Definition of law
1 a (1)
: a binding custom or practice of a community : a rule of conduct or action prescribed (see prescribe 1a) or formally recognized as binding or enforced by a controlling authority
(2)
: the whole body of such customs, practices, or rules
- The courts exist to uphold, interpret, and apply the law.
(3)
: common law
b (1)
: the control brought about by the existence or enforcement of such law
- preserved law and order in the town
(2)
: the action of laws considered as a means of redressing wrongs;
also
: litigation
- developed the habit of going to law over the slightest provocation
- —H. A. Overstreet
(3)
: the agency of or an agent of established law
- When he saw that the fighting was escalating, he called in the law.
c
: a rule or order that it is advisable or obligatory to observe
- a law of self-preservation
d
: something compatible with or enforceable by established law
- The decrees were judged not to be law and were therefore rescinded.
2 a
often capitalized
: the revelation of the will of God set forth in the Old Testament
3
: a rule of construction or procedure
- the laws of poetry
4
: the whole body of laws relating to one subject
- criminal law
- probate law
5 a
: the legal profession
- studied for a career in law
b
: law as a department of knowledge : jurisprudence
c
: legal knowledge
- a man with much history but little law
6 a
: a statement of an order or relation of phenomena that so far as is known is invariable under the given conditions
- a law of thermodynamics
- Boyle's law
b
: a general relation proved or assumed to hold between mathematical or logical expressions
—
at law
: under or within the provisions of the law
- enforceable at law
