different between jealous vs envy

English

Etymology

[1382] From Middle English jelous, gelous, gelus, from Old French jalous, from Late Latin zelosus, from Ancient Greek ????? (zêlos, “zeal, jealousy”). Doublet of zealous.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?d??l?s/
• Hyphenation: jeal?ous
• Rhymes: -?l?s

Adjective

jealous (comparative jealouser or more jealous, superlative jealousest or most jealous)

1. Suspecting rivalry in love; troubled by worries that one might have been replaced in someone's affections; suspicious of a lover's or spouse's fidelity. [from 13th c.]
2. Protective, zealously guarding, careful in the protection of something one has or appreciates. [from 14th c.]

   For you must not worship any other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jehovah, is a jealous God. —Exodus 34:14 (NET)

3. Envious; feeling resentful or angered toward someone for a perceived advantage or success, material or otherwise. [from 14th c.]
4. Suspecting, suspicious.

Usage notes

Some usage guides seek to distinguish "jealous" from “envious”, using jealous to mean “protective of one’s own position or possessions” – one “jealously guards what one has” – and envious to mean “desirous of others’ position or possessions” – one “envies what others have”. This distinction is also maintained in the psychological and philosophical literature. However, this distinction is not always reflected in usage, as reflected in the quotations of famous authors (above) using the word jealous in the sense “envious (of the possessions of others)”.

Derived terms

• jealous-like adjective
• jealously adverb
• jealousy noun
• jealousness noun

Related terms

• zeal
• zealot
• zealous

Translations

References

Anagrams

• jalouse

English

Etymology

From Middle English envie, from Old French envie, from Latin invidia (“envy”), from invidere (“to look at with malice”), from in- (“on, upon”) + videre (“to look, see”).

Displaced native Old English æfest.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??nvi/

Noun

envy (countable and uncountable, plural envies)

1. Resentful desire of something possessed by another or others (but not limited to material possessions). [from 13th c.]
   • 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Samuel Simmons, line 263–264:

     No bliss enjoyed by us excites his envy more.

   • 1804, Alexander Pope, The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, page 71:

     Envy, to which the ignoble mind's a slave,
     Is emulation in the learned or brave.

   • 1914, Louis Joseph Vance, Nobody, page 9:

     distilling therefrom an acid envy that robbed her napoleon of all its savour.

   • 1983, Stanley Rosen, Plato's Sophist: The Drama of Original and Image, page 66:

     Theodorus assures Socrates that no envy will prevent the Stranger from responding

2. An object of envious notice or feeling.
   • 1843, Thomas Macaulay, Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, Carey & Hart, page 277:

     This constitution in former days used to be the envy of the world[.]

   • 2008, Lich King, "Black Metal Sucks", Toxic Zombie Onslaught.

3. (obsolete) Hatred, enmity, ill-feeling. [14th–18th c.]
4. (obsolete) Emulation; rivalry.
   • c. 1631-1636, John Ford, The Fancies Chaste and Noble

     Such as cleanliness and decency
     Prompt to a virtuous envy.

5. (obsolete) Public odium; ill repute.

   • to lay the envy of the war upon Cicero

Translations

Verb

envy (third-person singular simple present envies, present participle envying, simple past and past participle envied)

1. (transitive) To feel displeasure or hatred towards (someone) for their good fortune or possessions. [from 14th c.]
2. (obsolete, intransitive) To have envious feelings (at). [15th-18th c.]
   • 1650, Jeremy Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living

     Who envy at the prosperity of the wicked?

3. (obsolete, transitive) To give (something) to (someone) grudgingly or reluctantly; to begrudge. [16th–18th c.]
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.v:

     But that sweet Cordiall, which can restore
     A loue-sick hart, she did to him enuy […].

4. (obsolete) To show malice or ill will; to rail.
5. (obsolete) To do harm to; to injure; to disparage.
   • 1621, John Fletcher The Pilgrim

     If I make a lie
     To gain your love and envy my best mistress,
     Put me against a wall.

6. (obsolete) To hate.
7. (obsolete) To emulate.

Related terms

• envious
• social envy

Translations

Anagrams

• veny