Peccator

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A person who commits sins or wrongdoing, often viewed within a religious context
2. someone who is morally flawed and acts contrary to ethical principles
3. an individual noted for their faults and misdeeds, typically in relation to transgressions against religious or moral laws

Etymology: Before it meant a moral failure, "peccator" was simply a Latin word for a wrongdoer, built from "peccare," "to stumble" or "to commit a fault." That verb is the root behind English "peccadillo," a small sin, which arrived in the 1500s from Spanish "pecadillo," a diminutive of "pecado," sin. The Latin noun "peccator" carried the sense of a sinner in the religious sense, and the Church used it heavily in Latin theology and scripture, where "peccator" translated Greek terms for those who miss the mark of divine law. English took the word more directly as a learned term rather than through everyday speech, so it appears mainly in religious, legal and literary writing. Its modern use is a deliberately formal, somewhat archaic register: a writer who wants a grander or more clinical-sounding word than "sinner" may reach for it. Its ancestry reveals the basic image behind all of this, a person who has stumbled or gone astray.

Synonyms: sinner, transgressor

Antonyms: saint, righteous person