionally, an oath (from Anglo-Saxon āþ, also a plight) is a statement of fact or a promise taken by a sacrality as a sign of verity. A common legal substitute for those who object to making sacred oaths is to give an affirmation instead. Nowadays, even when there is no notion of sanctity involved, certain promises said out loud in ceremonial or juridical purpose are referred to as oaths. "To swear" is a verb used to describe the taking of an oath; to make a solemn vow.
Etymology
The word comes from Anglo-Saxon āþ: "judicial swearing, solemn appeal to deity in witness of truth or a promise"; from Proto-Germanic *aiþaz; from Proto-Indo-European *oi-to-: "an oath". Common to Celtic and Germanic, possibly a loan-word from one to the other.
Historical development as a legal concept
Jewish tradition
The concept of oaths is deeply rooted within Judaism. It is found in Genesis 8:21, when God swears that he will "never again curse the ground because of man and never again smite every living thing". This repetition of the term never again is explained by Rashi, the pre-eminent biblical commentator, as serving as an oath, citing the Talmud Shavous 36a for this ruling.
The first person stated in the biblical narrative to have taken an oath is held to be the chief servant of Abraham, when Abraham asked him to find a wife for his son Isaac, not from the women of Canaan, but rather from among Abraham's own family in Aram-naharaim (Nahor).
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as personal affirmation of a statement. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q381045. The Library of Congress control number is sh85093593. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Oath” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.