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• gentile
  gentile

  adjective

  of or relating to any people not Jewish.
• Gentile
  Gentile

  noun

  a person who is not a Jew

gentile

American  

[jen-tahyl] / ˈdʒɛn taɪl /

adjective

(sometimes initial capital letter)

1. of or relating to any people not Jewish.

2. Christian, as distinguished from Jewish.

3. Mormon Church. not Mormon.

4. heathen or pagan.

5. (of a linguistic expression) expressing nationality or local origins.

6. of or relating to a tribe, clan, people, nation, etc.

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noun

• gentiles
  plural

1. a person who is not Jewish, especially a Christian.

2. (among Mormons) a person who is not a Mormon.

3. a heathen or pagan.

Gentile ¹ British  

/ ˈdʒɛntaɪl /

noun

1. a person who is not a Jew

2. a Christian, as contrasted with a Jew

3. a person who is not a member of one's own church: used esp by Mormons

4. a heathen or pagan

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adjective

1. of or relating to a race or religion that is not Jewish

2. Christian, as contrasted with Jewish

3. not being a member of one's own church: used esp by Mormons

4. pagan or heathen

Gentile ² British  

/ dʒenˈtiːle /

noun

1. Giovanni (dʒoˈvanni). 1875–1944, Italian Idealist philosopher and Fascist politician: minister of education (1922–24)

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gentile ³ British  

/ ˈdʒɛntaɪl /

adjective

1. denoting an adjective or proper noun used to designate a place or the inhabitants of a place, as Spanish and Spaniard

2. of or relating to a tribe or people

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Gentile Cultural  

1. Someone who is not a Jew (see also Jews). “The nations” is the common expression in the Old Testament for non-Jews as a group, and a Gentile is a person belonging to “the nations.”

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Discover More

Both the Old Testament and the New Testament tell of numerous conflicts between Jews and Gentiles. Figuratively, a “gentile” is any nonbeliever.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• nongentile
  adjective
• pro-Gentile
  adjective
• ungentile
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• gentiles
  plural

Etymology

Origin of gentile

First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English, from Latin gentīlis, from gent-, stem of gēns gens + -īlis -ile

Explanation

Use the word gentile to mean non-Jewish, like the gentile friend you invite to your family's Passover Seder because she's curious about Jewish religious traditions. When Gentile is a noun, it's usually capitalized, and it's most frequently used to contrast a Christian with a Jew. There are other religions that use the word gentile to describe a non-believer, including Mormonism and Hinduism. More generally, gentile refers to a person who doesn't acknowledge a particular god or belief. The root is the Latin gentilis, whose meaning of "fellow countryman or family member" changed over time to mean "foreign, heathen, pagan."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

gentile Gentile gentiles

Jesenská, a gentile, was a Czechoslovak citizen living in Vienna, and when she received Kafka’s permission to translate him into Czech the two began a passionate correspondence.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 15, 2026

But this will work only by learning how to protect ourselves and make the case to our gentile neighbors so that we can continue to contribute mightily to the future of our common home.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 30, 2025

“We reaffirm that Jew and gentile, we are one nation under God; that black and white, we are one nation indivisible; that Republican and Democrat, we are all Americans,” he said.

From Washington Times ● Jul. 3, 2023

Already aware that, being the daughter of a Jewish father and gentile mother, I was myself a demi-semite, I was worried.

From Salon ● Jun. 27, 2023

As my mother and I walked together, I could imagine my gentile friends nearby, still going to school, still playing the streetcar game, but I did not lift my eyes even for a quick peek.

From "The Boy on the Wooden Box" by Leon Leyson

Wilson’s picks for Lululemon’s board are Marc Maurer, former co-CEO of running-shoe maker On Holding, Laura Gentile, former chief marketing officer at ESPN, and Eric Hirshberg, the former CEO of Activision Blizzard’s Activision segment.

From MarketWatch ● May 18, 2026

Wilson nominated three candidates to the company’s board: Marc Maurer, former co-CEO of On Running; Laura Gentile, former chief marketing officer at ESPN; and Eric Hirshberg, former CEO of Activision.

From Barron's ● Feb. 27, 2026

In November, Trump pardoned David Gentile 12 days into a seven-year sentence after conviction for a private-equity Ponzi scheme External link that cost more than 17,000 people a total of $1 billion.

From Barron's ● Jan. 20, 2026

Apart from Qello, Gentile was the founder and CEO of private-equity firm GPB Capital and was convicted last year of defrauding more than 10,000 investors across three of its funds.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 19, 2025

I remembered how back home in Kraków, people sometimes mistook me for a Gentile.

From "Prisoner B-3087" by Alan Gratz

He removed the armband identifying him as a Jew and lined up before dawn with the gentiles to seek bread.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 2, 2026

But later generations who settled in London married up and out, with Ashkenazis as well as gentiles; they remade themselves as British aristocrats, not all of them gifted in business.

From New York Times ● Mar. 2, 2023

Moreover, their devotion paid off materially; after converting to Catholicism in mass baptisms, Frank’s followers take on Polish names and prosper as gentiles, with several even entering the nobility.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 3, 2022

A final example of how Roth's white gentiles talk about Blacks can be found in the autofictional novel "Deception."

From Salon ● Feb. 7, 2021

In fact, of the two hundred fifty workers Schindler hired in 1940, only seven were Jews; the rest were Polish gentiles.

From "The Boy on the Wooden Box" by Leon Leyson

Related Words

• agnostic