ordain
/ɔ:'dein/
Học thuậtThân thiện
Definition
- Verb:
- To order or command something officially: To issue a formal decree, law, or command with authority.
- To confer holy orders upon someone; to make someone a priest, minister, or rabbi: To invest a person with the authority and status of clergy in a religious ceremony.
- To preordain or predestine; to decree something as inevitable: To order or decide something in advance, often by a divine or fateful power.
Examples of Usage
- Verb:
- The king would ordain new laws for the kingdom.
- She was ordained as a priest in a ceremony last year.
- Fate had ordained that their paths would cross again.
Advanced Usage
- "to ordain that...": used to introduce the content of a formal decree or divine will.
- The council ordained that all citizens must pay the new tax.
- The prophecy ordained that a hero would rise to defeat the darkness.
Variants and Related Words
- Ordination (n): The act or ceremony of ordaining someone; the state of being ordained.
- He attended his sister's ordination into the ministry.
- Preordain (v): To ordain or decide beforehand.
- Some believe our destiny is preordained.
Synonyms
- Decree: To order something by an official authority.
- Enact: To make into law.
- Consecrate: To make or declare something sacred; often used in religious contexts similar to 'ordain'.
Related Phrasal Verbs / Constructions
(This word does not commonly form phrasal verbs. Its usage is typically direct.)
Related Idioms
- "As fate/God would ordain": Used to suggest that something happened because it was destined or willed by a higher power.
- They met again, twenty years later, as fate would ordain.
Verb
- issue an order
- invest with ministerial or priestly authority
- The minister was ordained only last month
- appoint to a clerical posts
- he was ordained in the Church
- order by virtue of superior authority; decree
- The King ordained the persecution and expulsion of the Jews
- the legislature enacted this law in 1985