# soul

Pronunciation: say "SOHL" US /soʊl/, UK /səʊl/

## Noun

1. The spiritual essence of a person, thought to include their thoughts and personality, and often believed to continue after death.
   - Simple: The part of a person that holds their thoughts and feelings, which many people believe lives on after death.
   - _The poet wrote of the soul yearning for something beyond earthly life._
   - _Mourners gathered to pray for the soul of the departed._
2. A single individual human being, especially when considered as one of a larger number.
   - Simple: A single human being, especially when counted among others.
   - _There wasn't a soul in sight on the abandoned road._
   - _The census recorded every soul living within the parish._
3. A genre of African American popular music that emerged from gospel and rhythm and blues, marked by expressive, emotive vocals.
   - Simple: A kind of music that grew from gospel and rhythm and blues, known for strong, emotional singing.
   - _Motown helped bring soul to a national audience in the 1960s._
   - _He plays guitar in a soul band on weekends._
4. The central quality or essence that gives something its true character.
   - Simple: The most important part of something that gives it its real character.
   - _Improvisation is the soul of jazz._
   - _Honesty was the very soul of her writing._
5. Deep feeling, energy, and vitality, especially as expressed in someone's actions or art.
   - Simple: Energy and strong feeling that makes a person or thing seem alive.
   - _The veteran musician played every note with soul._
   - _A team without soul rarely wins the close games._
6. The culture of African Americans, together with the pride and sense of common identity it carries; often placed before another noun. *(US)*
   - Simple: The culture of African Americans and the pride and feeling of belonging that come with it.
   - _He greeted his old friend from the block as a soul brother._
   - _The diner on the corner served soul food, the cooking of Black Southern families, for more than forty years._
7. Someone who is the perfect embodiment of a given quality, or whose energy and inspiration drive a group or enterprise.
   - Simple: A person who is a perfect example of a quality, or who gives a group its energy and spirit.
   - _The ambassador was the soul of discretion and never repeated a word of what she heard._
   - _As founder and chief organizer, he was the soul of the campaign from its very first meeting._

## Other meanings

- (verb) To go from house to house on All Souls' Day begging for food or alms, traditionally in return for prayers for the dead.
- (noun) A compact, totally geodesic submanifold of a complete, noncompact Riemannian manifold of nonnegative sectional curvature, as identified by the soul theorem.
- (verb) To endow a being with a soul or mind, giving it inner life.
- (verb) To supply with food, feeding and sustaining a person or animal.

## Origin

From Middle English "soule," from Old English "sāwol" (soul, life, spirit, being), going back through Proto-West Germanic and Proto-Germanic "*saiwalō" (soul), of uncertain ultimate origin. It is related to Dutch "ziel" and German "Seele."

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