transmigrate
Americanverb (used without object)
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to move or pass from one place to another.
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to migrate from one country to another in order to settle there.
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(of the soul) to be reborn after death in another body.
verb (used with object)
verb
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to move from one place, state, or stage to another
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(of souls) to pass from one body into another at death
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of transmigrate
1400–50; late Middle English < Latin trānsmigrātus (past participle of trānsmigrāre to depart, migrate). See trans-, migrate
Explanation
You're most likely to come across the word transmigrate in a religious context. Your soul, some people believe, will transmigrate into a new body after death. Another way to say transmigrate is reincarnate, or be born again after death. Many religions believe that people transmigrate after they die, including Buddhism and Hinduism as well as some Native American beliefs. Rarely, the verb transmigrate is used to mean "move to a new country," although migrate is much more common. The root is the Latin word transmigrat, "move from one place to another," from the prefix trans, "across or beyond," and migratus, "to move."
Vocabulary lists containing transmigrate
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:
According to the Pythagoreans, human souls transmigrate after death into animals.
From History of European Morals From Augustus to Charlemagne (Vol. 2 of 2) by William Edward Hartpole Lecky
Oh, if our souls could transmigrate I'd be a seamew above all birds that fly!
From Beyond the City by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The phenomena of spiritualism would then transmigrate from the region of materialized "mothers-in-law" and half-witted fortune-telling to the regions of the psycho-physiological sciences.
From From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan by H. P. (Helena Petrovna) Blavatsky
They think the soul will transmigrate many times before being finally united to Brahma.
From The Student's Mythology A Compendium of Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Assyrian, Persian, Hindoo, Chinese, Thibetian, Scandinavian, Celtic, Aztec, and Peruvian Mythologies by Catherine Ann White
So we may justly say that this "character"—this moral and intellectual essence of a man—does veritably pass over from one fleshly tabernacle to another, and does really transmigrate from generation to generation.
From Evolution and Ethics by Thomas Henry Huxley
Whether the soul of Georges transmigrated is a matter for metaphysicians.
From BBC ● Jan. 31, 2015
SAWtooth productions like Rick Astley's Never Gonna Give You Up are basically transmigrated American soul tempered down and slicked up into a formula that makes fashion as much as music.
From Time Magazine Archive
It was understandable; though he had been a "vers libre bard" before his death, his soul had transmigrated into the body of an ambitious cockroach.
From Time Magazine Archive
The world, therefore, will always exist, and each soul will continue to be transmigrated for any number of ages until it gets absorbed into God.
From India and the Indians by Edward Fenton Elwin
Others were of opinion that the soul of the fishmonger had transmigrated into the fish, an opinion borne out by the death of the fishmonger a few days before.
From Children of the Ghetto A Study of a Peculiar People by Israel Zangwill
That outlives us.That starts off wholly physical and thenis slowly transmigrating as it must,a voice, a face, a bike left on the lawn,because love's also made of metaphorsof other things.
From The Guardian ● Jan. 24, 2011
This quality is perhaps best illustrated by Haldane's conversion to vegetarianism under the impact of the Hindu doctrine of transmigrating souls.
From Time Magazine Archive
Novels are getting restless, shrugging off their expensive papery husks and transmigrating digitally into other forms.
From Time Magazine Archive
Who knows how long thy transmigrating soul Might from Boeotian to Boeotian roll?
From The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, Volume 2 by George Gilfillan
The pûrvapakshin maintains that the passage is concerned with the nature of the transmigrating soul, on account of the introductory and concluding statements.
From The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 by George Thibaut
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.
