laic

• laick (obsolete)

From French laïque, from Latin laĭcus (“common people”), from Ancient Greek λαός (laós). Doublet of lay.

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈleɪ.ɪk/

  Rhymes: -eɪɪk

laic (plural laics)

1. A layperson as opposed to a cleric, i.e. not a member of the clergy.
   • 2013 Ranjan Ghosh (ed.) Making sense of the secular. Chapter 3: How Do You Say 'Secular' in Italian? Edoardo Tortarolo. Pub. Routledge studies in religion p. 58. ISBN: 978-0-415-53695-0

     and laicist derive from the same root. Why did their meanings diverge? What meaning do they share? Both apply to people who believe that the well-being of societies requires that religious doctrines and churches do not interfere with the functioning of the state. To the laic, this end is reached when the state refrains from taking side with one confession against one or more other confessions, from supporting one citizen at the expense of another because of his or her religion. From an ideal—typical perspective, a laic state shows and practices neutrality between different confessions. To the laicist state, this is fine but not enough; neutrality between confessions is the goal, and state institutions have the responsibility to create egalitarian conditions. The state's job is to actively provide an environment equally propitious to believers in some God, agnostics, and atheists, and to stifle any attempt at endorsing confessional discriminations or church interference in public life.

• cleric

laic (comparative more laic, superlative most laic)

1. Lay, relating to laypersons, as opposed to clerical.
   • 1644, John Milton, Areopagitica

     And in conclusion it reflects to the disrepute of our ministers ... [that] they should still be frequented with such an unprincipled, unedified and laic rabble, as that the whiff of every new pamphlet should stagger them out of their catechism and Christian walking.

• -ical, Alic, Cail, Cali, Laci

Learned borrowing from Latin laicus, from Ancient Greek λαός (laós). Doublet of llec.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencia) [ˈlajk]

laic (feminine laica, masculine plural laics, feminine plural laiques)

1. laic, secular

laic m (plural laics, feminine laica, feminine plural laiques)

1. layperson

• “laic”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• “laic”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025
• “laic” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “laic” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

From Proto-Hmong-Mien *-rajH (“sharp”). Cognate with White Hmong zuag.

laic 

1. sharp

Borrowed from French laïque, from Latin laicus.

laic m or n (feminine singular laică, masculine plural laici, feminine and neuter plural laice)

1. secular