different between obedience vs obey

English

Alternative forms

• oboedience (obsolete, rare)

Etymology

From Anglo-Norman obedience, from Old French obedience (modern French obédience), from Latin oboedientia. Cognate with obeisance.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?(?)?bi?d??ns/

Noun

obedience (countable and uncountable, plural obediences)

1. The quality of being obedient.
   • February 24, 1823, Thomas Jefferson, letter to Mr. Edward Everett

     Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.

   • 1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Land That Time Forgot Chapter VIII

     Cautioning Nobs to silence, and he had learned many lessons in the value of obedience since we had entered Caspak, I slunk forward, taking advantage of whatever cover I could find...

2. The collective body of persons subject to any particular authority.
3. A written instruction from the superior of an order to those under him.
4. Any official position under an abbot's jurisdiction.

Synonyms

• hearsomeness (nonce word)
• submission

Antonyms

• disobedience, defiance, rebellion (ignoring)
• violation (ignoring, especially rules)
• control, dominance (ruling)

Related terms

• obedient
• obeisance
• obey

Translations

Further reading

• obedience in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• obedience in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Old French

Etymology

From Latin

Noun

obedience f (oblique plural obediences, nominative singular obedience, nominative plural obediences)

1. obedience
2. authority; influence; power

English

Etymology

From Middle English obeyen, from Anglo-Norman obeir, obeier et al., Old French obeir, from Latin oboedi? (also ob?di? (“to listen to, harken, usually in extended sense, obey, be subject to, serve”)), from ob- (“before, near”) + audi? (“to hear”). Compare audient. In Latin, ob + audire would have been expected to become Classical Latin *ob?di? (compare in + claud? becoming incl?d?), but it has been theorized that the usual law court associations of the word for obeying encouraged a false archaism from ? to oe, to oboedi? (compare Old Latin oinos ? Classical Latin ?nus).

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /o??be?/, /??be?/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /???be?/, /??be?/
• Rhymes: -e?
• Hyphenation: obey

Verb

obey (third-person singular simple present obeys, present participle obeying, simple past and past participle obeyed)

1. (transitive) To do as ordered by (a person, institution etc), to act according to the bidding of.
2. (intransitive) To do as one is told.
3. (obsolete, intransitive) To be obedient, compliant (to a given law, restriction etc.).
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.iv:

     They were all taught by Triton, to obay / To the long raynes, at her commaundement [...].

Synonyms

• hearken

Antonyms

• disobey
• defy
• rebel
• resist
• violate (especially rules)

Related terms

• obedience
• obedient
• obeisance

Translations

Further reading

• obey in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• obey in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

References

Anagrams

• e-boy, yebo