CLERGYMAN

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does clergyman mean? 

• CLERGYMAN (noun)
  The noun CLERGYMAN has 1 sense:

1. a member of the clergy and a spiritual leader of the Christian Church

  Familiarity information: CLERGYMAN used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CLERGYMAN (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A member of the clergy and a spiritual leader of the Christian Church

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

clergyman; man of the cloth; reverend

Hypernyms ("clergyman" is a kind of...):

spiritual leader (a leader in religious or sacred affairs)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "clergyman"):

acolyte (someone who assists a priest or minister in a liturgical service; a cleric ordained in the highest of the minor orders in the Roman Catholic Church but not in the Anglican Church or the Eastern Orthodox Churches)

vicar ((Episcopal Church) a clergyman in charge of a chapel)

vicar ((Church of England) a clergyman appointed to act as priest of a parish)

subdeacon (a clergyman an order below deacon; one of the Holy Orders in the unreformed western Christian church and the eastern Catholic Churches but now suppressed in the Roman Catholic Church)

shepherd (a clergyman who watches over a group of people)

priest (a clergyman in Christian churches who has the authority to perform or administer various religious rites; one of the Holy Orders)

preacher; preacher man; sermoniser; sermonizer (someone whose occupation is preaching the gospel)

postulator ((Roman Catholic Church) someone who proposes or pleads for a candidate for beatification or canonization)

ordinary (a clergyman appointed to prepare condemned prisoners for death)

ordinand (a person being ordained)

officiant (a clergyman who officiates at a religious ceremony or service)

doorkeeper; ostiarius; ostiary (the lowest of the minor Holy Orders in the unreformed Western Church but now suppressed by the Roman Catholic Church)

anagnost (a cleric in the minor orders of the Eastern Orthodox Church who reads the lessons aloud in the liturgy (analogous to the lector in the Roman Catholic Church))

archdeacon ((Anglican Church) an ecclesiastical dignitary usually ranking just below a bishop)

chaplain (a clergyman ministering to some institution)

churchman; cleric; divine; ecclesiastic (a clergyman or other person in religious orders)

curate; minister; minister of religion; parson; pastor; rector (a person authorized to conduct religious worship)

deacon (a cleric ranking just below a priest in Christian churches; one of the Holy Orders)

domine; dominee; dominie; dominus (a clergyman; especially a settled minister or parson)

lector; reader (someone who reads the lessons in a church service; someone ordained in a minor order of the Roman Catholic Church)

Instance hyponyms:

Beecher; Henry Ward Beecher (United States clergyman who was a leader for the abolition of slavery (1813-1887))

Donne; John Donne (English clergyman and metaphysical poet celebrated as a preacher (1572-1631))

John Keble; Keble (English clergyman who (with John Henry Newman and Edward Pusey) founded the Oxford movement (1792-1866))

King; Martin Luther King; Martin Luther King Jr. (United States charismatic civil rights leader and Baptist minister who campaigned against the segregation of Blacks (1929-1968))

John Wesley; Wesley (English clergyman and founder of Methodism (1703-1791))

Charles Wesley; Wesley (English clergyman and brother of John Wesley who wrote many hymns (1707-1788))

Roger Williams; Williams (English clergyman and colonist who was expelled from Massachusetts for criticizing Puritanism; he founded Providence in 1636 and obtained a royal charter for Rhode Island in 1663 (1603-1683))

Holonyms ("clergyman" is a member of...):

clergy (in Christianity, clergymen collectively (as distinguished from the laity))

Antonym:

layman (someone who is not a clergyman or a professional person)

 Context examples 

Go you to the church: see if Mr. Wood (the clergyman) and the clerk are there: return and tell me.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Do not you think it is quite a mistaken point of conscience, when a clergyman sacrifices his health for the sake of duties, which may be just as well performed by another person?

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

She liked him the better for being a clergyman, “for she must confess herself very partial to the profession”; and something like a sigh escaped her as she said it.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

She never has danced with a clergyman, she says, and she never will.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I know that everything was turning round, and the words of the clergyman were just like the buzz of a bee in my ear.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

There is some rumour that he is or has been a clergyman, but one or two incidents of his short residence at the Hall struck me as peculiarly unecclesiastical.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The other had been silent all this time, but I had observed that his more controlled excitement was even greater than the obtrusive emotion of the clergyman.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But though Peggotty's eye wanders, she is much offended if mine does, and frowns to me, as I stand upon the seat, that I am to look at the clergyman.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Perhaps, indeed, at that time she scarcely saw Mr. Elton, but as the clergyman whose blessing at the altar might next fall on herself.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

If I, said Mr. Collins, were so fortunate as to be able to sing, I should have great pleasure, I am sure, in obliging the company with an air; for I consider music as a very innocent diversion, and perfectly compatible with the profession of a clergyman.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)