father

noun

1. A male parent, especially of a human; a male who parents a child (which he has sired, adopted, fostered, taken as his own, etc.).

   “My father was a strong influence on me.”

   “The Pꝛouerbes of Solomon: A wiſe ſonne maketh a glad father: but a fooliſh sonne is the heauineſſe of his mother.”

   “When this conversation was repeated in detail within the hearing of the young woman in question, and undoubtedly for his benefit, Mr. Trevor threw shame to the winds and scandalized the Misses Brewster then and there by proclaiming his father to have been a country storekeeper.”

   “Ah, but how beautiful (my baby boy) is! And he is mine, mine for ever. Even if he hates me he will be mine. He cannot help it, he is made out of me; I am his father.”

   “My personal success or failure is insignificant; the rise or fall of the nation is my responsibility and must not be shirked. Upon introspection, I feel I am firmer than ever in confidence that the Communists will be defeated. These are feelings which will comfort Father's soul in Heaven.”

2. A male who has sired a baby; this person in relation to his child or children.

   “My friend Tony just became a father.”

3. A male ancestor more remote than a parent; a progenitor; especially, a first ancestor.

   “So Dauid ſlept with his fathers, and was buried in the citie of Dauid.”

   “Therefoꝛe it is of faith, that it might bee by grace; to the ende the pꝛomiſe might be ſure to all the ſeede, not to that onely which is of the Law, but to that alſo which is of the faith of Abꝛaham, who is the father of vs all,”

4. A term of respectful address for an elderly man.

   “Come, father; you can sit here.”

5. A term of respectful address for a priest.

   “Bless you, good father friar!”

6. A person who plays the role of a father in some way.

   “My brother was a father to me after my parents got divorced.”

   “The child is father to the man.”

   “I was a father to the pooꝛe: and the cauſe which I knewe not, I ſearched out.”

   “So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and loꝛd of all his houſe, and a ruler thꝛoughout all the land of Egypt.”

7. A pioneering figure in a particular field.

   “Albert Einstein is the father of modern physics.”

8. Something that is the greatest or most significant of its kind.

   “Soon after the announcement of this year's election results, Mereka said that "the father of all battles had just begun." His dispute with Muite goes back to March last year […]”

   “"If UK GDP slows by 1 per cent, there is the mother and father of all recessions. It was exciting, but very bizarre, working in such an environment."”

   ““The Father of All Battles” On March 23, 1991, a band of armed insurgents attacked the town of Bomaru […]”

9. Something inanimate that begets.

   “But may the Sun and gentle weather, / When you are both growne ripe together, / Load you with fruit, such as your Father / From you with all the joyes doth gather: / And may you when one branch is dead / Graft ſuch another in it's ſtead,[…]”

10. A member of a church council.

    “In proceeding in this fashion, the fathers assembled at Pisa were following the generally accepted canonistic teaching of the day […]”

    “On the part of the fathers of the synod, over 50 bishops, from every continent, spoke on different ‘group forms’ of the lay apostolate, whereas about 38 fathers made their own interventions in writing to the General Secretary.”

    “Remember that the fathers of Vatican II had rejected the first draft of the constitution on revelation entirely.”

11. The archived older version of a file that immediately precedes the current version, and was itself derived from the grandfather.

    “Three generations of file are usually kept, being the grandfather, father and son files.”

    “The file from which the father was developed with the transaction files of the appropriate day is the grandfather.”

12. A title given to priests.

    “Father Thomas was a good priest.”

    “On a merchant ship, Father Sinclair had to do safety drills every 10 days. On a fishing vessel, it’s monthly, and there is no requirement to check the log to see if the drill has been done or done correctly.”

13. One of the chief ecclesiastical authorities of the first centuries after Christ.

    “the Latin, Greek, or apostolic Fathers”

14. A title given to the personification of a force of nature or abstract concept, such as Father Time or Father Frost.
15. (historical)A senator of Ancient Rome.

    “Claudius put a stop to these executions, and the Conscript Fathers, repenting, placed Gallienus among the divi , — which was equivalent to the maintenance of his acts.”

    “When Romulus had left the earth and had become a god, the Fathers met together and appointed intermediate kings from the senate, to reign in turn each for five days, in the place of the king, till a new king should be chosen.”

    “His duties were to command the army, to perform certain sacrifices (as high priest), and to preside over the assembly of the Fathers of the families, which was called the Senate, i. e. an assembly of old men (Senex).”

verb

1. To be a father to; to sire.

   “Well go too, we'll haue no Baſtards liue, / Eſpecially ſince Charles muſt Father it.”

2. (figuratively)To give rise to.

   “Cowards father Cowards & Baſe things Syre Bace;”

3. To act as a father; to support and nurture.

   “I good youth, / And rather Father thee, then Maſter thee:”

4. To provide with a father.

   “Thinke you, I am no ſtronger then my Sex / Being ſo Father'd, and ſo Husbanded?”

   “The relations of the sexes were so loose and vague that children could not be fathered on any particular man.”

5. To adopt as one's own.

   “Kept company with men of wit / Who often fathered what he writ.”

name

1. God, the father of Creation.
2. God the Father, who eternally begets the Son.
3. One's father.

   “I will only do what Father asks.”

4. One of the triune gods of the Horned God in Wicca, representing a man, younger than the elderly Sage and older than the boyish Master.

   “...and our Lord as Master, Father, and Sage.”

   “In respect to our Lord (God), these are the less known Master, Father, and Sage.”