"honest to God" meaning in English

See honest to God in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Adjective

Etymology: Compare swear to God. Originally used as a sentence adverb or interjection, modifying entire clauses or utterances; honest itself is used this way, as in “Honest, I had no idea!” (meaning “I'm telling the truth, I had no idea!”). Etymology templates: {{m|en|swear to God}} swear to God, {{m|en|honest}} honest Head templates: {{en-adj|-}} honest to God (not comparable)
  1. Alternative form of honest-to-God Tags: alt-of, alternative, not-comparable Alternative form of: honest-to-God
    Sense id: en-honest_to_God-en-adj-msjyQ7lu

Adverb

Etymology: Compare swear to God. Originally used as a sentence adverb or interjection, modifying entire clauses or utterances; honest itself is used this way, as in “Honest, I had no idea!” (meaning “I'm telling the truth, I had no idea!”). Etymology templates: {{m|en|swear to God}} swear to God, {{m|en|honest}} honest Head templates: {{en-adv|-}} honest to God (not comparable)
  1. Honest; truly, really; used to emphasize that a statement is true. Tags: not-comparable Synonyms: honest-to-God, honest to goodness (alt: bowdlerised), honest to gods (english: polytheistic) [rare] Related terms: hand to God
    Sense id: en-honest_to_God-en-adv-pU-pQMjQ Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English entries with language name categories using raw markup, English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 9 77 15 Disambiguation of English entries with language name categories using raw markup: 8 77 15 Disambiguation of English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys: 9 74 17
  2. Truly, really. Tags: not-comparable
    Sense id: en-honest_to_God-en-adv-OKtgDQks

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for honest to God meaning in English (2.8kB)

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  "etymology_templates": [
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      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "swear to God"
      },
      "expansion": "swear to God",
      "name": "m"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "honest"
      },
      "expansion": "honest",
      "name": "m"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Compare swear to God. Originally used as a sentence adverb or interjection, modifying entire clauses or utterances; honest itself is used this way, as in “Honest, I had no idea!” (meaning “I'm telling the truth, I had no idea!”).",
  "head_templates": [
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      "args": {
        "1": "-"
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      "expansion": "honest to God (not comparable)",
      "name": "en-adj"
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  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "alt_of": [
        {
          "word": "honest-to-God"
        }
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      "glosses": [
        "Alternative form of honest-to-God"
      ],
      "id": "en-honest_to_God-en-adj-msjyQ7lu",
      "links": [
        [
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          "honest-to-God#English"
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      ],
      "tags": [
        "alt-of",
        "alternative",
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "honest to God"
}

{
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "swear to God"
      },
      "expansion": "swear to God",
      "name": "m"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "honest"
      },
      "expansion": "honest",
      "name": "m"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Compare swear to God. Originally used as a sentence adverb or interjection, modifying entire clauses or utterances; honest itself is used this way, as in “Honest, I had no idea!” (meaning “I'm telling the truth, I had no idea!”).",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
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      "name": "en-adv"
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  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adv",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "9 77 15",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
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            "Entry maintenance"
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          "source": "w+disamb"
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          "parents": [
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          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "Honest to God, I thought you already knew!"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Honest; truly, really; used to emphasize that a statement is true."
      ],
      "id": "en-honest_to_God-en-adv-pU-pQMjQ",
      "links": [
        [
          "Honest",
          "honest"
        ],
        [
          "truly",
          "truly"
        ],
        [
          "really",
          "really"
        ]
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "_dis1": "97 3",
          "word": "hand to God"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "_dis1": "2 95 3",
          "word": "honest-to-God"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "97 3",
          "alt": "bowdlerised",
          "word": "honest to goodness"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "97 3",
          "english": "polytheistic",
          "tags": [
            "rare"
          ],
          "word": "honest to gods"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    },
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "She is honest to God brilliant."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Truly, really."
      ],
      "id": "en-honest_to_God-en-adv-OKtgDQks",
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "honest to God"
}
{
  "categories": [
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    "English adverbs",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
    "English lemmas",
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    "English sentence adverbs",
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  "etymology_templates": [
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        "1": "en",
        "2": "honest"
      },
      "expansion": "honest",
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  ],
  "etymology_text": "Compare swear to God. Originally used as a sentence adverb or interjection, modifying entire clauses or utterances; honest itself is used this way, as in “Honest, I had no idea!” (meaning “I'm telling the truth, I had no idea!”).",
  "head_templates": [
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
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          "word": "honest-to-God"
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  "synonyms": [
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      "word": "honest-to-God"
    }
  ],
  "word": "honest to God"
}

{
  "categories": [
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    "English adverbs",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
    "English sentence adverbs",
    "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
    "English uncomparable adjectives",
    "English uncomparable adverbs"
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
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        "1": "en",
        "2": "honest"
      },
      "expansion": "honest",
      "name": "m"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Compare swear to God. Originally used as a sentence adverb or interjection, modifying entire clauses or utterances; honest itself is used this way, as in “Honest, I had no idea!” (meaning “I'm telling the truth, I had no idea!”).",
  "head_templates": [
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        "1": "-"
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      "expansion": "honest to God (not comparable)",
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adv",
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    {
      "word": "hand to God"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "Honest to God, I thought you already knew!"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Honest; truly, really; used to emphasize that a statement is true."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "Honest",
          "honest"
        ],
        [
          "truly",
          "truly"
        ],
        [
          "really",
          "really"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    },
    {
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "She is honest to God brilliant."
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Truly, really."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "alt": "bowdlerised",
      "word": "honest to goodness"
    },
    {
      "english": "polytheistic",
      "tags": [
        "rare"
      ],
      "word": "honest to gods"
    },
    {
      "word": "honest-to-God"
    }
  ],
  "word": "honest to God"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.