Jesuit
Americannoun
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a member of a Roman Catholic religious order Society of Jesus founded by Ignatius of Loyola in 1534.
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(often lowercase) a crafty, intriguing, or equivocating person: so called in allusion to the methods ascribed to the order by its opponents.
adjective
noun
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a member of a Roman Catholic religious order (the Society of Jesus ) founded by Saint Ignatius Loyola in 1534 with the aims of defending the papacy and Catholicism against the Reformation and to undertake missionary work among the heathen
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informal (sometimes not capital) a person given to subtle and equivocating arguments; casuist
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of Jesuit
1550–60; < New Latin Jēsuita, equivalent to Latin Jēsu ( s ) + -ita -ite 1
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Liam and Enda leave by choice—Liam for India as a Jesuit missionary and Enda for America with her fiddle—though leaving is a heartbreak.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 29, 2026
Jesuit High, an all-boys Catholic school, has a strong college prep program along with a history of sending players to Division 1 programs and even the NFL.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 10, 2026
He grew up in Kolkata, moving between a convent school and a prestigious Jesuit boys' school where he first discovered music while cleaning instruments in the music room.
From BBC • Apr. 17, 2026
Powe’s relatives belonged to the Knights, named for a 17th century Spanish Jesuit who ministered to enslaved people in Colombia and is the country’s patron saint.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 22, 2025
Since the old Aristotelian doctrine was crumbling, Descartes, true to his Jesuit training, tried to use nought and infinity to replace the old proof of God’s existence.
From "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" by Charles Seife
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
