Word.ws English Dictionary

spiritualism

/ˈspɪɹɪtjuəlɪzəm/

spiritualism noun: a doctrine, opposing materialism, that claims transcendency of the divine being, the altogether spiritual character of reality and the value of inwardness of consciousness.

Noun (1)

spiritualism (countable and uncountable, plural spiritualisms)

  1. A doctrine, opposing materialism, that claims transcendency of the divine being, the altogether spiritual character of reality and the value of inwardness of consciousness.
    • What is called spiritualism should, I think, be called a mental species of materialism.1880, R. H. Hutton, “Preface”, in Theological essays
  2. A belief that the dead communicate with the living, especially through a medium. Used in a broader sense than spiritism.
    • I wish it were possible to impress this truth upon people who rush into spiritualism from curiosity, or who try "table rapping" or some similar phenomenon "for fun".1936, Rollo Ahmed, The Black Art, London: Long, page 229
  3. The quality or state of being spiritual.

Noun (2) capitalized: Spiritualism

Spiritualism (uncountable)

  1. A belief that spirits of the dead have both the ability and the inclination to communicate with the living, providing useful knowledge about moral and ethical issues, as well as about the nature of God.

spiritualism meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada

spiritualism in Hindi

the philosophic doctrine, opposing materialism
आत्मवाद ātmavād, अध्यात्मवाद adhyātmavād

spiritualism in Tamil

ஆன்மீகக் கொள்கை

spiritualism in Malayalam

ആത്മീയത, അധ്യാത്മവാദം

spiritualism in Kannada

ಆಧ್ಯಾತ್ಮವಾದ, ಪ್ರೇತಾತ್ಮವಾದ
More languagesFewer languages
spiritualism in Sanskrit
आध्यात्मिकता ādhyātmikatā
spiritualism in Tagalog
diwakuro, pagkamakadiwa

Forms of spiritualism

pluralspiritualisms

Origin of spiritualism

From spiritual + -ism. In Allan Kardec's book The Spirits Book (1857) (Le Livre des Esprits in the original French), in which a distinction between spiritism and spiritualism is defined.

From spiritual + -ism.

Words formed from spiritualism

Questions about spiritualism

What does spiritualism mean?
Spiritualism means a doctrine, opposing materialism, that claims transcendency of the divine being, the altogether spiritual character of reality and the value of inwardness of consciousness.
What is spiritualism in Hindi?
Spiritualism in Hindi is आत्मवाद (ātmavād), अध्यात्मवाद (adhyātmavād). See Spiritualism meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is spiritualism?
Spiritualism is a noun.
How do you pronounce spiritualism?
Spiritualism is pronounced /ˈspɪɹɪtjuəlɪzəm/.
What is the plural of spiritualism?
The plural of spiritualism is spiritualisms.

Words near spiritualism in the dictionary

  1. spiritualised
  2. spiritualiser
  3. spiritualisers
  4. spiritualises
  5. spiritualising
  6. spiritualism
  7. spiritualisms
  8. spiritualist
  9. spiritualistic
  10. spiritualistically
  11. spiritualists

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: spiritualism (page history and authors); Spiritualism (page history and authors); spiritualism (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); spiritualism (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); spiritualism (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); आध्यात्मिकता (Sanskrit) (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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Cite this entry: “spiritualism.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/spiritualism. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.