wholeness

American  

[hohl-nis] / ˈhoʊl nɪs /

noun

1. soundness, health, or well-being in body, mind, soul, or spirit.

   Shalom is a sense of contentment, wholeness, and harmony.

2. the state or condition of being not broken, injured, or damaged; intact condition.

   It may help to maintain the durability and wholeness of your roof if you have an expert roofing contractor look at it every few years.

3. the state of including the full amount or extent of something, or all parts of something, with nothing missing.

   In this beautiful 18-karat rose-gold ring, the flower appears in all its wholeness, with stem, leaf, and blossom.

4. the state or condition of being in one piece, without separation of parts.

   Recognizing event, author, text, and reader, we see the narrative work in all its indivisible wholeness, while also understanding the diverse elements that make it up.

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Etymology

Origin of wholeness

First recorded before 1000; whole ( def. ) + -ness ( def. )

Example Sentences

By the time of its breathless ending, “A Perfect Hand” has done what Eliot warned against in fiction-writing: moving from the “picture” to the “diagram,” from wholeness to formula.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 26, 2026

It necessitates a wholeness from both parties, wherein two individuals take ownership and accountability over their own success and well-being.

From Los Angeles Times • May 8, 2026

"They're getting that confidence, that self-assurance, they're getting that wholeness from themselves, and that's ultimately what's the most empowering."

From BBC • Mar. 12, 2026

Meeting all of these needs is required for full health, full wholeness.

From Salon • Apr. 8, 2025

The important thing was that Barack had managed to process his life story, snapping together the disparate pieces of his Afro-Kansan-Indonesian-Hawaiian-Chicagoan identity, writing himself into a sort of wholeness this way.

From "Becoming" by Michelle Obama