Praying

How to spell praying

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce praying

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does praying mean?

1. verbAddressing or appealing to a god or higher power, especially in worship or earnest request.

Praying in a sentence

• The whole congregation knelt, praying quietly before the morning service.

• She spent the night praying for her father's safe recovery after surgery.

Where does praying come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of the verb 'pray', which came into English in the 1200s from the Old French preier, meaning 'to ask, beg, or request'. That French word descended from the Latin precari, 'to entreat or beseech', built on the noun prex, meaning a prayer or request. The original sense was simply asking a favour of someone, which survives in old-fashioned phrasings like 'pray tell'; the religious sense of addressing a deity grew naturally out of that idea of earnest petition. The same Latin prex root sits inside 'precarious', a word that literally described something held only by request and therefore uncertain. The spelling trap is the near-identical sound of 'preying' (from prey, to hunt), so remember that praying involves a plea, sharing the -ay- of 'pray'.

How the word is built

• pray (from Latin precari: to beg, entreat)
• -ing (present participle suffix)