Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Interest, support, or benefit.
- idiom. in behalf of For the benefit of; in the interest of.
- idiom. on behalf of As the agent of; on the part of.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Advantage, benefit, interest, or defense (of somebody or something).
- n. Affair; cause; matter.
Wiktionary
- n. Advantage; favor; stead; benefit; interest; profit; support; defense; vindication.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Advantage; favor; stead; benefit; interest; profit; support; defense; vindication.
WordNet 3.0
- n. as the agent of or on someone's part (usually expressed as
- n. for someone's benefit (usually expressed as `in behalf' rather than `on behalf' and usually with a possessive)
Etymologies
- Middle English, from Old English be healfe, by (his) side : be, by, at; see by1 + healf, side, half; see half.
Examples
“The manifestation of love God makes in our behalf is a communication of the love that He Himself is.”
“We are the ones who are muddling through and getting crapped on by the media all the time and harped to raise our kids right and blamed if they don't turn out to be perfect little citizens, so yes, a little push back on our behalf is welcome.”
“I picked the easiest and most obvious evidence in behalf of ID for that illustration.”
“The interested party or another person in his behalf is entitled to seek these remedies.”
“Increase the number of conservatives who actively participate, through contributions and personal activism, in behalf of conservative candidates in Republican nomination contests.”
Conservative Republican Participation - Morton_C_Blackwell’s blog - RedState
“She was at the March on Washington and spoke and performed in behalf of the NAACP, SNCC and the National Council of Negro Women.”
“How a huge military establishment, prepped for offensive war in behalf of Marxism-Leninism, disintegrated in just a few years.”
“A Cornell professor has entered a plea in behalf of Milrad Blagojevich, arguing that the soon-to-be-ex-governor is being condemned by the Illinois legislature on weak evidence without due process of law.”
“He was, of course, a brilliant orator, and to have that voluminous baritone employed on my behalf was a delight.”
“Do you really think that McCain's willingness to allow swiftboating on his behalf is a voice for freedom of speech?”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘behalf’.
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Academic Vocabulary
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abandon, abandonment, abnormally, abstract, abstraction, abstractly, abstracts, academia, academic, academically, academics, academies and 3092 more...
qroqqa Another disfavoured construction is 'on the behalf of'. The initial half million hits on Google looks numerous (to the dubious extent that numbers mean anything on Google any more), but there are a hundred million for 'on behalf of'. Likewise, BNC has 4 against 2717. So while it's probably not to be considered entirely ungrammatical, it's not standard. Mar 19, 2009
qroqqa Central industrial property offices of those Member States which have decided accordingly draw up simultaneously and on their own behalves, search reports relating to earlier national trade marks in their registers.
—OHIM website on Community trade marks
A rare instance of the plural. Examination of the 48 000 ghits for this shows that about half of them are genuine uses of it; but "on their behalves" has only a fraction of 1% of the frequency of "on their behalf". Sep 15, 2008