heaven

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“
"And in his outward circumstances soared as much above my thoughts as the heaven is above the earth.

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Definitions (26)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (9)

  1. noun The sky or universe as seen from the earth; the firmament. Often used in the plural.
  2. noun Christianity The abode of God, the angels, and the souls of those who are granted salvation.
  3. noun Christianity An eternal state of communion with God; everlasting bliss.
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Examples (50)

  • You will go no were, except in the ground. your heaven is here on earth, enjoy each day, instead of thinking you will go to this heaven. —  Top stories from Times Online
  • A piece of this heaven is also owned by triple Olympic gold-medallist, Usain Bolt. —  Jamaica Gleaner Online
  • But each day also had its ritual, in which the Roman deities of the heaven were the objects of worship, not, as by the Tiber bank, Greek deities of the earth and the nether world. —  The Religious Experience of the Roman People From the Earliest Times to the Age of Augustus
  • And because the Norseman very much disliked the bitter, cruel cold of the long winter, his heaven was a warm, well-fired abode, and his place of punishment one of terrible frigidity. —  A Book of Myths
  • When the heaven is as brass and makes no sign, men are thrown back on themselves to eke out their small stores of love At the same time friendship is not an obsolete sentiment. —  Friendship
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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

sky ·  god ·  earth ·  glory ·  world ·  sun ·  beauty ·  sea ·  truth ·  universe ·  kingdom ·  forest

Used in the same contextWord Family

heaven:   heavens
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English heven, from Old English heofon; see ak- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. Early modern English also heven; from Middle English heven, from Anglo-Saxon heofon, heofen, hefon, earlier heben = Old Saxon hebhan = Middle Low German heven = Icelandic hifinn, heaven. The Icelandic form is more commonly himinn, modern himin = Gothic (Moesogothic) himins, heaven, the same, but with different suffix -in, as Old Saxon himil = OFries. himul = Dutch hemel = Old High German Middle High German himel, German himmel = Swedish Danish himmel, heaven, also in Old High German, D., Icelandic, etc., ceiling, canopy (so early Anglo-Saxon heben-hūs, glossed by L. lacunar, ceiling), pointing to a prob. orig. meaning ‘covering,’ represented by English hame, q. v. The forms with f or b and those with m are prob. orig. identical, but the reason of the change is not clear. The word heaven is often erroneously explained as orig. the past participle of heave, the sky being regarded as that which is ‘heaved’ up; but the Anglo-Saxon hafen, hæfen, past participle of hebban, heave, is very different phonetically from heofon, heaven, and the two words must be of different origin. This supposed relation of heaven to heave appears reversed and modified in the actual relation of lift, the air, the sky, with lift, raise.
  2. from heaven, n.
 

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/ˈhɛvn/
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