 In postexilic Judaism, the meaning of the word changed to an expression of God's displeasure with all persons, Jew or pagan, who do not subordinate their personal conduct and tendencies to the discipline of the theocracy, and must be purged from the community—thus making anathema an instrument of synagogal discipline.The noun ἀνάθεμα ("anathema") occurs in the Greek New Testament six times, and frequently in the Septuagint (Greek Old Testament).Its meaning in the New Testament is "disfavour of God", and is used both of the sentence of disfavour, as in Acts 23