Audience

Audience - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

AUD'IENCE, n.

1. The act of hearing, or attending to sounds.

His bold discourse had audience.

2. Admittance to a hearing; public reception to an interview; a ceremony observed in courts, or by official characters, when ambassadors or applicants to men in office are permitted to appear and state their business in person.

3. An auditory; an assembly of hearers.

4. In the Spanish dominions, a court; as the audience of Seville, which is a court of oyer and terminer; and the audience pretorial, in the Indies, which is a high court of judicature. The word in Spain also signifies certain law-officers, appointed to institute a judicial inquiry.

5. In England, a court held by the arch-bishop of Canterbury, on the subject of consecrations, elections, institutions, marriages, _c.

o'-di-ens: Translated from the Hebrew 'ozen, "ear." In Ge 23:10 f "in the audience of" is equal to "in the presence of," or "while they listened." Compare Ex 24:7; 1Sa 25:24 (Revised Version (British and American) "in thine ears"); 1Ch 28:8; Ne 13:1. In the New Testament the expression "to give audience" (Ac 22:22; 13:16, the Revised Version (British and American) "hearken"; Ac 15:12, the Revised Version (British and American) "they hearkened") translated from the Greek akouo "to hear" or derivatives, and means "to listen," "to pay attention." In the King James Version Lu 7:1 (Revised Version, "in the ears of") and the King James Version Lu 20:45 (Revised Version, "in the hearing of") the usage is similar to that of the Old Testament.