Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- intransitive verb To go beyond or over (a limit or boundary); exceed or overstep.
- intransitive verb To act in violation of (the law, for example).
- intransitive verb To commit an offense by violating a law, principle, or duty.
- intransitive verb To spread over land, especially over the land along a subsiding shoreline. Used of the sea.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To pass over or beyond; go beyond.
- Hence To overpass, as some law or rule prescribed; break or violate; infringe.
- To offend against (a person); disobey; thwart; cross; vex.
- Synonyms Infringe upon, Encroach upon, etc. (see trespass, v. i.), pass, transcend, overstep, contravene.
- To offend by violating a law; sin.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- intransitive verb To offend against the law; to sin.
- transitive verb rare To pass over or beyond; to surpass.
- transitive verb Hence, to overpass, as any prescribed as the �imit of duty; to break or violate, as a law, civil or moral.
- transitive verb obsolete To offend against; to vex.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive To
exceed oroverstep somelimit orboundary . - verb transitive To act in
violation of somelaw . - verb intransitive To
commit anoffense ; tosin . - verb intransitive, of the sea To
spread overland along ashoreline ; toinundate .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb pass beyond (limits or boundaries)
- verb act in disregard of laws, rules, contracts, or promises
- verb commit a sin; violate a law of God or a moral law
- verb spread over land, especially along a subsiding shoreline
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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No physical image of a man stepping over a boundary is presented to our minds by the word transgress, nor in using the word comprehension do we picture to ourselves any manual act of grasping.
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No physical image of a man stepping over a boundary is presented to our minds by the word transgress, nor in using the word comprehension do we picture to ourselves any manual act of grasping.
The Unseen World and Other Essays John Fiske 1871
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Rather, it had to do with taking responsibility for where he did transgress, which is having an inappropriate relationship with an informant.
SFGate: Top News Stories dbulwa@sfchronicle.com (Demian Bulwa 2011
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Ruth Anne: You are one of my faves, as you know, but honestly, when it comes to sex and women, it truly does seem that your compassion capacity for women who, I guess the word is "transgress" for want of a better, in a particular way is oddly low.
The sleazy sexism that's served up... Ann Althouse 2007
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Goebel: not simply mediated views of the world, but also fantasies and imaginative extrapolations that 'transgress' given reality can be constructed and communicated.
Ethics in Games: Cfp Torill 2005
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Goebel: not simply mediated views of the world, but also fantasies and imaginative extrapolations that 'transgress' given reality can be constructed and communicated.
Archive 2005-06-01 Torill 2005
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Y: "And to you there came Joseph in times gone by, with Clear Signs, but ye ceased not to doubt of the (Mission) for which he had come: At length, when he died, ye said: 'No messenger will Allah send after him.' thus doth Allah leave to stray such as transgress and live in doubt," -
Three Translations of The Koran (Al-Qur'an) side by side Abdullah Yusuf Ali 1902
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May my life be laid down for the transgressions of such as transgress against Thee, for through them the breath of Thy grace and the fragrance of Thy loving-kindness are made known and diffused amongst men.
Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh 1817-1892 Bah��'u'll��h 1854
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So that it may, I confess, give temporal impunity to such as transgress upon this account, but for all that, it can never by so doing warrant the transgression itself; it may indeed indemnify the person, but cannot take away the guilt, which, resulting from the very nature of the action, is inseparable from it.
Sermons Preached Upon Several Occasions. Vol. IV. 1634-1716 1823
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The books were not only at the barricades, they were the barricades, behind which the students could both take shelter and push forward; could "transgress" across the police lines while the truncheons fell on the books, not the demonstrators.
The Guardian World News Jay Griffiths 2010
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