Cause

Cause - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

CAUSE, n. s as z.

1. A suit or action in court; any legal process which a party institutes to obtain his demand, or by which he seeks his right or his supposed right. This is a legal, scriptural and popular use of the word, coinciding nearly with case from cado, and action from ago, to urge or drive.

The cause of both parties shall come before the judges. Exo 22.

2. That which produces an effect; that which impels into existence, or by its agency or operation produces what did not before exist; that by virtue of which any thing is done; that from which any thing proceeds, and without which it would not exist.

Cause is a substance exerting its power into act, to make a thing begin to be.

3. The reason or motive that urges, moves, or impels the mind to act or decide.

For this cause have I raised up Pharaoh. Exo 9.

And David said, is there not a cause? 1 Sam 17.

4. Sake; account.

I did it not for his cause that had done the wrong. 2 Cor 6. [See Sake.]

5. That which a party or nation pursues; or rather pursuit, prosecution of an object. We say, Bible Societies are engaged in a noble cause. [See the first definition.] Hence the word cause is used to denote that which a person or thing favors; that to which the efforts of an intelligent being are directed; as, to promote religion is to advance the cause of God. So we say, the cause of truth or of justice. In all its applications, cause retains something of its original meaning, struggle, impelling force, contest, effort to obtain or to effect something.

6. Without cause, without good reason; without a reason or motive to justify the act.

They hate me without cause. Psa 35:69.

CAUSE, v.t.

1. To produce; to bring into existence.

They caused great joy to all the brethren. Acts 15.

2. To effect by agency, power or influence.

I will cause it to rain on the earth forty days. Gen 7.

I will cause him to fall by the sword. 2 Ki 19.

CAUSE, v.i. To assign insufficient cause.

kos: In both the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) "for this cause" (the King James Version "cause") occurs in Ex 9:16 as the rendering of ba`abhur zo'th = "in order that"; "to the end that"; so also in Da 2:12 for kol-qebhel denah, and in 2Ch 32:20 the King James Version for `al-zo'th, where RVS read "because of." In the New Testament the word is used adverbially in the translation of several Greek phrases: heneka toutou (Mt 19:5; Mr 10:7); dia touto, Joh 12:27; Ro 1:26; 13:6; 15:9 (the Revised Version (British and American) "therefore"); 1Co 11:30; 1Th 2:13; 2Th 2:11; 1Ti 1:16; Hebrews 9:15; eis touto, Joh 18:37 (where the King James Version varying the phraseology reads "to this end" "for this cause"); 1Pe 4:6 the King James Version; toutou charin, Eph 3:14. Unusual renderings occur, as "for his cause" (= "because of"), 2Co 7:12; as = "affair," "thing," obsolete in the King James Version 1Ki 12:15; 2Ch 10:15, where the word occurs as a paraphrase of necibbah (= "turn of affairs"). In 1Sa 25:31 (King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American)) "causeless" (= without cause the American Standard Revised Version) occurs arbitrarily in adverb sense.

W. N. Stearns