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Definition 2024


human_condition

human condition

English

Noun

human condition (uncountable)

  1. (usually preceded by the) The characteristics, key events, and situations which compose the essentials of human existence, such as birth, growth, emotionality, aspiration, conflict, and mortality.
    • 1894, Thomas Hardy, "An Imaginative Woman":
      Neither symboliste nor decadent, he was a pessimist in so far as that character applies to a man who looks at the worst contingencies as well as the best in the human condition.
    • 1970, "Alive and Well," Time, 18 May:
      Youth dies. Life hurts. Love warms. Understanding heals. The wounds and balms of the human condition are so commonplace that men eventually experience them without noticing.
    • 2006, S. Mark Heim, Saved from Sacrifice, ISBN 9780802832153, p. 8:
      Christian theology traditionally sees three elements of the human condition that are in need of transformation: sin (estrangement from God), evil (estrangement among humans), and death (mortality, and our estrangement from nature).

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