Definitions
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Characterized by or causing mental or physical pain; painful; distressing; of the nature of an affliction: as, an afflictive dispensation of Providence.
- Synonyms Afflicting, grievous, calamitous, disastrous, oppressive, severe, unhappy, trying.
Wiktionary
- adj. That causes physical or mental pain
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Giving pain; causing continued or repeated pain or grief; distressing.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. causing misery or pain or distress
Examples
“Another point from the Buddhist perspective is what we call afflictive emotion or defilements of the mind.”
“People find themselves forced to "afflictive" methods which stand in no relation with the realities of life.”
“Occasionally, this process of digesting and releasing is accompanied by "spiritual and mystical experience," and more often the process includes a letting go of old afflictive emotions, as the realization of deep insights and our innate healing energies arise from within.”
The Huffington Post: Dr. Isaac Eliaz: What Are You Feeling?: The Journey to Self Awareness
“Intentionally looking for gratitude is a strategy to counter afflictive thoughts and emotions, and deepen the feelings that strengthen us.”
The Huffington Post: Michael Stanclift, N.D.: holiday mindfulness
“We all have the capacity to achieve complete perfect enlightenment; it requires clearing away the two obstructions, afflictive and cognitive, and the way to do this is by countering all wrong conceptions.”
“The one method that eliminates the afflictive defilements (rooted in ignorant grasping) and their respective karma is non-dual meditative concentration on the sole antidote, the wisdom of emptiness.”
“Turning to Kamalashila's text which sets out the prerequisites for calm abiding and special insight meditation on conventional Bodhicitta and the wisdom of Emptiness, His Holiness discusses the mental states that arise spontaneously (afflictive emotions which disturb the mind) to dominate our physical and verbal actions.”
“The Chinese prayer has been translated: May the three types of afflictive emotions be dispelled.”
“He says their presentation of emptiness does not fulfil its purpose, which is to eliminate the afflictive emotions.”
“Arhats realize the wisdoms of ultimate and conventional truth to eliminate their afflictive obscurations, but they do not complete the collections of merit required to eliminate the cognitive obscurations to the full enlightenment sought by”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘afflictive’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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Gil Blas
Interesting words and usages from Smollett's 1749 translation of Lesage's L'Histoire de Gil Blas de Santillane
reck, durance, rhodomontade, hangdog, trap, lustre, pin, boggle, dandle, birthday suit, colic, gripes and 238 more...
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lucidityprevails's Words
lucidity, journalistic, truthiness, foolhardy, egotism, lesbian, orgasmic, activism, moonglow, voodoo, conquer, demolish and 534 more...
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negative words
abysmal, afflictive, anachronism, ancillary, banal, befuddle
Tweets
Looking for tweets for afflictive.

yarb But the idea most afflictive to my mind, what drove me to despair, and laid fiend-like hold upon my fancy, was the unquestioned plunder of my effects.
- Lesage, The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, tr. Smollett, bk 9 ch. 5 Oct 7, 2008