indulgence
Syllables: in·dul·gence/ɪnˈdʌl.d͡ʒəns/
indulgence noun: the act of indulging.
Noun
indulgence (countable and uncountable, plural indulgences)
- The act of indulging.
- will all they that either through indulgence to others or fondness to any sin in themselves, substitute for repentance any thing that is less than a sincere, uniform resolution of new obedience1654, H[enry] Hammond, Of Fundamentals in a Notion Referring to Practise, London: […] J[ames] Flesher for Richard Royston, […], →OCLC
- As indulgence in several wives depended mainly on the length of a man's purse, the poor naturally contented themselves with monogamy.1922, Maneckji Nusservanji Dhalla, Zoroastrian Civilization, page 220
- Tolerance.
- The act of catering to someone's every desire.
- A wish or whim satisfied.
- "In other words, the ONLY indulgences we'll be getting for a while is fixing your wardrobe. This means no new manga. No new games. Nothing. Get used to it."2013, Jocelyn Samara D., Rain, volume 1, →ISBN, page 199
- Something in which someone indulges.
- I made but one error—giving way to petulance in the earlier instance; that lost me the Prince of Conti. Temper is bourgeois indulgence, though I own to a predilection for it.1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter I, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 5
- An indulgent act; a favour granted; gratification.
- If all these gracious indulgences are without any effect on us, we must perish in our own folly.a. 1729, John Rogers, The Goodness of God a Motive to Repentance
- A pardon or release from the expectation of punishment in purgatory, after the sinner has been granted absolution.
- To understand how indulgences were intended to work depends on linking together a number of assumptions about sin and the afterlife, each of which individually makes considerable sense.2009, Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity, Penguin, published 2010, page 555
Verb
indulgence (third-person singular simple present indulgences, present participle indulgencing, simple past and past participle indulgenced)
- To provide with an indulgence.
indulgence meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
indulgence in Tamil
- இளக்காரம், நலம், சலிகை, செருக்கு, ஈடுபாடு, செல்லம்
indulgence in Urdu
- عیش پسندی, رعایت
indulgence in Bengali
- তৃপ্তি, প্রশ্রয়, ক্ষমা
indulgence in Malayalam
- gratification, satisfaction, fulfillment
- ഇഷ്ടം സാധിക്കൽ, ആസക്തി പൂരണം, തോഷണം, അനുവർത്തനം, അഭിലാഷനിവൃത്തി, ഇച്ഛാദാനം
- intemperance, self-gratification, self-indulgence
- ആത്മസംതൃപ്തിവരുത്തൽ, അസംയമം, അടക്കമില്ലായ്മ, അനിയന്ത്രിതത്വം, ഇന്ദ്രിയനിഗ്രഹരാഹിത്യം, ഭോഗാസക്തി
- luxury, extravgance, treat
- ആർഭാടം, ധാരാളിത്തം, അമിതവ്യയം, ആഡംബരം, സുഖഭോഗവസ്തു, സദ്യ
- pampering, coddling, mollycoddling
- ലാളനം, കൊഞ്ചിക്കൽ, താലോലം, താറ്റോലം, അതിലാളനം, ചുലുമ്പം
More languagesFewer languages
- indulgence in Kannada
- ಸಲಿಗೆ
- indulgence in Assamese
- লাই lai
- indulgence in Tagalog
- indulhensiya
- indulgence in Arabic
- صَكّ غُفْرَان ṣakk ḡufrān
- indulgence in Persian
- افراط efrât
- indulgence in Thai
- ใบบุญ bai-bun
- indulgence in Vietnamese
- ơn xá, ân xá, ban ơn xá, xá tội
Examples of indulgence in a sentence
- I humbly crave your indulgence to read this letter until the end.
- Likewise our indulgence of those who act as if they’re above the law.
- Unfortunately, there were moments of pure indulgence, drunken boorishness and rambling unintelligible poetry midway through the evening.
Forms of indulgence
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | indulgences |
| alternative form (dated) | indulgency |
| alternative form (archaic) | indulgement |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | indulgences |
| present participle | indulgencing |
| past participle | indulgenced |
| past | indulgenced |
Origin of indulgence
From Middle English indulgence, indulgens, from Middle French indulgence and its source, Latin indulgentia.
Words formed from indulgence
Phrases with indulgence
Questions about indulgence
- What does indulgence mean?
- Indulgence means the act of indulging.
- What is indulgence in Tamil?
- Indulgence in Tamil is இளக்காரம், நலம், சலிகை. See Indulgence meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is indulgence?
- Indulgence can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce indulgence?
- Indulgence is pronounced /ɪnˈdʌl.d͡ʒəns/.
- What is the plural of indulgence?
- The plural of indulgence is indulgences.
Words near indulgence in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: indulgence (page history and authors); indulgence (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); indulgence (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); Indulgence (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); indulgence (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); indulgence (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); লাই (Assamese) (page history and authors). 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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-indulgence.ogg.
Cite this entry: “indulgence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/indulgence. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.