purgatorial

purgatorial

English

Adjective

purgatorial (comparative more purgatorial, superlative most purgatorial)

1. Of, pertaining to, or resembling purgatory.
   • 1581, James Bell (translator), Against Ierome Osorius Byshopp of Siluane in Portingall by Walter Haddon et al., London: John Daye, Book 3,

     What aunswere then will you make to him that shall frame out of Saynt Paul an argument to ouerthrow the whole force and estimacion of your Purgatory on this wise?

     Fe. Christ needeth no Purgatoriall Expiation.

     Ri, Christ is our Righteousnes, out of S. Paul.

     So. Ergo. Our Righteousnes needeth not any Purgatoriall Expiation.

   • 1784, John Brown, A Compendious History of the British Churches in England, Scotland, Ireland, and America, Glasgow, Volume 1, p. 113,

     At the same time, [the three bishops] emitted a summary confession of their faith […] that there is no purgatorial state after this life […]

   • 1848, Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Chapter 35,

     […] can you suppose it would offend that benevolent Being […] to raise a devoted heart from purgatorial torments to a state of heavenly bliss, when you could do it without the slightest injury to yourself or any other?

   • 1917, James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, London: The Egoist, Chapter 4, p. 171,

     […] fearful lest in the midst of the purgatorial fire, which differed from the infernal only in that it was not everlasting, his penance might avail no more than a drop of moisture […]

2. That purifies by removing sin; expiatory.
   • 1895, Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure, Part 3, Chapter 1,

     But to enter the Church in such an unscholarly way that he could not in any probability rise to a higher grade through all his career than that of the humble curate wearing his life out in an obscure village or city slum—that might have a touch of goodness and greatness in it; that might be true religion, and a purgatorial course worthy of being followed by a remorseful man.

   • 1970, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, “George Lamming and the Colonial Situation” in Homecoming: Essays on African and Caribbean Literature, Culture and Politics, London: Heinemann, p. 127,

     Often […] exile is conceived as a purgatorial experience which the West Indian must undergo in order to know himself.