Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Conventicle

Con·ven′ti·cle (kŏn·vĕn′tĭ·k'l), n. [L. conventiculum, dim. of conventus: cf. F. conventicule. See Convent, n.] 1. A small assembly or gathering; esp., a secret assembly.

They are commanded to abstain from all conventicles of men whatsoever. Ayliffe.

2. An assembly for religious worship; esp., such an assembly held privately, as in times of persecution, by Nonconformists or Dissenters in England, or by Covenanters in Scotland; — often used opprobriously, as if those assembled were heretics or schismatics.

The first Christians could never have had recourse to nocturnal or clandestine conventicles till driven to them by the violence of persecution. Hammond.

A sort of men who . . . attend its [the curch of England's] service in the morning, and go with their wives to a conventicle in the afternoon. Swift.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.