Word Direct Answers

What does "corrupt" mean?

Corrupt: Changed from a state of uprightness, correctness, truth, etc., to a worse state; vitiated; depraved; debased; perverted; as, corrupt language; corrupt judges. At what ease Might corrupt minds procure knaves as corrupt To swear against you. Shak.

Additional senses

  1. 2.Abounding in errors; not genuine or correct; as, the text of the manuscript is corrupt.
  2. 3.To change from a sound to a putrid or putrescent state; to make putrid; to putrefy.
  3. 4.To change from good to bad; to vitiate; to deprave; to pervert; to debase; to defile. Evil communications corrupt good manners.
  4. 5.Cor. xv.
  5. 6.3. To draw aside from the path of rectitude and duty; as, to corrupt a judge by a bribe. Heaven is above all yet; there sits a Judge That no king can corrupt. Shak.
  6. 7.To debase or render impure by alterations or innovations; to falsify; as, to corrupt language; to corrupt the sacred text. He that makes an ill use of it [language], though he does not corrupt the fountains of knowledge, . . . yet he stops the pines. Locke.
  7. 8.To waste, spoil, or consume; to make worthless. Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt. Matt. vi.
  8. 9.1. To become putrid or tainted; to putrefy; to rot. Bacon.
  9. 10.To become vitiated; to lose putity or goodness.

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