Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A member of a Christian Uniat church, chiefly of Lebanon, the liturgy of which is written in Syriac.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. One of a body of Syriac Christians dwelling chiefly in the mountains of Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon. They are named from St. Maron, a Syrian monk (about a. d. 400), or less probably from John Maron, patriarch of the sect in the seventh century. The Maronites were originally Monothe-lites, but they entered into a partial union with the Roman Catholic Church in 1182, which after an interruption was made closer in 1445 and again in 1596. They still retain their own patriarchate of Antioch (now seated at Kanobin), their Syriac liturgy (although Arabic is now their vernacular tongue), the marriage of priests, their traditional fast-days, and the use of both elements in lay communion. The Maronites as a tribe were formerly under the same local government as the Druses, with whom they have had some bloody conflicts. In 1861, after a severe outbreak, they were put under a separate governor.
Wiktionary
- n. One of a Pre-Arab Semitic Christian ethnoreligious group in the Levant.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Eccl. Hist.) One of a body of nominal Christians, who speak the Arabic language, and reside on Mount Lebanon and in different parts of Syria. They take their name from one Maron of the 6th century.
Etymologies
- Maron + -ite, after the Syriac saint Mar Maron, whose followers moved to Mount Lebanon from northern Syria, establishing the Maronite Church. (Wiktionary)
- Medieval Latin marōnīta, after Maro, fourth-century A.D. Syrian religious leader. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Why the monks of Beit-Marun, hitherto so faithful to the Byzantine emperors, should have deserted them when they returned to orthodoxy, we do not know; but it is certain that in this defection the Maronite Church and nation had its origin, and that the name Maronite thenceforward becomes a synonym for Monothelite, as well with Byzantine as with Nestorian or”
“Their proselyte, the emperor Heraclius, was rejected as a Maronite from the walls of Emesa, he found a refuge in the monastery of his brethren; and their theological lessons were repaid with the gift a spacious and wealthy domain.”
“The Maronite is a Syrian Rite, Syriac being the liturgical language, though the Gospel is read in Arabic for the benefit of the people.”
“The Maronites in Lebanon are their followers, that is to say the Maronite Syrians.”
“Lahhud will only stay in power due to the sectarian nature of the political system and the Maronite patriarch and other sectarian Maronite leaders would not support the principle of the resignation or the ouster of a "Maronite" president.”
“Last month reporter Joyce Akiki and her crew were assaulted and their camera smashed in a village that is home to a large Shiite population while covering news of illegal construction on land purportedly owned by the Christian Maronite patriarchate.”
The Huffington Post: Magda Abu-Fadil: Lebanon's MTV News Defies Critics, Rolls With the Punches
“I use my talents in the Maronite Mass, where the default language is Aramaic, which I studied in grad school.”
“Thank you for all your contributions to EWTN and the Maronite Catholic Church.”
“Suleiman, a Maronite Catholic, and thus unveiled, is to Farahi's right, elegantly bejeweled in gold, her face framed with finely shaped eyebrows.”
The Huffington Post: Shirin Sadeghi: Women and Style in Iran
“Spike, last I checked Argentina and Lebanon constitutions both required that the president be a Catholic (Latin or Maronite rites respectively).”
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