to kingdom come
11
9.4
- idiom
- Informal
:
hecho añicos
- The explosion sent debris flying to kingdom come, leaving nothing intact.
- blown to kingdom come
- blasted to kingdom come
Examples
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So, I just scaled the walls, blew the whole place to kingdom come.
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If we had a real leader in the White House, we would target who did it and blow them to kingdom come!
Blog text (23) -
So before you blow me to kingdom come, I want you to answer one question.
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I will blow you to kingdom come.
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Then we blow them all to kingdom come.
Fiction book (1998) -
How 'bout I just blow you to kingdom come right now?
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Hold your horses, or I'll knock you to kingdom come.
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Then he'll detonate the grenade and blow everything to kingdom come.
Fiction book (1992) -
I realize that this mission is your call, but there would be some mighty angry people here at the White House and at the Pentagon, and out there in the world if you allow these people to leave and blow a shopping mall to kingdom come.
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Then, in 1981, when Saddam's precious Osirak 1 and 2 plants were about to start up, Israeli fighter-bombers swept in and blew the lot to kingdom come.
Fiction book (1994)
How Complete
Surface Forms
Morphology
to + kingdom + come
The sense 'sent to complete destruction / to the afterlife' is not transparently derived from 'kingdom' (a realm) and 'come' (to arrive); the phrase is a fixed idiom with historical/biblical connotations. A B1 learner who knows the individual words but has not encountered the expression would not reliably infer this idiomatic meaning, so it should be treated as opaque.
Etymology
To kingdom come may come from old religious talk about the kingdom that comes after the end of the world, a far and final place. That image of being sent to that distant, final place is why we now use to kingdom come to mean 'sent very far away' or 'destroyed completely'.