supererogatory love

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Performed or observed beyond the required or expected degree.
  • adjective Superfluous; unnecessary.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Partaking of supererogation; performed to an extent not enjoined or not required by duty; unnecessary; superfluous.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Performed to an extent not enjoined, or not required, by duty or necessity.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Pertaining to supererogation; doing more than is required, especially with reference to good works in Roman Catholicism

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective more than is needed, desired, or required

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin superērogātōrius ("supererogatory"), from superērogātiō ("payment in addition"), from superērogō ("pay out over and above"), from super ("above") + ērogō ("pay out, expend"); from ex ("out of, from") + rogō ("ask; request").

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word supererogatory.

Examples

  • It might be morally better to give the money to charity, but such contributions seem supererogatory, that is, above and beyond the call of duty.

    Consequentialism Sinnott-Armstrong, Walter 2006

  • Christian virtue was conceived, in much greater freedom from self-seeking, as the-simple fruit of faith; and the notion of supererogatory works became impossible in view of the decided recognition, that the life even of the most holy always falls short of moral perfection.

    Christian Ethics. Volume I.���History of Ethics. 1819-1870 1873

  • The evangelical tendency which during the time of the universal domination of the Romish church had never entirely disappeared, and which, especially since the appearance of the Waldenses, had been growing more positive in its opposition to the corrupted church, directed its efforts from the very first against the anti-scriptural and arbitrary ordinances of said church, especially against the work-holiness of monastic morality, in order to vindicate the moral freedom of the Christian personality, and also against the sophistical laxity of the more recent period; this tendency insists above all upon faith-born love as the source and essence of all true morality, and rejects the notion of supererogatory merit as arising from the observance of the so-called evangelical counsels. —

    Christian Ethics. Volume I.���History of Ethics. 1819-1870 1873

  • I typed it in to the computer and swiftly learned – I can see you smiling up your sleeve – that it is really “supererogatory”.

    Archive 2009-06-01 Jean 2009

  • This was supererogatory, for the tracks told their own tale too well.

    TO THE MAN ON THE TRAIL 2010

  • I typed it in to the computer and swiftly learned – I can see you smiling up your sleeve – that it is really “supererogatory”.

    Jean's Knitting Jean 2009

  • This was supererogatory, for the tracks told their own tale too well.

    To The Man on the Trail 2010

  • Carrying a pregnancy to term and enduring the violent crisis of childbirth is a supererogatory act of grace on the part of a woman, not an obligation.

    Matthew Yglesias » Too Hot for CBS 2010

  • Although adoption is arguably an unnatural arrangement, it is nonetheless widely agreed to be a laudatory, if not supererogatory, service to society.

    Giving evidence to the Chilcot inquiry, Tony Blair said: “I... 2010

  • Most of those people are utilitarians of one kind or another, so they do not recognize the existence of supererogatory actions.

    The Book Mike Huemer Should Write, Bryan Caplan | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • If you have been disappointed by the battery life in your conventional erogatory, try this.

    March 10, 2009