congregationn.

a. The action of congregating or collecting in one body or mass.

b. As a condition or state.

a. of men.

b. of animals or things.

†c. technical of plovers. Obsolete.

a. A regular meeting or assembly of a society or body.

b. University. A general assembly of the members of a University, or of such of them as possess certain specified qualifications.At Cambridge an assembly or meeting of the Senate. At Oxford a meeting of the Vice-Chancellor, Proctors, and ‘Regent Masters’ ( Ancient House of Congregation), to grant or confer degrees, etc.; also since 1854, the name of the whole body of resident Masters, Doctors, and Professors ( Congregation of the University), and of a regular meeting of this body, constituting the chief deliberative assembly of the University. (The intention of the Act of 1854 was to enlarge the constitution and powers of the ‘Ancient House of Congregation’: it was held however by the legists that, instead of doing so, it had created a new body, ‘the Congregation of the University’, leaving the ‘Ancient House’ intact. There are therefore now two Congregations in the University.)

a. In English versions of the Bible, applied in the Old Testament to the collective body of the Israelites in the wilderness, and to a public solemn assembly of the people or nation: so congregation of the Lord, etc.Here it is put for two distinct Hebrew words ʿēdāh and qāhāl, the original difference between which was apparently that ʿēdāh meant the collective body or community, and qāhāl an actual assembly that had met and would disperse again; but in application the two were necessarily often identical; the assembly consisted of or represented the community. By the Septuagint ʿēdāh is, with rare exceptions, rendered συναγωγή; qāhāl is rendered 70 times ἐκκλησία, 37 times συναγωγή, 10 times by ὄχλος or other word. The Vulgate has for both words a great variety of renderings, e.g. multitudo, cœtus, populus, turba, congregatio for both; also plebs, vulgus, globus, caterva, synagoga for ʿēdāh; concio, ecclesia, exercitus for qāhāl. Wyclif has congregacioun only in the few places in which congregatio appears in the Vulgate; but in the 16th cent. versions, congregation became the predominant rendering of both words; in the 1611 version it occurs 124 times for ʿēdāh, 86 times for qāhāl. In a relatively small number of cases, both words are rendered company, and assembly.) The Revised Version of 1885 has distinguished ʿēdāh and qāhāl in the Heptateuch as congregation and assembly, but elsewhere has usually continued the indiscriminate use of ‘congregation’ found in the earlier version.

b. Hence, in Old Testament language, in certain phrases, e.g. the congregation of saints, of the wicked, of evildoers, of hypocrites, etc. = whole body, company.

a. in sense of the whole body of the faithful, the Church of Christ.Cf. Luther's use of Gemeinde instead of Kirche, to express the Church as the congregation or community of the saints or saved people. Also Article xix. of Church of England ‘The Visible Church of Christ is a Congregation of faithful Men.’

b. in sense of a particular local assembly or society of believers, a ‘church’ (in the Congregational sense).

c. A body of Christians, a denomination.

a. A body of persons assembled for religious worship or to hear a preacher. (The most common modern use.)

b. The body of persons who habitually attend or belong to a particular place of worship.In the Episcopal and Presbyterian systems, a local organized body of worshippers, in contrast to the collective body or ‘Church’, composed of these congregations.In the Congregational system, the whole local body of worshippers, as distinguished from the ‘church’ or company of communicants.

c. In the New England colonies in which Congregationalism was established: The community of a settlement, town, or ‘parish’, having its particular place of worship, as distinguished from the ‘church’, or body of communicants, within the same. Now called the ‘society’.

a. Scottish History. The designation given to the party of Protestant Reformers during the reign of Mary. (Also Congregation of Christ, Congregation of the Lord.) The term appears to have originated in the language of the National Covenant, subscribed 3 December 1557, in which the word occurs 8 times (in the sense ‘church’, as in 6a).

b. A local section or body of the Reforming party.

c. Lords of the Congregation: the nobles and other chief men who subscribed the National Covenant.

a. Roman Catholic Church A community or order bound together by a common rule, either without vows (as the Oratorians), or without solemn vows (as the Passionists, Redemptorists, etc.). Extended, esp. in France, to lay associations of men or women, having a religious end in view, and devoting themselves to some work of instruction or charity (as the Brothers of the Christian Schools). Cf. congreganist adj.

b. A group of monasteries belonging to some great order, which agree to unite themselves together by closer ties of doctrine and discipline (as the great congregation of Cluny, that of St. Maur, and that of La Trappe).

a. The name given to several permanent committees of the Roman College of Cardinals of which eleven are of primary importance, each having charge of a certain department of the business of the Church. Sometimes specifically applied to the Congregation de propaganda fide. Also a temporary committee of cardinals and ecclesiastics, constituted a special congregation, to clear up or decide a matter that has arisen.

b. At a General Council, a committee of bishops appointed for drawing up rules for the dispatch of business, and preparation of questions for debate, etc.