strife
Pronunciation
  • IPA: /stɹaɪf/
Noun

strife

  1. Striving; earnest endeavor; hard work.
  2. Exertion or contention for superiority, either by physical or intellectual means.
    • 1595: Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
      From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
      A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;
      Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
      Do with their death bury their parents' strife.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), imprinted at London: By Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981 ↗, 1 Timothy 6:4 ↗:
      Hee is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions, and ſtrifes of wordes,{{...}
  3. Bitter conflict, sometimes violent.
    Synonyms: altercation, contention, discord, wrangle
    • 1927-29, Mahatma Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, translated 1940 by Mahadev Desai, Part I, Chapter xvii ↗:
      A few observations about the interpretation of vows or pledges may not be out of place here. Interpretation of pledges has been a fruitful source of strife all the world over. No matter how explicit the pledge, people will turn and twist the text to suit their own purposes.
  4. (colloquial) A trouble of any kind.
  5. (obsolete) That which is contended against; occasion of contest.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene[https://books.google.co.in/books?id=S9tBAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA311&lpg=PA311&dq=Lamenting+her+unlucky+strife.(Spenser)&source=bl&ots=oa_27GST5G&sig=ACfU3U1cj0ONcLwIVADGmRWDU0hMOvQjlw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjAkcq_5bTjAhUDOI8KHb3wAYYQ6AEwBHoECAcQAQ]:
      He ſpide lamenting her unlucky ſtrife,
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