misobey

misobey

English

Etymology

mis- +‎ obey

Verb

misobey (third-person singular simple present misobeys, present participle misobeying, simple past and past participle misobeyed)

1. To fail to obey for reasons other than deliberate defiance.
   • 1915, The Railway and Engineering Review - Volume 57, page 243:

     the dispatcher may properly perform his duties in issuing an order, which may then be misunderstood or misobeyed through negligence, forgetfulness, absentmindedness, or in some other manner, with no opportunity for the dispatcher to detect such errors in time to avoid accident.

   • 1980, John Gower, ‎Russell A. Peck, Confessio Amantis, page 248:

     The world stands in a mist where no man sees the right way, while the keepers of the Church's key misobey.

   • 1983, Human Science: Journal of the Anthropological Survey of India, page 141:

     This right had been accepted by relative tribals but misobeyed and effaced by non-tribals and foreign peasants.

   • 1990, Lalit Kishore, Lal Srivastava, Advaitic Concept of Jīvanmukti, page 121:

     It is possible to take liberty with secular and vedic injunctions: one may obey, not obey or misobey them, but the same cannot be done with regard to objects of knowledge.

See also

• disobey