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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

righteous.

Free from sin or guilt.

9 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/ˈɹaɪt͡ʃəs//ˈɹaɪtjəs/obsolete/ˈɹaɪti.əs/obsolete

  1. Free from sin or guilt.

  2. Moral and virtuous, perhaps to the point of sanctimony.

    Human beings should take a righteous path, and so should art. We should promote kindness and beauty through art.

  3. Justified morally.

  4. Awesome; great.

    US · slang

  5. Major; large; significant.

    US · slang
Where this word comes from

From earlier rightuous, rightwose, rightwos, rightwise, from Middle English rightwise, rightwis, from Old English rihtwīs (“righteous, just”), corresponding to right + -wise (with assimilation of second element to -ous), or to right + wise (“way, manner”). Cognate with Scots richtwis (“righteous”), Old High German rehtwīsic (“righteous, just”), Icelandic réttvíss (“righteous, just”). Compare also thefteous, mighteous.

verb/ˈɹaɪt͡ʃəs//ˈɹaɪtjəs/obsolete/ˈɹaɪti.əs/obsolete

  1. To make righteous; specifically, to justify religiously, to absolve from sin.

Where this word comes from

From earlier rightuous, rightwose, rightwos, rightwise, from Middle English rightwise, rightwis, from Old English rihtwīs (“righteous, just”), corresponding to right + -wise (with assimilation of second element to -ous), or to right + wise (“way, manner”). Cognate with Scots richtwis (“righteous”), Old High German rehtwīsic (“righteous, just”), Icelandic réttvíss (“righteous, just”). Compare also thefteous, mighteous.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.