Word of the month: Lebenslüge

Word of the Month: Index

Here's another addition to Leben ("life") that creates a special meaning: A Lüge is a lie, and a Lebenslüge is a lie people tell themselves in order to be able to live with a clear conscience in spite of the fact that some actions in the past should give them anything but a clear conscience. It appears to be a particular manifestation of cognitive dissonance, which we talked about a while ago. According to the Wikipedia article I consulted, the term goes back to Henrik Ibsen's "The Wild Duck", which means there has to be an initial coinage in Norwegian—I wonder what that would be.

It is interesting to note that in German political discourse, the term has been applied to nations or countries; for example, to countries that go to great lengths to suppress the memory of and references to atrocities that have been committed in the past in the name of the country or were sanctioned by its leaders, or to countries whose self-image or policies are based on false assumptions about events that happened in the past.