Adjective

evil (comparative eviller or eviler or more evil, superlative evillest or evilest or most evil)Category:English lemmas#EVILCategory:English adjectives#EVILCategory:English entries with incorrect language header#EVILCategory:Pages with entries#EVILCategory:Pages with 2 entries#EVIL

1. Intending to harm; malevolent.

   an evil plot to brainwash and even kill innocent peopleCategory:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   • 1864 August – 1866 January, [Elizabeth] Gaskell, chapter 47, in Wives and Daughters. An Every-day Story. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], published 1866, →OCLC:

     For a good while the Miss Brownings were kept in ignorance of the evil tongues that whispered hard words about Molly.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1916, Zane Grey, chapter 10, in The Border Legion‎, New York: Harper & Bros., page 147:

     He looked at her shapely person with something of the brazen and evil glance that had been so revolting to her in the eyes of those ruffians.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 2006, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, Wizard of the Crow, New York: Pantheon, Book Three, Section II, Chapter 3, p. 351,

     “Before this, I never had any cause to suspect my wife of any conspiracy.”

     “You mean it never crossed your mind that she might have been told to whisper evil thoughts in your ear at night?”

   • 1989, Pilgrimage‎, volume 15, Human Sciences Press, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 7:

     He tells secret dreams to strangers , imagines he can achieve art without discipline , regards all boundaries as evil , ignores ancestors , wants comfort and merging , believes cunning is wrong , and as a scholar or artist doesn't […]

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

2. Morally corrupt.

   If something is evil, it is never mandatory.Category:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   Do you think that companies that engage in animal testing are evil?Category:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies. […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iii]:

     Ah, what a sign it is of evil life,
     When death’s approach is seen so terrible.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1848, Anne Brontë, chapter 41, in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall‎:

     I had much trouble at first in breaking him of those evil habits his father had taught him to acquire […]

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

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   • 1967, Chaim Potok, chapter 1, in The Chosen‎, New York: Fawcett Columbine, published 2003, page 14:

     To the rabbis who taught in the Jewish parochial schools, baseball was an evil waste of time […]

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

3. Unpleasant, foul (of odor, taste, mood, weather, etc.).
   • 1660, John Harding (translator), Paracelsus his Archidoxis, London: W.S., Book 7, “Of an Odoriferous Specifick,” p. 100,

     An Odoriferous Specifick […] is a Matter that takes away Diseases from the Sick, no otherwise then as Civet drives away the stinck of Ordure by its Odour; for you are to observe, That the Specifick doth permix it self with this evil Odour of the Dung; and the stink of the Dung cannot hurt, no[r] abide there […]

   • 1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter 18, in The Invisible Man: A Grotesque Romance, New York, N.Y.; London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC:

     He awoke in an evil temper […]

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1937, Robert Byron, The Road to Oxiana, London: Macmillan, Part V, “Mazar-i-Sherif,” p. 282,

     It was an evil day, sticky and leaden: Oxiana looked as colourless and suburban as India.

   • 1958, Graham Greene, Our Man in Havana‎, Penguin, published 1979, Part Four, Chapter 1, p. 125:

     He herded them into a small and evil toilet and then through a window.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

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   • 1993, Carol Shields, chapter 1, in The Stone Diaries‎, Toronto: Random House of Canada, page 39:

     Everyone in the tiny, crowded, hot, and evil-smelling kitchen […] has been invited to participate in a moment of history.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

4. Producing or threatening sorrow, distress, injury, or calamity; unpropitious; calamitous.
   • c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene vi]:

     The owl shrieked at thy birth,—an evil sign;

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Deuteronomy 22:19:

     […] he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel:

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes, […].”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 89, lines 438-439:

     A little stay will bring some notice hither,
     For evil news rides post, while good news baits.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1931, Pearl S. Buck, chapter 15, in The Good Earth‎, New York: Modern Library, published 1944, page 122:

     “ […] with bandits and robbers roving over the land in these evil times of famine and war, how can it be said that this one or that stole anything? Hunger makes thief of any man.”

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

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   • 1988 February 14, Richard Tremblay, “A Boat With A Sail”, in Gay Community News, volume 15, number 30, page 5:

     I cannot overestimate how much it meant to me to have the support of my brothers in BWMT/MACT both in and out of prison while I was laid up with pneumocystis pneumonia during those dog days of August 1987. My wall is decked with cards, letters, and pictures from those evil days, and my support system included rides, flowers, candy, magazines of every description, and lots of hugs from gay and lesbian brothers and sisters.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

5. (obsoleteCategory:English terms with obsolete senses#EVIL) Having harmful qualities; not good; worthless or deleterious.

   an evil beast; an evil plant; an evil cropCategory:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Matthew 7:18:

     A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

6. (computingCategory:en:Computing#EVIL, programmingCategory:en:Programming#EVIL, slangCategory:English slang#EVIL) Undesirable; harmful; bad practice.

   Global variables are evil; storing processing context in object member variables allows those objects to be reused in a much more flexible way.Category:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

Noun

English Wikipedia has an article on:

evil

Wikipedia

evil (countable and uncountable, plural evils)Category:English lemmas#EVILCategory:English nouns#EVILCategory:English uncountable nouns#EVILCategory:English countable nouns#EVILCategory:English countable nouns#EVILCategory:English entries with incorrect language header#EVILCategory:Pages with entries#EVILCategory:Pages with 2 entries#EVIL

1. Moral badness; wickedness; malevolence; the forces or behaviors that are the opposite or enemy of good.

   Synonym: enormity

   The evils of society include murder and theft.Category:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   Evil lacks spirituality, hence its need for mind control.Category:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Ecclesiastes 9:3:

     The heart of the sons of men is full of evil.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVI, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

     The preposterous altruism too! […] Resist not evil. It is an insane immolation of self—as bad intrinsically as fakirs stabbing themselves or anchorites warping their spines in caves scarcely large enough for a fair-sized dog.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., “The Death of Evil upon the Seashore”, in Strength to Love‎, New York: Pocket Books, published 1964, →OCLC, page 71:

     IS ANYTHING more obvious than the presence of evil in the universe? Its nagging, prehensile tentacles project into every level of human existence. We may debate the origin of evil, but only a victim of superficial optimism would debate its reality. Evil is stark, grim, and colossally real.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

2. Something which impairs the happiness of a being or deprives a being of any good; something which causes suffering of any kind to sentient beings; harm; injury; mischief.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:

     evils which our own misdeeds have wrought

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:

     The evil that men do lives after them.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

3. (obsoleteCategory:English terms with obsolete senses#EVIL) A malady or disease; especially in combination, as in king's evil, colt evil.
   • c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii]:

     [The disease]Tis call'd the Euill.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

   • 1711 March 24 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “TUESDAY, March 13, 1710–1711”, in The Spectator, number 329; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume IV, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC:

     He [Edward the Confessor] was the first that touched for the evil.

     The spelling has been modernized.

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

References

Adverb

evil (comparative more evil, superlative most evil)Category:English lemmas#EVILCategory:English adverbs#EVILCategory:English entries with incorrect language header#EVILCategory:Pages with entries#EVILCategory:Pages with 2 entries#EVIL

2. (obsoleteCategory:English terms with obsolete senses#EVIL) wickedly, evilly, iniquitously
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], part I (books I–III), London: […] [Richard Field] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza ii, page 66:

     O what of Gods then boots it to be borne, / If old Aveugles ſonnes ſo euill heare?

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

3. (obsoleteCategory:English terms with obsolete senses#EVIL) injuriously, harmfully; in a damaging way.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 2 Peter 2:2:

     And many ſhall follow their pernicious wayes, by reaſon of whom the way of trueth ſhall be euill ſpoken of:

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

4. (obsoleteCategory:English terms with obsolete senses#EVIL) badly, poorly; in an insufficient way.

   It went evil with him.Category:English terms with usage examples#EVIL

   • 1570, William Lambard, quoting Horace, A Perambulation of Kent‎, published 1596, page 341:

     But (as the Poet ſaith) Malè ſarta gratia, nequicquam coit, & reſcinditur: Friendſhip, that is but euill peeced, will not ioine cloſe, but falleth aſunder againe:

     Category:English terms with quotations#EVIL

Adjective

evilCategory:Middle English alternative forms#EVILCategory:Middle English entries with incorrect language header#EVILCategory:Pages with entries#EVILCategory:Pages with 2 entries#EVIL

1. alternative form of yvel (“evil”)

Adverb

evilCategory:Middle English alternative forms#EVILCategory:Middle English entries with incorrect language header#EVILCategory:Pages with entries#EVILCategory:Pages with 2 entries#EVIL

1. alternative form of yvel (“evilly”)