Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Sect
Sect
(sĕkt)
, Noun.
[L.
secare
, sectum
, to cut.] A cutting; a scion.
[Obs.]
Shak.
Sect
(sĕkt)
, Noun.
[F. ]
secte
, L. secta
, fr. sequi
to follow; often confused with L. secare
, sectum
, to cut. See Sue
to follow, and cf. Sept
, Suit
, Noun.
Those following a particular leader or authority, or attached to a certain opinion; a company or set having a common belief or allegiance distinct from others; in religion, the believers in a particular creed, or upholders of a particular practice; especially, in modern times, a party dissenting from an established church; a denomination; in philosophy, the disciples of a particular master; a school; in society and the state, an order, rank, class, or party.
He beareth the sign of poverty,
And in that
And in that
sect
our Savior saved all mankind. Piers Plowman.
As of the
He kept his lay, to which that he was sworn.
sect
of which that he was born,He kept his lay, to which that he was sworn.
Chaucer.
The cursed
sect
of that detestable and false prophet Mohammed. Fabyan.
As concerning this
sect
[Christians], we know that everywhere it is spoken against. Acts xxviii. 22.
Webster 1828 Edition
Sect
SECT
,Noun.
1. A body or number of persons united in tenets, chiefly in philosophy or religion, but constituting a distinct party by holding sentiments different from those of other men. Most sects have originated in a particular perlon, who taught and propagated some peculiar notions in philosophy or religion, and who is considered to have been its founder. Among the jews, the principal sects were the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes. In Greece were the Cynic sect, founded by Antisthenes; and the Academic sect, by Plato. The Academic sect gave birth to the Peripatetic, and a Cynic to the Stoic.
2. A cutting or coin. [Not used.]
Definition 2024
sect
sect
English
Noun
sect (plural sects)
- An offshoot of a larger religion; a group sharing particular (often unorthodox) political and/or religious beliefs.
- A religious sect.
- A group following a specific ideal or a leader.
- 1984, Steven M. Tipton, Getting Saved from the Sixties: Moral Meaning in Conversion and Cultural Change, University of California Press, ISBN 978-0520052284, page 104:
- Zen Center welcomes visitors, guests, and prospective students, but it does not engage in systematic institutional or network recruiting of new members, unlike the Christian sect and Erhard Seminars Training.
- 1995, Flo Conway, Jim Siegelman, Snapping: America's Epidemic of Sudden Personality Change, Stillpoint Press, Inc., ISBN 978-0964765009, page 161:
- Every person who is not a fellow member, and every social, religious and political institution that lies outside the sect's domain, is portrayed as a representative of Satan's world. In our research, we found that Moonies and members of many Christian sects with similar religious and political doctrines often focus on such beliefs to the exclusion of all other thought.
- 1995, Stuart A. Wright, Armageddon in Waco: Critical Perspectives on the Branch Davidian Conflict, University Of Chicago Press, ISBN 978-0226908458, page 207:
- Peoples Temple and the Branch Davidians both approximated the 'apocalyptic sect' as an ideal type. In such sects the end of the world is taken as a central tenet.
- 1996, John Ankerberg, John Weldon, Encyclopedia of New Age Beliefs, Harvest House Publishers, ISBN 978-1565071605, page 216:
- There are scores of modern religious cults and sects that have been influenced by Hinduism to varying degrees. Werner Erhard, founder of 'Landmark Education's 'The Forum',' and 'est' seminars, which have about 700,000 graduates, was influenced by Hinduism through Swami Muktananda, one of Erhard's principal gurus.
- 1998, Mary McCormick Maaga, Hearing the Voices of Jonestown, Syracuse University Press, ISBN 978-0815605157, page 75:
- The Indiana Peoples Temple was essentially a sect, which was joined by new religious movement members in California, which then recruited black church members as it focused its ministry on the residents of urban California.
- 1999, R. C. S. Trahair, Utopias and Utopians: An Historical Dictionary, Greenwood, ISBN 978-0313294655, page 47:
- Branch Davidians are a modern religious sect that claims to be an offshoot of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church. The church renounced any connection with the sect in the 1930s.
-
- (obsolete) A cutting; a scion.
Related terms
Translations
religious movement
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