predestinate
Americanverb (used with object)
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Theology. to foreordain by divine decree or purpose.
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Obsolete. to foreordain; predetermine.
adjective
verb
adjective
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predestined or foreordained
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theol subject to predestination; decided by God from all eternity
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of predestinate
1350–1400; Middle English predestinaten (v.) < Latin praedestinātus, past participle of praedestināre to appoint beforehand. See pre-, destine, -ate 1
Explanation
Something that's predestinate has been planned or arranged already — there's no way to change its outcome. Some religious observers believe that life is predestinate, willed by God. If you believe that people have free will, the ability to make decisions that change the course of their lives, then you don't agree that everything is predestinate. If, however, you think God or fate or nature has already determined what will happen to you, you believe in a predestinate life. This adjective comes from the Old French prédestiner, "ordain of God," from the Latin root praedestinare, "determine beforehand."
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.
See Examples For:
I have recently learned that I am But a creature that moves In predestinate grooves.
From Time Magazine Archive
But the human will does not exist in the abstract world of reasoned science, in the world of atoms and vibrations, that rigidly predestinate scheme of things in space and time.
From Anticipations Of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human life and Thought by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
“Whom He did foreknow He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son.”
From Orthography As Outlined in the State Course of Study for Illinois by Elmer W. Cavins
Byron, the predestinate wanderer, and Rousseau, who never found rest, who complained that his birth was but the beginning of his misfortunes, le premier de mes malheurs—these are types of the less fortunate class.
From The Galaxy, April, 1877 Vol. XXIII.—April, 1877.—No. 4. by Various
And so the pleasant facile days went by in idly roving, idly writing, meeting interrogatively his predestinate experience and setting the more presentable answers down.
From The Open Question a tale of two temperaments by Elizabeth Robins
And right now no one seems to posses the same sense of predestinated greatness that accompanied Warne, Murali and Tendulkar.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 5, 2011
She thanked and complimented him warmly, but without being very much astonished at his success, for she began to think he was predestinated.
From The Life of Mohammad The Prophet of Allah by Etienne Dinet
In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.”—Eph. i.
From The Calvinistic Doctrine of Predestination Examined and Refuted by F. (Francis) Hodgson
VIII, 29: “Whom he foreknew, he also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of his Son.”
From Grace, Actual and Habitual A Dogmatic Treatise by Arthur Preuss
Anyhow, if I'm predestinated to be lost in New York City it's better I should be lost amongst my own kind, which talks my native language, rather than amongst plumb strangers.
From J. Poindexter, Colored by Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury) Cobb
His existence appears as fashioned in essence and end by predestinating power, and the Eternal "takes the responsibility."
From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 95, September 1865 by Various
Within it by Thy predestinating knowledge and might, He had set forth all that is essential and obligatory for the upraising of Thy Cause in this world below.
From Bahíyyih Khánum by Baha'i World Centre
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.
