# brethren

Pronunciation: US say "BRETH-ruhn" /ˈbɹɛðɹən/; UK

## Noun

1. The members of a group considered together, especially those of a fraternal, religious, or military order.
   - Simple: All the members of a group, especially a society, a religious group, or a military group.
   - _The brethren of the lodge gathered in full regalia to install their new master._
   - _Cut off by the siege, the brethren of the order held the castle for another month._
3. The men of someone's family, related to them by blood or descent. *(literary)*
   - Simple: Men who are part of your family, such as uncles and cousins.
   - _Far from the hills of his brethren, the exile sang of the clan he had lost._
   - _The old chief summoned his brethren from every scattered branch of the family to the feast._

## Noun · Brethren

4. Members of any congregation in the Anabaptist tradition of the Schwarzenau Brethren. They practice believer's baptism and hold to nonresistance and nonviolence, and some wear plain dress and avoid modern technology.
   - Simple: Members of churches that come from the Schwarzenau Brethren, who baptize only believers and refuse all violence.
   - _The Brethren in the valley still worship in a plain meetinghouse and baptize new members in the creek._
   - _Because the Brethren hold to nonresistance, many of their young men refused to carry weapons during the war._

## Noun

2. Plural of brother. *(archaic)* — plural of brother
   - Simple: Plural of brother. An old form, mostly found in older books.
   - _The farmhouse rang with the quarrels of five brethren, all sons of one mother._
   - _When their father died, the brethren divided his land into equal shares._

## Other meanings

- (noun) In particular, the members of the denomination called the Church of the Brethren.
- (adjective) Of the same kind as something else, and so related to it or like it.

## Origin

**Meanings 1–3** — From Early Modern English brethren, the plural of brother, which came from Middle English brethren, formed from brethere or brether plus the plural ending -en. It goes back to Old English brōþor, brōþru ("brothers, brethren"), influenced by brēþer, the dative singular of brōþor ("brother"); compare German Brüder ("brothers, brethren"). The vowel change from o to e is called umlaut.
**Meaning 4** — A special use of brethren, translating German Brüder ("brothers").

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/brethren (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).