different between sympathy vs fellowship

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French sympathie, from Late Latin sympath?a (“feeling in common”), from Ancient Greek ?????????? (sumpátheia, “fellow feeling”), from ???????? (sumpath?s, “affected by like feelings; exerting mutual influence, interacting”) +? -?? (-ia, “-y”, nominal suffix); equivalent to sym- (“acting or considered together”) +? -pathy (“feeling”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?s?m.p??.i/
• Rhymes: -?mp??i

Noun

sympathy (countable and uncountable, plural sympathies)

1. A feeling of pity or sorrow for the suffering or distress of another.

   Synonym: compassion

   1. (in the plural) The formal expression of pity or sorrow for someone else's misfortune.
   2. The ability to share the feelings of another.
2. Inclination to think or feel alike; emotional or intellectual accord; common feeling.
   1. (in the plural) Support in the form of shared feelings or opinions.
   2. Feeling of loyalty; tendency towards, agreement with or approval of an opinion or aim; a favorable attitude.

3. An affinity, association or mutual relationship between people or things such that they are correspondingly affected by any condition.
   1. Mutual or parallel susceptibility or a condition brought about by it.
   2. (art) Artistic harmony, as of shape or colour in a painting.

Usage notes

• Used similarly to empathy, interchangeably in looser usage. In stricter usage, empathy is stronger and more intimate, while sympathy is weaker and more distant; see empathy: usage notes.

Antonyms

• contempt (context-dependent)

Derived terms

Translations

References

• “sympathy”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–present.
• “sympathy”, in Merriam–Webster Online Dictionary, (Please provide a date or year).

English

Etymology

From Middle English felowschipe, felawshipe, fela?schyp, equivalent to fellow +? -ship; or perhaps adapted from Old Norse félagskapr, félagsskapr (“fellowship”). Compare Icelandic félagsskapur (“companionship, company, community”), Danish fællesskab (“fellowship”), Norwegian fellesskap (“fellowship”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?f?l???p/, /?f?l????p/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?f?l???p/, /?f?lo???p/
• Hyphenation: fel?low?ship

Noun

fellowship (countable and uncountable, plural fellowships)

1. A company of people that share the same interest or aim.

2. (dated) Company, companions; a group of people or things following another.
3. A feeling of friendship, relatedness or connection between people.
4. A merit-based scholarship.
5. A temporary position at an academic institution with limited teaching duties and ample time for research; this may also be called a postdoc.
6. (medicine) A period of supervised, sub-specialty medical training in the United States and Canada that a physician may undertake after completing a specialty training program or residency.
7. (arithmetic, archaic) The proportional division of profit and loss among partners.

Translations

Verb

fellowship (third-person singular simple present fellowships, present participle fellowshipping or fellowshiping, simple past and past participle fellowshipped or fellowshiped)

1. (transitive) To admit to fellowship, enter into fellowship with; to make feel welcome by showing friendship or building a cordial relationship. Now only in religious use.

   The Society of Religious Snobs refused to fellowship the poor family.

   • c. 1524, Sidney John Hervon Herrtage (editor), The early English versions of the Gesta Romanorum, first edition (1879), anthology, published for The Early English Text Society by N. Trübner & Co., translation of Gesta Romanorum by anon., xxxiv. 135, (Harl. MS. c.1440), page 135:

     Then pes seynge hir sistris alle in acorde...she turnid ayene; For whenne contencions & styf wer' cessid, then pes was felashipid among hem.

     Then Peace saw her sisters all in accord...she turned again; for when contentions and strife were ceased, then Peace was fellowshipped among them.

2. (intransitive, now chiefly religious, especially in Canada, US) To join in fellowship; to associate with.

   The megachurch he attends is too big for making personal connections, so he also fellowships weekly in one of the church's small groups.

   After she got married, she stopped fellowshipping with the singles in our church.

   • c. 1410, Hans Kurath quoting Nicholas Love (translator), The Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ, fifth edition (1989), quoted in Middle English Dictionary, translation of Meditationes Vitae Christi by Pseudo-Bonaventura, (Gibbs MS. c.1400), page 463:

     Oure lorde Jesu came in manere of a pilgrym and felauschipped [Aldh felischippede] with hem.

     Our lord Jesus came in the manner of a pilgrim and fellowshipped with them.

Derived terms

• unfellowship