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Webster 1913 Edition


Zealot

Zeal′ot

,
Noun.
[F.
zélote
, L.
zelotes
, Gr. [GREEK]. See
Zeal
.]
One who is zealous; one who engages warmly in any cause, and pursues his object with earnestness and ardor; especially, one who is overzealous, or carried away by his zeal; one absorbed in devotion to anything; an enthusiast; a fanatical partisan.
Zealots
for the one [tradition] were in hostile array against
zealots
for the other.
Sir J. Stephen.
In Ayrshire, Clydesdale, Nithisdale, Annandale, every parish was visited by these turbulent
zealots
.
Macaulay.

Webster 1828 Edition


Zealot

ZEALOT

,
Noun.
Zelot. One who engages warmly in any cause, and pursues his object with earnestness and ardor. It is generally used in dispraise, or applied to one whose ardor in intemperate and censurable. The fury of zealots was one cause of the destruction of Jerusalem.