"be-all" meaning in English

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "be-alls",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "be-all (plural be-alls)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "derived": [
        {
          "word": "be-all and end-all"
        },
        {
          "word": "end-all and be-all"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              34,
              40
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "a. 1606, William Shakespeare, Macbeth, act 1, scene 7, lines 4–5:",
          "text": "That but this blow / Might be the be-all and the end-all!",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              132,
              138
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1988 February 14, Louise Rice, quoting Angela Bowen, “Confronting The Mythology Of Motherhood”, in Gay Community News, volume 15, number 30, page 11:",
          "text": "Bowen also spoke of […] teaching her daughter to rely not just on a mother, but on a community. \"No one person should try to be the be-all to another person. We must surround our children with people they can count on.\"",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              104,
              111
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2007, Kirbyjon H. Caldwell, Be In It to Win It:",
          "text": "[…] to be happy with their lot in life, content with things as they are, things that may once have been be-alls and absolute end-alls but that lost their intoxication after five years, put them on automatic pilot after ten and became a prison after fifteen.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The whole; all that is to be."
      ],
      "id": "en-be-all-en-noun-5qpahh1s",
      "links": [
        [
          "whole",
          "whole"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(poetic) The whole; all that is to be."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "poetic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "be-all"
}

{
  "derived": [
    {
      "word": "be-all and end-all"
    },
    {
      "word": "end-all and be-all"
    }
  ],
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "be-alls",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "be-all (plural be-alls)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English countable nouns",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English nouns",
        "English poetic terms",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries",
        "Quotation templates to be cleaned"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              34,
              40
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "a. 1606, William Shakespeare, Macbeth, act 1, scene 7, lines 4–5:",
          "text": "That but this blow / Might be the be-all and the end-all!",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              132,
              138
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1988 February 14, Louise Rice, quoting Angela Bowen, “Confronting The Mythology Of Motherhood”, in Gay Community News, volume 15, number 30, page 11:",
          "text": "Bowen also spoke of […] teaching her daughter to rely not just on a mother, but on a community. \"No one person should try to be the be-all to another person. We must surround our children with people they can count on.\"",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              104,
              111
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2007, Kirbyjon H. Caldwell, Be In It to Win It:",
          "text": "[…] to be happy with their lot in life, content with things as they are, things that may once have been be-alls and absolute end-alls but that lost their intoxication after five years, put them on automatic pilot after ten and became a prison after fifteen.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The whole; all that is to be."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "whole",
          "whole"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(poetic) The whole; all that is to be."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "poetic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "be-all"
}