Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Often Offensive An unbeliever with respect to a particular religion, especially Christianity or Islam.
- noun One who has no religious beliefs.
- noun One who doubts or rejects a particular doctrine, system, or principle.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Without faith: unbelieving; disbelieving; especially, rejecting the distinctive doctrines of a particular religion, while perhaps an adherent of some other religion.
- Specifically Rejecting the Christian religion while accepting no other; not believing in the Bible or any divine revelation: used especially of persons belonging to Christian communities.
- Due to or manifesting unbelief.
- noun An unbeliever; a disbeliever; one who denies the distinctive tenets of a particular religion.
- noun Specifically A disbeliever in religion or divine revelation in general; especially, one who denies or refuses to believe in the Christian religion while accepting no other; one who rejects the inspiration of the Scriptures, or the divine origin and authority of Christianity as revealed in the Bible.
- noun In feudal law, one who violated fealty. Rapalje and Lawrence.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Not holding the faith; -- applied by Christians to one who does not believe in the inspiration of the Scriptures, and the supernatural origin of Christianity; used by Mohammedans to refer to those who do not believe in Islam.
- noun One who does not believe in the prevailing religious faith; a heathen; a freethinker; -- used especially by Christians and Mohammedans.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A non-believer of a certain religion.
- noun One who does not believe in a certain principle.
- noun One with no religious beliefs.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a person who does not acknowledge your god
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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At a time when the term infidel or unbeliever was still the accusation of choice, the rejoinder that one was a-gnostic -- literally, "against gnosis" -- meant that he or she was taking a principled stand against ancient systems of belief.
The Full Feed from HuffingtonPost.com Christopher Lane 2011
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And though the application of the term infidel to such a man would not fail to arouse his fiercest indignation, his indifference to the events and the fate of the great hereafter can arise from nothing else than an utter disbelief in the teachings of Holy
The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 Devoted to Literature and National Policy Various
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The term infidel was used by Christians to describe non-Christians or those perceived as the enemies of Christianity, especially to designate monotheists (Muslims) who do not subscribe to the Judeo-Christian concept of God, and thus differs from heathen or pagan.
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Note 257: Like barbarian, the term infidel is unavoidably subjective and reflexive: often it is used to describe "others" that are beyond one's sphere of familiarity.
Architecture and Memory: The Renaissance Studioli of Federico da Montefeltro 2008
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Al Shahab as they're known, are battling what they called the infidel Christian occupier Ethiopia and (inaudible) its regime.
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But if you introduce such a mixture into the stomach, and thence into the brain of an already fiery Bedouin; and then introduce the Bedouin to trouble; and if, in addition to the trouble, you provide impertinent, alien, and what he calls infidel restraint, it is fair to presume that the mixture might explode.
Jimgrim and Allah's Peace Talbot Mundy 1909
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In this document Lincoln seemed to make two different claims: that he never believed in infidel doctrines, and that he never publicly espoused them.
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That, of course, has been hotly debated from the election of 1800 to today, and Jefferson has been called an infidel, a Deist and more.
Thomas Jefferson's Cut-and-Paste Bible Stephen Prothero 2011
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In this document Lincoln seemed to make two different claims: that he never believed in infidel doctrines, and that he never publicly espoused them.
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And how does a bunch of "infidels" like us make any deal with Muslims, whose Holy Book says that no promise to an infidel is binding upon Muslims?
pixie-elf commented on the word infidel
Infidel is just sexy.
April 13, 2007
bilby commented on the word infidel
"Marayaw sumabulak sumping ha kubul kapil, ayaw sumabulak ha kubul lalim.
It’s better to strew flowers on the grave of an infidel than that of a tyrant." - Tausug proverb.
December 20, 2007