religiouslyadv.
/rᵻˈlɪdʒəsli/, U.S. /rəˈlɪdʒəsli/, /riˈlɪdʒəsli/ In a religious manner.† 2. In accordance with a monastic rule; in the manner of a person bound by religious vows. Obsolete.
1.
a. With religious feeling or conduct; in accordance with the principles of religion; piously, reverently, devoutly.figurative in quot. 1600.
ΘΚΠ
society > faith > aspects of faith > religion > [adverb]
religiouslyc1384
society > faith > church government > monasticism > [adverb] > in accordance with a rule
religiouslyc1384
c1384 Bible (Wycliffite, E.V.) (Douce 369(2)) (1850) 2 Macc. xii. 43 He sente twelue thousand dragmes..for to be offrid sacrifice for synnes of dead men, wele and religiously [L. religiose] bythenkynge of aȝein rysyng.
c1440 (a1401) Life Bridlington in Neuphilol. Mitteilungen (1970) 71 142 (MED) He woke And knelde, Prayand to God ful besily, Lifand wele and religiously.
?c1450 (?a1400) J. Wyclif Eng. Wks. (1880) 393 (MED) Þe whiche oure bischopis..biholdynge religiously & purveynge hoolsumly, dempten þat who so euer take mynystres of þe chirche fro spiritualle office to seculere, þat þer be noone offrynge done for hym.
a1500 tr. Thomas à Kempis De Imitatione Christi (Trin. Dublin) (1893) 6 (MED) At þe day of dome, it shal not be asked of us..what good we haue seide, but hou religiously we haue lyued.
1598 W. Shakespeare Love's Labour's Lost iv. ii. 146 Sir you haue done this in the feare of God verie religiously . View more context for this quotation
1600 Weakest goeth to Wall sig. G3v Lady, I affirme it constantly, I loue the Gentleman religiously.
1613 S. Purchas Pilgrimage iii. x. 246 In their Fast or Lent they abstaine very religiously.
1631 B. Jonson Bartholmew Fayre i. vi. 14 in Wks. II I would be satisfied from you, Religiously-wise, whether a widdow..may commit the act.
1687 R. Boyle Martyrdom Theodora (1703) viii. 110 The first of those who are recorded to have religiously deceased.
1744 G. Berkeley Siris (ESTC T72826) §183 In old Rome the eternal fire was religiously kept by virgins.
1839 J. Wilson in Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. 45 564 This Christian poet journeyed religiously among the magnificencies of nature.
1853 T. T. Lynch Lect. Self-improvem. ii. 32 People who would find a religion must seek it religiously.
1918 W. Faulkner Let. 3 Nov. in Thinking of Home (1992) 123 My room-mate..is an R.C. Says his prayers very religiously every night.
1960 J. A. Hutchison & J. A. Martin Ways of Faith (ed. 2) i. 18 Let us therefore seek to classify religions according to the kinds of objects to which men have responded religiously.
2007 University Wire (Nexis) 2 Apr. Humans are perhaps inevitably conditioned to think and behave religiously.
b. Faithfully, conscientiously; strictly, scrupulously; fervently.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > language > speech > agreement > observance > [adverb]
straitlyc1290
holilyc1374
strait1390
unpartingly1435
ritelyc1475
religiously1534
heedfully1561
rigorouslya1564
heedily1577
officiously1582
strictly1597
punctually1598
ritually1612
unadulterously1643
observantially1652
righteously1748
1534 W. Marshall tr. Erasmus Playne & Godly Expos. Commune Crede ii. f. 34 Spero in te, those men dare not saye: which do somewhat relygiouslye and preciselye obserue the elegauncie of the Latyne speche.
1579 E. K. in E. Spenser Shepheardes Cal. June 25 Gloss. The opinion of Faeries..sticketh very religiously in the myndes of some.
1605 W. Camden Remaines i. 104 These distinctions of locall names..were religiously observed in Records vntill about the time of king Edward the fourth.
1663 A. Cowley Ess. in Verse & Prose (1669) 106 Duty for Natures Bounty they repay, And her sole Laws religiously obey.
1726 G. Leoni tr. L. B. Alberti Architecture I. 51/1 One thing which I find the Ancients observed very religiously.
1776 E. Gibbon Decline & Fall I. xiii. 385 The image of the old constitution was religiously preserved in the senate.
1846 Edinb. Rev. 84 70 This legend is universally and religiously believed by the Arab Tribes.
1892 G. S. Layard Life & Lett. C. S. Keene iv. 80 He had religiously tramped all the way home through the deserted streets.
1935 G. Santayana Last Puritan ii. ii. 106 She was religiously saving every penny she could spare from her modest salary.
1953 Tomorrow's Man (Chicago) Mar. 43/2 I followed the exercise religiously..regarding reps, sets, rhythm, and so forth.
2004 Time Out N.Y. 23 Sept. 43/2 A '50s-era conservative ethic that many of the longtime students abide by religiously.
c. Solemnly, ceremoniously. Now rare.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > emotion > pride > ostentation > ceremony or formality > [adverb]
in (full, great) formc1405
solemnedlyc1480
religiously1576
ceremoniously1600
complementally?1617
ceremonially1644
complimentally1679
solemn1743
1576 A. Fleming tr. Cicero in Panoplie Epist. 96 I protest vnfainedly, and promise religiously, that I will be wholy in your iurisdiction.
a1616 W. Shakespeare King John (1623) iii. i. 66 I,..from Pope Innocent the Legate heere, Doe in his name religiously demand [etc.] . View more context for this quotation
1631 W. Gouge Gods Three Arrowes iii. §94. 359 Such as would not..by solemne and sacred oath religiously subscribe thereto.
1707 T. Hind Hist. Greece iii. 341 The Samians, Chians, Lesbians, and others, who had revolted, having solemnly and religiously sworn to observe the League.
1800 J. Hoole tr. P. Metastasio Artaxerxes iii. xi This to perform, to all Religiously I swear.
1989 Renaissance Q. 42 37 Bertram runs away from a marriage he has religiously sworn to consummate.
ΚΠ
c1460 in A. Clark Eng. Reg. Oseney Abbey (1907) 17 (MED) Vs sterith auctorite to ryȝghtfull axynges..to fauere, to þem namely þe which..after þe purpose of reguler lyfe religiously to leve.
c1460 Tree & 12 Frutes (McClean) (1960) 119 (MED) Al simulaciouns, sister, a voyde away fro þe; Schew in word and in dede as þou shuldist religiously.
1483 W. Caxton tr. J. de Voragine Golden Legende 360/2 A woman which was relygyously clad, whiche was his lauender.
1530 Myroure Oure Ladye (Fawkes) (1873) i. 62 A relygyous persone oughte to be gouerned relygiously ouer all..in sayng of this holy seruyce.
1542 Plowman's Prol. in Wks. G. Chaucer (new ed.) f. cxix He nas nat alway in cloystre ypent He coulde not religiouslyche lout[e].
1662 R. Codrington tr. G. Ruggle Ignoramus v. xi. sig. V2 Wheresoever he is, he is religiously covered with a Friars Hood.
3. In a religious sense; from a religious point of view; with respect to religion.
ΚΠ
1582 R. Robinson in tr. J. Leland Learned Assertion Life Prince Arthure xvii. f. 36v (note) Beda more religiously then Historically addicted.
1609 R. Crakanthorpe Serm. Solemnizing King James sig. B2v Those many, and most Religiously wise speeches, vttered in a manner in the hearing of the whole Realme.
a1638 J. Mede Treat. Daniel's Weeks (1643) xxvii. 42 They should serve them not religiously, but politically, in as much as they were to become Slaves and Vassals to Idolatrous Nations.
1720 C. Beckingham Henry IV iii. i. 28 I find him out To be State-mad, Religiously sick.
1725 J. Glanvill tr. Juvenal in Poems 257 If we made Fortune a Goddess, if we plac'd our Felicity in her Goods, those indeed were not in her Disposal; we must resort to other Powers for them. This is said more philosophically than religiously.
1833 J. H. Newman Arians 4th Cent. v. 381 Their own piety enabled them to interpret expressions religiously, which were originally..evasions of the orthodox doctrine.
1834 L. Ritchie Wanderings by Seine 90 When the [leper] was thus religiously dead, he was taken out of the town.
1872 H. P. Liddon Some Elements Relig. i. 15 The worthlessness, religiously speaking, of unfruitful knowledge.
c1905 J. Hunter in L. S. Hunter Life (1921) 220 The English Congregational Union. Its churches and ministry..are getting to be religiously more and more ‘Wesleyanised’.
1948 A. C. Kinsey et al. Sexual Behavior Human Male xiii. 485 The sexually most active groups are religiously non-active Protestants or Catholics as often as they are Jewish.
2006 The Word July 109/4 From much further afield—geographically, musically, religiously—comes Matisyahu, one of the few New Yorkers I know to make decent-sounding Hassidic Jewish reggae.
Compounds
Forming adjectives with past participles, as religiously-inclined, religiously-minded, etc.
ΚΠ
1593 R. Hooker Of Lawes Eccl. Politie Pref. 4 Otherwise right well affected and most religiouslie enclined mindes.
1627 R. Maynwaring Relig. & Alegiance ii. 26 How farre, a Religiously-affected Mind, a pious and deuout Affection, the Impression of true Thankfulnesse, will reach and extend it selfe towards God.
1716 M. Davies Diss. Physick 14 in Athenæ Britannicæ III Religiously inclin'd Doctors of the same Panto-Iatrical Scriptures.
a1744 J. Fothergill Acct. Life & Trav. (1753) 174 A good body of honest, religiously-minded Friends, with whom we had an open, and a solid comfortable time.
1835 Tait's Edinb. Mag. New Ser. 2 406 The..religiously educationized portions of the public.
1886 J. G. Matteson in Hist. Sketches Foreign Missions Seventh-day Adventists 63/1 I found the people in Norway far more religiously inclined than those in Denmark; they..are not so much given to pleasure-seeking.
1906 Springfield (Mass.) Weekly Republican 13 Sept. 11 The religiously-minded commercial travelers, known as Gideons, have four prosperous camps in cities of New York state.
1990 M. Booth Triads i. 13 It seems likely that the Boxers were infiltrated by Triads, but they remained a predominantly religiously-based movement.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2009; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adv.c1384