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temporality

temporality

9.9
Land and other things that belong to a church
  • noun
  • /ˌtɛmpəˈrælɪti/
  • Archaic
translation icon : temporalidad
  • The debate centered around the temporality of church assets, emphasizing their physical presence over spiritual duties.

Examples

  • The church focused on its secular temporality, ensuring its financial stability and property management.

  • Discussions about the temporality of the building highlighted its importance within the community rather than its spiritual function.

  • In the post-war period, the allegiances between many humanist scholars and the left were also a factor in this insistence on the novel's secular temporality.

    Academic text (2018)

Synonyms

temporalty
vstemporality
  • Archaic
9.9

Property and money that a church owns

has identical meaning but is an alternative historical spelling

Surface Forms

temporality singular
temporalities plural

Morphology

temporality = temporal (opaque) = temporal + ity

Although formed from 'temporal' + '-ity', the specialized legal/historical meaning 'worldly possessions of a church' is not predictable from the adjective for most learners.

Etymology

Temporality comes from the Latin tempus meaning 'time' and from temporal, which came to mean 'worldly' or 'not spiritual'. So in the church, temporality means the church's worldly property and possessions, not its spiritual power.