apophatic
/apə(ʊ)ˈfatɪk/adjective
apophatic is an adjective meaning “Pertaining to knowledge of God obtained through negation rather than positive assertions” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled A-P-O-P-H-A-T-I-C, and it appears about once in every 37 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does apophatic mean?
adjective
- 1
Pertaining to knowledge of God obtained through negation rather than positive assertions.
- 2
That passively defines a thing by describing what is not characteristic of it.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce apophatic?
- UK /apə(ʊ)ˈfatɪk/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of apophatic
- more apophatic comparative
- most apophatic superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is apophatic?
Apophatic appears about once in every 37 million words in written English, the 187,122nd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Apophatic in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense pertaining to knowledge of God obtained through negation rather than positive as:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | apophatique |
| German | apophatisch |
| Portuguese | apofático |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does apophatic come from?
From Ancient Greek ἀποφατικός (apophatikós, “negative”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).