faith

English Online Dictionary. What means faith‎? What does faith mean?

English

Alternative forms

• feith, feithe, fayth, faythe, faithe (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English faith (also fay), borrowed from Old French fei, feid, from Latin fidem. Displaced native Old English ġelēafa, which was also a word for "belief."

Old French had [θ] as a final devoiced allophone of /ð/ from lenited Latin /d/; this eventually fell silent in the 12th century. The -th of the Middle English forms is most straightforwardly accounted for as a direct borrowing of a French [θ]. However, it has also been seen as arising from alteration of a French form with -d under influence of English abstract nouns in the suffix -th (e.g. truth, ruth, health, etc.), or as a recharacterisation of a French form like fay, fey, fei with the same suffix, thus making the word equivalent to fay +‎ -th (abstract nominal suffix). Compare Champenois fiate, fiaite, showing the same preservation of the final consonant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /feɪθ/
• Rhymes: -eɪθ

Noun

faith (countable and uncountable, plural faiths)

1. A trust or confidence in the intentions or abilities of a person, object, or ideal from prior empirical evidence.
2. A conviction about abstractions, ideas, or beliefs, without empirical evidence, experience, or observation.
4. A religious or spiritual belief system.
5. An obligation of loyalty or fidelity and the observance of such an obligation.

6. (obsolete) Credibility or truth.
   • 1784-1810, William Mitford, History of Greece

     the faith of the foregoing […] narrative

Quotations

For quotations using this term, see Citations:faith.

Synonyms

• (knowing, without direct observation, based on indirect evidence and experience, that something is true, real, or will happen): belief, confidence, trust, conviction
• (system of religious belief): religion

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Adverb

faith (not comparable)

1. (archaic) Alternative form of in faith (“really, truly”).

Interjection

faith

1. (obsolete) Ellipsis of by my faith.

References

• “faith”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• faith in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “faith”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “faith”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Anagrams

• hatif

Old Irish

Noun

faith m

1. alternative spelling of fáith

Welsh

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /vai̯θ/

Adjective

faith

1. soft mutation of maith

Mutation