Word.ws English Dictionary

concupiscence

/kənˈkjuːpɪsəns/

concupiscence noun: an ardent desire, especially sexual desire; lust.

Noun

concupiscence (countable and uncountable, plural concupiscences)

  1. An ardent desire, especially sexual desire; lust.
    • [Y]it haue vvee one thing in our ſelues and of our ſelues, (euen originall ſinne, concupiſcence or luſt) vvhich neuer ceaſeth too egge vs and allure vs from God, and too ſtaine vs vvith all kinde of vnclennes: […]1571, Arthur Golding, “To the Right Honorable and His Verie Good Lord Edward de Vere Erle of Oxinford, […]”, in John Calvin, translated by Arthur Golding, The Psalmes of Dauid and Others. With M....
    • for as St. Jerome observes, it is to shew that the true Christian not setting his heart upon the goods of the Earth, ought to trample under foot, all Avarice and immoderate concupiscence of corruptible riches: […]1662, Jacques Olivier, translated by Richard Banke, A Discourse of Women, Shewing Their Imperfections Alphabetically, →OCLC, page 5
  2. the desire of a person's lower appetite, contrary to reason, which subjugates and inclines them to experience temptation and to give in to sin, due to the Fall and original sin.
    • [“]Since concupiscence is the most common form of temptation, it is better for him to know something about it. The soul cannot be humbled by fasts and prayer; it must be broken by mortal sin to experience forgiveness of sin and rise to a state of grace. Otherwise, religion is nothing but dead...1927, Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop, Book V, section 1, page 147

concupiscence meaning in Tamil and Malayalam

concupiscence in Tamil

காமவேட்கை

concupiscence in Malayalam

lust, ardour, sexual desire
ആസക്തി, അമിതമായ ഭോഗേച്ഛ, അതികാമം, കാമം, ശൃംഗാരം, ശൃംഗാരകം

Examples of concupiscence in a sentence

  • Poor Miss Tita's sense of her failure had produced an extraordinary alteration in her, but I had been too full of my literary concupiscence to think of that.1888 September 29, Henry James, “[The Aspern Papers.] Chapter IX.”, in The Aspern Papers; Louisa Pallant; The Modern Warning, London; New...
  • Quite certainly you command me to refrain from concupiscence of the flesh and concupiscence of the eyes and worldy pride.1997, St. Augustine, The Confessions, X, 30, 41. translated by Maria Boulding:
  • But New York in this time of plenty had become the object and goal of the world’s concupiscence and lust, and the “insult” only made the rest of the planet more desirous than ever.2001, Salman Rushdie, Fury: A Novel, London: Jonathan Cape, →ISBN, page 6:
  • [“]Since concupiscence is the most common form of temptation, it is better for him to know something about it.1927, Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop, Book V, section 1, page 147:

Forms of concupiscence

pluralconcupiscences

Origin of concupiscence

From Latin concupīscentia, from concupīscō (“to desire strongly, to desire eagerly; to covet”).

Questions about concupiscence

What does concupiscence mean?
Concupiscence means an ardent desire, especially sexual desire; lust.
What is concupiscence in Tamil?
Concupiscence in Tamil is காமவேட்கை. See Concupiscence meaning in Tamil.
How do you use concupiscence in a sentence?
Poor Miss Tita's sense of her failure had produced an extraordinary alteration in her, but I had been too full of my literary concupiscence to think of that.
What part of speech is concupiscence?
Concupiscence is a noun.
How do you pronounce concupiscence?
Concupiscence is pronounced /kənˈkjuːpɪsəns/ (UK).
What is the plural of concupiscence?
The plural of concupiscence is concupiscences.

Words near concupiscence in the dictionary

  1. conculcated
  2. conculcates
  3. conculcating
  4. conculture
  5. concultures
  6. concupiscence
  7. concupiscences
  8. concupiscent
  9. concupiscential
  10. concupiscentious
  11. concupiscently

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: concupiscence (page history and authors); concupiscence (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); concupiscence (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “concupiscence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/concupiscence. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.