Prejudice
King James Dictionary [1]
PREJ'UDICE, n. L. prejudicium proe and judico.
1. Prejudgment an opinion or decision of mind, formed without due examination of the facts or arguments which are necessary to a just and impartial determination. It is used in a good or bad sense. Innumerable are the prejudices of education we are accustomed to believe what we are taught, and to receive opinions from others without examining the grounds by which they can be supported. A man has strong prejudices in favor of his country or his party, or the church in which he has been educated and often our prejudices are unreasonable. A judge should disabuse himself of prejudice in favor of either party in a suit.
My comfort is that their manifest prejudice to my cause will render their judgment of less authority.
2. A previous bent or bias of mind for or against any person or thing prepossession.
There is an unaccountable prejudice to projectors of all kinds.
3. Mischief hurt damage injury. Violent factions are a prejudice to the authority of the sovereign.
How plain this abuse is, and what prejudice it does to the understanding of the sacred Scriptures.
This is a sense of the word too well established to be condemned.
PREJ'UDICE, To prepossess with unexamined opinions, or opinions formed without due knowledge of the facts and circumstances attending the question to bias the mind by hasty and incorrect notions, and give it an unreasonable bent to one side or other of a cause.
Suffer not any beloved study to prejudice your mind so far as to despise all other learning.
1. To obstruct or injure by prejudices, or an undue previous bias of the mind or to hurt to damage to diminish to impair in a very general sense. The advocate who attempts to prove too much, may prejudice his cause.
I am not to prejudice the cause of my fellow poets, though I abandon my own defense.
Webster's Dictionary [2]
(1): ( n.) Foresight.
(2): ( n.) An opinion or judgment formed without due examination; prejudgment; a leaning toward one side of a question from other considerations than those belonging to it; an unreasonable predilection for, or objection against, anything; especially, an opinion or leaning adverse to anything, without just grounds, or before sufficient knowledge.
(3): ( n.) A bias on the part of judge, juror, or witness which interferes with fairness of judgment.
(4): ( n.) Mischief; hurt; damage; injury; detriment.
(5): ( n.) To obstruct or injure by prejudices, or by previous bias of the mind; hence, generally, to hurt; to damage; to injure; to impair; as, to prejudice a good cause.
(6): ( n.) To cause to have prejudice; to prepossess with opinions formed without due knowledge or examination; to bias the mind of, by hasty and incorrect notions; to give an unreasonable bent to, as to one side or the other of a cause; as, to prejudice a critic or a juryman.
Vine's Expository Dictionary of NT Words [3]
denotes "pre-judging" (akin to prokrino, "to judge beforehand"), 1—Timothy 5:21 , RV, "prejudice" (marg., "preference"), preferring one person, another being put aside, by unfavorable judgment due to partiality.
Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature [4]
(praejudico, to judge before inquiry) is a prejudging, that is, forming or adopting an opinion concerning anything before the grounds of it have been fairly or fully considered. The opinion may be true or false; but in so far as the grounds of it have not been examined, it is erroneous or without proper evidence. "In most cases prejudices are opinions which, on some account, men are pleased with, independently of any conviction of their truth; and which, therefore, they are afraid to examine, lest they should find them to be false. Prejudices then, are unreasonable judgments, formed or held under the influence of some other motive than the love of truth. They may therefore be classed according to the nature of the motives from which they result. These motives are either, 1, pleasurable, innocent, and social; or, 2, they are malignant (Taylor, Elements of Thought). Dr. Reid (Intell. Powers, essay 6, ch. 8) has treated of prejudices, or the causes of error, according to the classification given of them by lord Bacon, under the name of idols. Locke (Essay on the Human Understanding, bk. 4, ch. 20) has treated of the causes of error. Some excellent observations on the prejudices peculiar to men of study may be seen in Malebranche (Search after Truth). See Christian Examiner and Gen. Revelation 4 (1830), 280.
