Polytheism
noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 The belief in the existence of multiple gods. countable, uncountable
"And remember when Lokmân said unto his son, as he admonished him, Oh my son, give not a partner unto GOD; for polytheism is a great impiety."
- 2 belief in multiple Gods wordnet
- 3 A religion or belief system with multiple gods. countable, uncountable
"The Chaldeans worshipped the seven planets. These seven planets were the "Seven Great Gods" of the ancients, and constituted a polytheism, the component members of which varied in importance, with the moon occupying the premier position."
Antonyms
All antonymsExample
More examples"Like Christianity and Judaism, Islam is a so-called Abrahamic religion. Muslims, as Islamic people are called, repudiate Christianity's Trinity which alludes to polytheism. Islam is strictly monotheistic as they believe that there is only One God, Allāh. Their sacred writings are in the Qur'an, divided into 114 suras, containing 6236 āyāt, verses. Muslims believe that the Qur'an is only perfect in the original Arabic because any translation would be deficient. Their main prophet is Muhammad, the messenger. Muslim eschatology includes bodily resurrection at the Day of Resurrection, Yawm al-Qiyāmah, when everyone will be judged for good or bad deeds. Trials and tribulation precede and coincide with al-Qiyāmah, the time of which no human knows. (I read somewhere too that in Islam, being in hell may be an impermanent condition.) Like other Abrahamicists, Muslims believe in angels. Muslims believe in predestination or divine preordainment. Muslims must pray 5 times during the day. The prayer rituals are called Ṣalāh. Like other religions, Islam has subdivisions, as the Sunni and Shia, the contention being the successor, Abu Bakr or Ali respectively, to Muhammad. (The Islamic religion's progression and overall ambiance are depicted in Frank Herbert's Dune series, which is set thousands of years from now in outer space. There is a desert planet called Arrakis.)"
Etymology
From French polythéisme, from Ancient Greek πολύς (polús, “many”) and θεός (theós, “god”), corresponding to poly- + theism.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.