Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The act or an instance of profaning; desecration.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The act of violating sacred things, or of treating them with contempt or irreverence; desecration: as, the profanation of the Lord's day; the profanation of a sanctuary.
- noun The act of treating with too little reserve or delicacy, or of making common.
- noun Synonyms Profanation, Desecration, Sacrileye, pollution. The first three words express offenses, amounting almost or quite to outrages, against the religious sentiment, in connection with places, days, etc., taking off their sacred character. They are in the order of strength. Profanation is perhaps most distinctly a matter of irreverence. Sacrilege seems most directly an invasion of the rights of God.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The act of violating sacred things, or of treating them with contempt or irreverence; irreverent or too familiar treatment or use of what is sacred; desecration
- noun The act of treating with abuse or disrespect, or with undue publicity, or lack of delicacy.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The act of
profaning ;desecration ,blasphemous behaviour ,defilement .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun blasphemous behavior; the act of depriving something of its sacred character
- noun degradation of something worthy of respect; cheapening
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Atherton, “may differ essentially, and what you term profanation may to me seem perfectly harmless; but, be that as it will, my sojourn here has been so brief, that I do not feel accountable for a slight breach of local regulations, of which I was entirely ignorant.”
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Great care is alwavs taken that the bones may be burned, as it would be con - sidered a profanation were the dogs permitted to touch them.
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Confucius of the revolution, was a kind of profanation of the holy fire, well calculated to revive the languid rage, and extinguish the small remains of humanity yet left among the people.
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Confucius of the revolution, was a kind of profanation of the holy fire, well calculated to revive the languid rage, and extinguish the small remains of humanity yet left among the people.
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What passionate avowals of her affection she made, so sweet, so thrilling, that it would be a kind of profanation to write them.
A Daughter of Fife Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr 1875
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That quiet and easily satisfied people, whose existence you might forget except when they testify their happiness by their shouts; noisy without a thought of sedition; whose only care is to shun poverty without amassing wealth; lowly in fortune but rich in temper -- it is a kind of profanation to rob such people as these.
The Letters of Cassiodorus Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator Senator Cassiodorus 1872
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The corruption of a notorious courtier would have made no impression: the King had already been overwhelmed with such accusations, and they had lost their effect: but to have seduced the virtuous Mirabeau, the very Confucius of the revolution, was a kind of profanation of the holy fire, well calculated to revive the languid rage, and extinguish the small remains of humanity yet left among the people.
A Residence in France During the Years 1792 1793 1794 and 1795 Lady, An English 1797
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This is the worst kind of profanation because holy things are mixed by them with profane to the point where they cannot be separated.
Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence Emanuel Swedenborg 1730
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Those who have confirmed themselves by this kind of profanation against the Divine and against the Word and thus against the spiritual things of the Word, sit in outer darkness dumb, unable to speak, wanting to babble pious and holy things as they did in the world, but unable to do so.
Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence Emanuel Swedenborg 1730
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_ The Lord does this lest man fall into that most serious kind of profanation of which we have treated in this chapter.
Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence Emanuel Swedenborg 1730
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