English Dictionary

SECT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does sect mean? 

SECT (noun)
  The noun SECT has 2 senses:

1. a subdivision of a larger religious groupplay

2. a dissenting cliqueplay

  Familiarity information: SECT used as a noun is rare.


 Dictionary entry details 


SECT (noun)


Sense 1

Meaning:

A subdivision of a larger religious group

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

religious order; religious sect; sect

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

faith; organized religion; religion (an institution to express belief in a divine power)

Meronyms (parts of "sect"):

convent (a community of people in a religious order (especially nuns) living together)

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

Albigenses; Cathari; Cathars (a Christian religious sect in southern France in the 12th and 13th centuries; believers in Albigensianism)

Zurvanism (a Zoroastrian sect that claims Zurvan was the ultimate source of the universe)

Vaudois; Waldenses (a Christian sect of dissenters that originated in southern France in the late 12th century adopted Calvinist doctrines in the 16th century)

Shakers; United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing (a celibate and communistic Christian sect in the United States)

Quakers; Religious Society of Friends; Society of Friends (a Christian sect founded by George Fox about 1660; commonly called Quakers)

monastic order; order (a group of person living under a religious rule)

brethren ((plural) the lay members of a male religious order)

Shua; Shuha Shinto (any branch of Shinto other than Kokka)

Kokka; Kokka Shinto (the branch of Shinto recognized as the official state religion of Japan)

Taoism (a Chinese sect claiming to follow the teaching of Lao-tzu but incorporating pantheism and sorcery in addition to Taoism)

Jainism (sect founded in the 6th century BC as a revolt against Hinduism)

Hare Krishna; International Society for Krishna Consciousness; ISKCON (a religious sect founded in the United States in 1966; based on Vedic scriptures; groups engage in joyful chanting of 'Hare Krishna' and other mantras based on the name of the Hindu god Krishna; devotees usually wear saffron robes and practice vegetarianism and celibacy)

Vaishnavism; Vaisnavism (Hindu sect worshiping of Vishnu)

sisterhood (a religious society of women who live together as sisters (especially an order of nuns))

High Anglican Church; High Church (a group in the Anglican Church that emphasizes the Catholic tradition (especially in sacraments and rituals and obedience to church authority))

Abecedarian (a 16th century sect of Anabaptists centered in Germany who had an absolute disdain for human knowledge)

Amish sect (an orthodox Anabaptist sect separated from the Mennonites in late 17th century; settled chiefly in southeastern Pennsylvania)

Karaites (a Jewish sect that recognizes only the Hebrew Scriptures as the source of divinely inspired legislation and denies the authority of the postbiblical tradition of the Talmud; the sect arose in Iraq in the eighth century)

Shia; Shiah; Shiah Islam (one of the two main branches of orthodox Islam; mainly in Iran)

Sunni; Sunni Islam (one of the two main branches of orthodox Islam)

Shivaism; Sivaism (a Hindu sect worshiping Shiva)

Saktism; Shaktism (a Hindu sect worshiping Shakti)

Haredi (any of several sects of Orthodox Judaism that reject modern secular culture and many of whom do not recognize the spiritual authority of the modern state of Israel)

Derivation:

sectarian (belonging to or characteristic of a sect)

sectarian (of or relating to or characteristic of a sect or sects)


Sense 2

Meaning:

A dissenting clique

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

faction; sect

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

camp; clique; coterie; ingroup; inner circle; pack (an exclusive circle of people with a common purpose)

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

splinter group (a faction or sect that has broken away from its parent organization)

left; left wing (those who support varying degrees of social or political or economic change designed to promote the public welfare)

right; right wing (those who support political or social or economic conservatism; those who believe that things are better left unchanged)

old guard (a faction that is unwilling to accept new ideas)

pro-choice faction (those who argue that the decision to have an induced abortion should be made by the mother)

pro-life faction (those who argue that induced abortion is killing and should be prohibited)


 Context examples 


I computed the number of our people, by reckoning how many millions there might be of each religious sect, or political party among us.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

I am not a pagan, but a Christian philosopher—a follower of the sect of Jesus.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

That's a 'label' on my 'sect', answered Laurie, quoting Amy, as he went to partake of humble pie dutifully with his grandfather, who was quite saintly in temper and overwhelmingly respectful in manner all the rest of the day.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

He laughed at my odd kind of arithmetic, as he was pleased to call it, in reckoning the numbers of our people, by a computation drawn from the several sects among us, in religion and politics.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)



 Learn English with... Proverbs 
"The more things change, the more they stay the same." (English proverb)

"The cheap thing isn’t without problem, the expensive without help." (Afghanistan proverb)

"Dissent and you will be known." (Arabic proverb)

"It hits like a grip on a pig." (Dutch proverb)



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