Customer trust is the alpha and omega of our business.
Alpha and Omega
idiomThe beginning and the end; the most essential or all-encompassing element of something.
Origin
Alpha and omega are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet. In Revelation 1:8, and again at 22:13, the divine voice declares I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end — a claim to encompass all of time from start to finish.
Naming the whole by its two endpoints is an old rhetorical move, and the striking pairing of the two Greek letters made it memorable enough to survive translation into languages that use a different alphabet entirely.
In English the alpha and omega of a thing is its totality, or its single most vital element — the beginning and end of the matter, the point on which everything else depends.
For the old coach, discipline was the alpha and omega of the sport; everything else was detail.
Safety was the alpha and omega of the operation, the principle from which every procedure was derived and against which every shortcut was ultimately measured and rejected.
End-times and final-judgment imagery, from the Gospels to Revelation.
- 01
a bottomless pit (idiom)
Something that consumes endlessly and can never be filled or satisfied.
- 02
fire-and-brimstone (word)
Threats of punishment or damnation, especially in stern moralising or preaching.
- 03
separate the sheep from the goats (idiom)
To distinguish the worthy or capable from the unworthy or inadequate.
- 04
gnashing of teeth (idiom)
Extreme distress, frustration, or anguished complaining.
- 05
cast into outer darkness (idiom)
To be completely excluded, banished, or shut out from a group or from favour.