necessity

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The quality or state of being necessary, unavoidable, or absolutely requisite.

   I bought a new table out of necessity. My old one was ruined.

2. 2
   noun

   The condition of being needy; desperate need; lack.

   For it is in vain for a man to think to seek God in his necessity and exigence, if he seek not God in his ordinances, and do not joy in them.

3. 3
   noun

   Something necessary; a requisite; something indispensable.

   A tent is a necessity if you plan on camping.

4. 4
   noun

   Something which makes an act or an event unavoidable; an irresistible force; overruling power.

   After eating a full meal, the human body's necessity for food will compel the person to eat again in the future.

5. 5
   noun

   Greater utilitarian good; used in justification of a criminal act.

   doctrine of necessity

6. 6
   noun

   anything indispensable

7. 7
   noun

   the condition of being essential or indispensable

8. 8
   noun

   The negation of freedom in voluntary action; the subjection of all phenomena, whether material or spiritual, to inevitable causation; necessitarianism.

Etymology

From Middle English necessite, from Old French necessite, from Latin necessitās (“unavoidableness, compulsion, exigency, necessity”), from necesse (“unavoidable, inevitable”); see necessary. Doublet of Necessitas.