repent
verb
Simple meaning
To feel pain, sorrow, or regret for what one has done or omitted to do.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
rihpehntSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ɹɪˈpɛnt
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
verb
intransitive
To feel pain, sorrow, or regret for what one has done or omitted to do; the cause for repenting may be indicated with "of".
Feel remorse for; feel sorry for; be contrite about
theologyintransitive
To be sorry for sin as morally evil, and to seek forgiveness; to cease to practice sin and to love.
transitive
To feel pain on account of; to remember with sorrow.
transitive
To be sorry for, to regret.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: To feel pain, sorrow, or regret for what one has done or omitted to do; the cause for repenting may be indicated with "of".
Used this way, repent is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It sounds natural in ordinary conversation and in expressive writing alike.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- Usage feel
- Everyday but emotionally strong
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: to feel pain or sorrow
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.