adjective
definition
Of or akin to; related; like
noun
definition
Son of the same parents as another person.
definition
A male having at least one parent in common with another (see half-brother, stepbrother).
definition
A male fellow member of a religious community, church, trades union etc.
example
I would like to thank the brother who just spoke.
definition
A form of address to a man.
example
Listen, brother, I don't know what you want, but I'm not interested.
definition
A black male.
definition
Somebody, usually male, connected by a common cause or situation.
definition
Someone who is a peer, whether male or female.
Examples of brethren in a Sentence
The growth of the Brethren was rapid.
His new brethren gave him letters to the Kiev and Odessa Masons and promised to write to him and guide him in his new activity.
This was the origin of the Brethren of the Common Lot (or Common Life).
The Jews of America have also taken a foremost place in the succour of their oppressed brethren in Russia and other parts of the world.
For a hundred years the Brethren were almost extinct.
The severe impartiality of the sacred historian has concealed no feature in this dark picture, - the brutal passion of Amnon, the shameless counsel of the wily Jonadab, the " black scowl " 1 that rested on the face of Absalom through two long years of meditated revenge, the panic of the court when the blow was struck and Amnon was assassinated in the midst of his brethren.
The commander was bound by the advice of his brethren; and in the same way the general chapter of the Order, consisting of the landmeisters and the great dignitaries, formed an advisory board to the grand master in matters such as treaties and internal legislation.
The Christian population, who in common with their Mussul- Macedo ' 'Questio man fellow subjects suffered from the defective methods of government of their rulers, had at least before them the example of their brethren - Greeks, Bulgarians or Servians - dwelling in independent kingdoms under Christian governments on the other side of the frontier.
There were 67,044 Baptists (2226 United Baptists, 2019 Primitive Baptists and 1513 Free Baptists); 40,011 Roman Catholics; 1 9,993 United Brethren, all of the " New Constitution "; 19,668 Presbyterians; 13,323 Disciples of Christ; 6506 Lutherans, and 5230 Protestant Episcopalians.
It hampered the Brethren's progress in Germany, and explains the smallness of their numbers there.
Instead of aiming at Church extension, they built settlements on the estates of friendly noblemen, erected Brethren's and Sisters' houses, and cultivated a quiet type of spiritual life.
For a few years they took an active share in the Evangelical Revival (173817S5); but Zinzendorf's "ecclesiola" policy prevented their growth, and not till 1853 did the English Moravians resolve to aim at "the extension of the Brethren's Church."
He as vainly sought to secure Luther's adoption of a strict rule of church discipline, after the manner of the Moravian Brethren.
Whether led by this Mattathias or not, certain Jews fled into the wilderness and found a leader in Judas Maccabaeus his reputed son, the first of the five Asmonean (Hasmonean) brethren.
This Smyrnan pretender not only proclaimed himself Messiah (c. 1650) but he was accepted in that role by vast numbers of his brethren.
It was feared that the heresy, if suffered to make headway, would spread like wildfire among the ignorant Russian peasantry, and Archbishop Nikon was sent to Athos to threaten the recalcitrant brethren with severe temporal and eternal penalties should they remain obstinate.
Those who quitted the Society maintained, for some little time, a separate organization of their own, but sooner or later most of them joined the Evangelical Church or the Plymouth Brethren.
The Pennsylvanian Quakers advised their members against the trade in 1696; in 1754 they issued to their brethren a strong dissuasive against encouraging it in any manner; in 1774 all persons concerned in the traffic, and in 1776 all slave holders who would not emancipate their slaves, were excluded from membership. The Quakers in the other American provinces followed the lead of their brethren in Pennsylvania.
Besides himself and his brother, four other clergymen were present and four "lay brethren."
From the time of my admission to the priesthood to my (present) fifty-ninth year, I have endeavoured, for my own use and that of my brethren, to make brief notes upon the Holy Scripture, either out of the works of the venerable fathers, or in conformity with their meaning and interpretation."
It was accepted as an unquestionable fact by every one who undertook to describe the catacombs, that the Christians of Rome, finding in the labyrinthine mazes of the exhausted arenariae, which abounded in the environs of the city, whence the sand used in building had been extracted, a suitable place for the interment of their martyred brethren, where also the sacred rites accompanying the interment might be celebrated without fear of interruption, took possession of them and used them as cemeteries.
These and similar statements favouring the doctrines of the New Testament made many Kabbalists of the highest position in the synagogue embrace the Christian faith and write elaborate books to win their Jewish brethren over to Christ.
Those who had not yet crossed the river refused, in face of this omen, to follow their brethren; the little band, numbering 400 warriors (according to others, consisting of 2000 horsemen) decided to remain under Ertoghrul, son of the drowned leader.
The Bohemian brethren, whose intellectual originator was Peter Chelcicky, but whose actual founders were Brother Gregory, a nephew of Archbishop Rokycan, and Michael, curate of Zamberk, to a certain extent continued the Taborite traditions, and in the 15th and 16th centuries included most of the strongest opponents of Rome in Bohemia.
Christ, the firstborn among many brethren, had a natural birth at Bethlehem and also a spiritual birth begun at his baptism and consummated at his resurrection.
The city has a public library, a business college and Central College (1897), controlled by the United Brethren in Christ (Old Constitution).
Having secretly become a Christian, Sebastian was wont to encourage those of his brethren who in the hour of trial seemed wavering in their profession.
His ancestors had been members of the community of the Bohemian Brethren, and had secretly maintained their Protestant belief throughout the period of religious persecution, eventually giving their adherence to the Augsburg confession as approximate to their original faith.
At one time, indeed, a Magyar archbishop and four or five bishops openly joined the Orthodox communion and willingly crowned Manuel's nominees despite the anathemas of their Catholic brethren.
The separatist movement was strongest in the south, where the Rumans were in touch with their kinsmen in Walachia and Moldavia, the Serbs with their brethren in Servia, and the Croats intent on reasserting the independence of the" Tri-une Kingdom."
A few years after this the Brethren of the Temple of Solomon at Jerusalem or Knights of the Temple came into being at the Holy City, and they settled first on the south side of Holborn near Southampton Row.
Along with his six brethren, Ken was committed to the Tower on the 8th of June 1688, on a charge of high misdemeanour; the trial, which took place on the 29th and 30th of the month, and which resulted in a verdict of acquittal, is matter of history.
At this city four brethren of his order, three of them Italians and the fourth a Georgian, had shortly before met death at the hands of the Mahommedan governor.
From Canton he travelled overland to the great ports of Fukien, at one of which, Zayton or Amoy harbour, he found two houses of his order; in one of these he deposited the bones of the brethren who had suffered in India.
The fame of his vast journeys appears to have made a much greater impression on the laity of his native territory than on his Franciscan brethren.
The buildings of the society include a church, a school and houses for the brethren, the sisters and the widowed of both sexes, while it possesses an ethnographical museum and other collections of interest.
The religious element was more prominent in Orcy's gild at Abbotsbury and in the fraternity at Exeter; their ordinances exhibit much solicitude for the salvation of the brethren's souls.
The brethren were aided in old age, sickness and poverty, often also in cases of loss by robbery, shipwreck and conflagration; for example, any member of the gild of St Catherine, Aldersgate, was to be assisted if he "fall into poverty or be injured through age, or through fire or water, thieves or sickness."
Alms were often given even to non-gildsmen; lights were supported at certain altars; feasts and processions were held periodically; the funerals of brethren were attended; and masses for the dead were provided from the common purse or from special contributions made by the gildsmen.
The ordinances of a gild merchant thus aim to protect the brethren from the commercial competition of strangers or non-gildsmen.
The Morwenspeches were periodical meetings at which the brethren feasted, revised their ordinances, admitted new members, elected officers and transacted other business.
Admission to the gild was not restricted to burgesses; nor did the brethren form an aristocratic body having control over the whole municipal polity.
The last book (xvii.) treats of theology or (as we should now say) mythology, and winds up with an account of the Holy Scriptures and of the Fathers, from Ignatius and Dionysius the Areopagite to Jerome and Gregory the Great, and even of later writers from 'Isidore and Bede, through Alcuin, Lanfranc and Anselm, down to Bernard of Clairvaux and the brethren of St Victor.
He relegated many of the brethren to a quieter retreat outside the city, only retaining in Florence those best fitted to aid in intellectual labour.
Thereupon Savonarola turned, bade farewell to the brethren, and, accompanied by the faithful Domenico,.
At Dayton are the Union Biblical seminary, a theological school of the United Brethren in Christ, and the publishing house of the same denomination.
At the colloquy of Marburg "Zwingli offered his hand to Luther with the entreaty that they be at least Christian brethren, but Luther refused it and declared that the Swiss were of another spirit.
Yet no social attractions or successes diverted him from his devotion to his profession, the welfare of his brethren in art or of the Royal Academy.
Adamson (Perth, 1638) are the lines "For what we do presage is riot in grosse, For we are brethren of the Rosie Crosse; We have the Mason Word and second sight, Things for to come we can fortell aright."
Several modern societies have been formed from time to time (some of which are still flourishing in Great Britain) for the study of Rosicrucianism and allied subjects, but in no sense are they directly derived from the "Brethren of the Rosy Cross" of the 17th century, though keen followers thereof.