Definition of EXHORTING

Did You Know?

Exhort is a 15th-century coinage. It derives from the Latin verb hortari, meaning "to incite," and it often implies the ardent urging or admonishing of an orator or preacher. People in the 16th century apparently liked the root -hort, but they couldn't resist fiddling around with different prefixes to create other words similar in meaning to "exhort." They came up with adhort and dehort. Adhort was short-lived and became obsolete after the 17th century. Dehort was similar to exhort and adhort but with a more specific meaning of "to dissuade." It had a better run than adhort, being used well into the late 19th century, but it is now considered archaic.

Examples of exhort in a Sentence

He exhorted his people to take back their land. She exhorted her listeners to support the proposition.

Recent Examples on the Web To make its case, the union enlisted prominent politicians such as Sanders and voting rights activist and former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams to exhort workers to vote yes. — Washington Post, "The labor movement is working to regroup, with emotions high after a veteran organizer wrote a sharp critique of the union’s tactics in Alabama," 18 Apr. 2021 Even Ikolo’s parents joined the crowd to exhort their son to tell Titi the reason for his change of heart. — Imbolo Mbue, The New Yorker, "The Case for and Against Love Potions," 15 Mar. 2021 If precedent is any indication, global news consumers in a landscape weighed down by a glut of imagery may surrender to short attention spans — even if the scenes coming out of Myanmar exhort them to do otherwise. — NBC News, "Myanmar's searing smartphone images flood a watching world," 11 Mar. 2021 If precedent is any indication, global news consumers in a landscape weighed down by a glut of imagery may surrender to short attention spans – even if the scenes coming out of Myanmar exhort them to do otherwise. — Ted Anthony, The Christian Science Monitor, "Smartphones have redefined protests. But will it last?," 11 Mar. 2021 Huey Newton and Bobby Seale raised their fists to exhort members of the Black Panther Party. — National Geographic, "The history of the raised fist, a global symbol of fighting oppression," 31 July 2020 Since the first people began carrying signs and exhorting us to say Breonna Taylor’s name last week, Louisville has wrestled with what has unfolded on our downtown streets. — Joseph Gerth, The Courier-Journal, "Gerth: Mayor Fischer is missing in action as Louisville struggles with racial issues," 2 June 2020 Everything has the patina of an old VHS tape, and cuts from the soundtrack to Drive exhort us to make nightcalls and wear sweet, sweet scorpion jackets. — Peter Opaskar, Ars Technica, "At the end of time and space are phat beats: Blood Machines movie review," 20 May 2020 In this outbreak, Xi has repeatedly exhorted doctors to treat patients with a mix of Chinese and Western medicines. — Nectar Gan And Yong Xiong, CNN, "Beijing is promoting traditional medicine as a 'Chinese solution' to coronavirus. Not everyone is on board," 14 Mar. 2020

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'exhort.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.