Merism (Latin: merismus, Ancient Greek: μερισμός, romanized: merismós) is a rhetorical device (or figure of speech) in which a combination of two contrasting parts of the whole refer to the whole.
[1]: 10 Other famous examples of Biblical merisms are Genesis 1:5 in which "evening" and "morning" refer to "one day" (including noon, afternoon etc.)
[1]: 10 The term entered English in 1894 in the biological sense but had appeared earlier in rhetorical contexts in which it denoted "'synecdoche in which totality is expressed by contrasting parts' (such as high and low, young and old)".
It became customary to combine the instruments in a single dispositive document, and the name has continued long after the doctrines that had required its use became obsolete in common law.
During such periods, key terms were paired with synonyms from multiple languages in an attempt to prevent ambiguity and ensure hermeneutic consistency.