Adjacent Words

Enable definitions

	Tweet

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

ENABLE, v.t. [Norm. enhabler; en and hable, able. See Able.]
1. To make able; to supply with power,physical or moral; to furnish with sufficient power or ability. By strength a man is enabled to work. Learning and industry enable men to investigate the laws of nature. Fortitude enables us to bear pain without murmuring.
2. To supply with means. Wealth enables men to be charitable, or to live in luxury.
3. To furnish with legal ability or competency; to authorize. The law enables us to dispose of our property by will.
4. To furnish with competent knowledge or skill, and in general, with adequate means.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

v
1: render capable or able for some task; "This skill will enable you to find a job on Wall Street"; "The rope enables you to secure yourself when you climb the mountain" [ant: disable, disenable, incapacitate]

Merriam Webster's

transitive verb (enabled; enabling) Date: 15th century 1. a. to provide with the means or opportunity <training that enables people to earn a living> b. to make possible, practical, or easy <a deal that would enable passage of a new law> c. to cause to operate <software that enables the keyboard> 2. to give legal power, capacity, or sanction to <a law enabling admission of a state>

Oxford Reference Dictionary

v.tr. 1 (foll. by to + infin.) give (a person etc.) the means or authority to do something. 2 make possible. 3 esp. Computing make (a device) operational; switch on. Phrases and idioms: enabling act 1 a statute empowering a person or body to take certain action. 2 US a statute legalizing something otherwise unlawful. Derivatives: enabler n.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Enable En*a"ble, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Enabled; p. pr. & vb. n. Enabling.] 1. To give strength or ability to; to make firm and strong. [Obs.] ``Who hath enabled me.'' --1 Tim. i. 12. Receive the Holy Ghost, said Christ to his apostles, when he enabled them with priestly power. --Jer. Taylor. 2. To make able (to do, or to be, something); to confer sufficient power upon; to furnish with means, opportunities, and the like; to render competent for; to empower; to endow. Temperance gives Nature her full play, and enables her to exert herself in all her force and vigor. --Addison.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(enables, enabling, enabled) Frequency: The word is one of the 3000 most common words in English. 1. If someone or something enables you to do a particular thing, they give you the opportunity to do it. The new test should enable doctors to detect the disease early. VERB: V n to-inf • enabling Researchers describe it as an enabling technology. ADJ 2. To enable something to happen means to make it possible for it to happen. The hot sun enables the grapes to reach optimum ripeness... The working class is still too small to enable a successful socialist revolution. VERB: V n to-inf, V n 3. To enable someone to do something means to give them permission or the right to do it. ...the republic's legislation which enables young people to do a form of alternative service. VERB: V n to-inf • enabling Some protection for victims must be written into the enabling legislation. ADJ: ADJ n

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

en-a'-b'-l:

Only in 1Ti 1:12 (the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American)) in the sense of "strengthen" (Greek endunamoo, "endue with strength").

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

v. a. Empower, qualify, capacitate, make able, make capable, render capable.

Moby Thesaurus

OK, accredit, adapt, adjust, agree to, aid, allow, approve, arm, assent to, assign, assist, attune, authorize, capacitate, certificate, certify, charter, clothe, clothe with power, commission, condition, delegate, depute, deputize, empower, endow, endue, enfranchise, entitle, entrust, equip, expedite, facilitate, fit, franchise, furnish, give official sanction, give power, go along with, help, invest, legalize, legitimize, let, license, make possible, okay, patent, permit, prepare, privilege, put in trim, put in tune, qualify, ratify, ready, sanction, suit, tune, validate, warrant