reprobate
/ˈrɛprəbeɪt
/noun
1An unprincipled person: he had to present himself as more of a lovable reprobate than a spirit of corruption...
- They're all hypocrites, liars and reprobates.
- After all, as a conservative of fairly recent vintage, I've seen how easy it is for liberals, assisted by a compliant press, to cast ideological foes as moral reprobates and thus avoid engaging their ideas.
- They might be pirates, they might be reprobates, they might have picked the pockets of poor bluesmen and ignorant English kids, but at least they were dedicated to music.
Synonyms
rogue, rascal, scoundrel, good-for-nothing, villain, wretch, unprincipled person, rake, profligate, degenerate, debauchee, libertine;
troublemaker, mischief-maker, wrongdoer, evil-doer, transgressor, sinner;
French roué, vaurien
informal scallywag, bad egg
North American informal scofflaw, hellion
informal, dated rotter, bounder
dated cad, ne'er-do-well
archaic miscreant, blackguard, knave, rapscallion, varlet, wastrel, rakehell, scapegrace
2 archaic (In Calvinism) a sinner who is not of the elect and is predestined to damnation.Those who were chosen by God were no better than reprobates except that by his irresistible grace the elect could be brought to hate their sin, as Sir Walter does....
- And this is why the greatest effort of the Holy Parish of the Divinity of Christ has been towards the forcible conversion and Spiritual Salvation of these most hated of reprobates.
adjective
1Unprincipled: reprobate behaviour...
- He almost becomes one of the family, cheerfully going out gambling with her dopey, reprobate nephew.
- In each case, while Joe seems to be the catalyst, we soon see that it is the internal flaws that each individual carries that result in their reprobate behavior.
- There is a further hint that bustle and business are the properties of the older, reprobate drama.
Synonyms
unprincipled, roguish, bad, wicked, rakish, shameless, immoral, profligate, degenerate, dissipated, debauched, depraved, corrupt;
incorrigible, hardened, unregenerate
informal scoundrelly, rascally
archaic knavish
2 archaic (In Calvinism) predestined to damnation.
verb [with object] archaic
Express or feel disapproval of: his neighbours reprobated his method of proceeding...
- Instead, she foregrounds how recent novels have been devoted to recommending or reprobating what she calls the ‘systems of philosophy or politics which have raised so much ferment of late years’.
Synonyms
criticize, condemn, censure, denounce, express strong disapproval of
rare reprehend
Derivatives
reprobation
- As for streaming, it deserves to be condemned by the strongest term of reprobation known to the vocabulary of consensus: unhelpful.
- His background and early experiences could not have been more different from the era of counselling, victim status for minorities and po-faced reprobation of so-called ‘xenophobia’.
- This tale of ‘falling from grace,’ from divinity to abjection, of the subjection of feminine powers to the reprobation and constraints of the patriarchy society seems to be a universal trope.
reprobative
reprobatory
Origin
Late Middle English (as a verb): from Latin reprobat- 'disapproved', from the verb reprobare, from re- (expressing reversal) + probare 'approve'.