that which has actuality either materially or in idea.
b.
absolute existence in a complete or perfect state, lacking no essential characteristic; essence.
–conjunction
9.
Nonstandard. since; because; considering that (often fol. by as, as how, or that): Being it's midnight, let's go home. Being as how you cooked supper, I'll do the dishes.
beAudio Help/bi; unstressedbi, bɪ/Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[bee; unstressedbee, bi]Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciationverb and auxiliary verb, present singular 1st person am, 2nd are or (Archaic) art, 3rd is, present plural are; past singular 1st person was, 2nd were or (Archaic) wast or wert, 3rd was, past plural were; present subjunctive be; past subjunctive singular 1st person were, 2nd were or (Archaic) wert, 3rd were; past subjunctive plural were; past participle been; present participle be·ing.
–verb (used without object)
1.
to exist or live: Shakespeare's “To be or not to be” is the ultimate question.
2.
to take place; happen; occur: The wedding was last week.
3.
to occupy a place or position: The book is on the table.
4.
to continue or remain as before: Let things be.
5.
to belong; attend; befall: May good fortune be with you.
6.
(used as a copula to connect the subject with its predicate adjective, or predicate nominative, in order to describe, identify, or amplify the subject): Martha is tall. John is president. This is she.
7.
(used as a copula to introduce or form interrogative or imperative sentences): Is that right? Be quiet! Don't be facetious.
–auxiliary verb
8.
(used with the present participle of another verb to form the progressive tense): I am waiting.
9.
(used with the present participle or infinitive of the principal verb to indicate future action): She is visiting there next week. He is to see me today.
10.
(used with the past participle of another verb to form the passive voice): The date was fixed. It must be done.
11.
(used in archaic or literary constructions with some intransitive verbs to form the perfect tense): He is come. Agamemnon to the wars is gone.
[Origin: bef. 900; ME been, OE béon (béo- (akin to OFris, OHG bim, G bin, OS bium, biom (I) am, OE, OHG, OS būan, ON būa reside, L fuī (I) have been, Gk phy- grow, become, OIr boí (he) was, Skt bhávati (he) becomes, is, Lith búti to be, OCS byti, Pers būd was)) + -n inf. suffix. See am, is, are1, was, were]
beAudio Help (bē) Pronunciation Key
v.
First and third person singular past indicativewas (wŭz, wŏz; wəz when unstressed), second person singular and plural and first and third person plural past indicativewere (wûr), past subjunctivewere, past participlebeen (bĭn), present participlebe·ing (bē'ĭng), first person singular present indicativeam (ām), second person singular and plural and first and third person plural present indicativeare (är), third person singular present indicativeis (ĭz), present subjunctivebe
v.
intr.
To exist in actuality; have life or reality: I think, therefore I am.
To occupy a specified position: The food is on the table.
To remain in a certain state or situation undisturbed, untouched, or unmolested: Let the children be.
To equal in identity: "To be a Christian was to be a Roman"(James Bryce).
To have a specified significance: A is excellent, C is passing. Let n be the unknown quantity.
To belong to a specified class or group: The human being is a primate.
To have or show a specified quality or characteristic: She is witty. All humans are mortal.
To seem to consist or be made of: The yard is all snow. He is all bluff and no bite.
To take place; occur: The test was yesterday.
To go or come: Have you ever been to Italy? Have you been home recently?
Used as a copula in such senses as:
To equal in identity: "To be a Christian was to be a Roman"(James Bryce).
To have a specified significance: A is excellent, C is passing. Let n be the unknown quantity.
To belong to a specified class or group: The human being is a primate.
To have or show a specified quality or characteristic: She is witty. All humans are mortal.
To seem to consist or be made of: The yard is all snow. He is all bluff and no bite.
To belong; befall: Peace be unto you. Woe is me.
v.
aux.
Used with the past participle of a transitive verb to form the passive voice: The mayoral election is held annually.
Used with the present participle of a verb to express a continuing action: We are working to improve housing conditions.
Used with the infinitive of a verb to express intention, obligation, or future action: She was to call before she left. You are to make the necessary changes.
Archaic Used with the past participle of certain intransitive verbs to form the perfect tense: "Where be those roses gone which sweetened so our eyes?"(Philip Sidney).
[Middle English ben, from Old English bēon; see bheuə- in Indo-European roots. See am1, is, etc. for links to other Indo-European roots.]
Usage Note: Traditional grammar requires the nominative form of the pronoun in the predicate of the verb be: It is I (not me); That must be they (not them), and so forth. Nearly every speaker of Modern English finds this rule difficult to follow. Even if everyone could follow it, in informal contexts the nominative pronoun often sounds pedantic and even ridiculous, especially when the verb is contracted, as in It's we. But constructions like It is me have been condemned in the classroom and in writing handbooks for so long that there seems little likelihood that they will ever be entirely acceptable in formal writing. · The traditional rule creates additional problems when the pronoun following be also functions as the object of a verb or preposition in a relative clause, as in It is not them/they that we have in mind when we talk about "crime in the streets" nowadays, where the plural pronoun serves as both the predicate of is and the object of have. In this example, 57 percent of the Usage Panel prefers the nominative form they, 33 percent prefer the objective them, and 10 percent accept both versions. Writers can usually revise their sentences to avoid this problem: They are not the ones we have in mind, We have someone else in mind, and so on. See Usage Notes at I1, we.
Our Living Language: In place of the inflected forms of be, such as is and are, used in Standard English, African American Vernacular English (AAVE) and some varieties of Southern American English may use zero copula or an invariant be, as in He be working, instead of the Standard English He is usually working. As an identifying feature of the vernacular of many African Americans, invariant be in recent years has been frequently seized on by writers and commentators trying to imitate or parody Black speech. However, most imitators use it simply as a substitute for is, as in John be sitting in that chair now, without realizing that within AAVE, invariant be is used primarily for habitual or extended actions set in the present. Among African Americans the form is most commonly used by working-class speakers and young persons. Since the 1980s, younger speakers have tended to restrict the use of the form to progressive verb forms (as in He be walking), whereas their parents use it with progressives, adjectives (as in He be nice), and expressions referring to a location (as in He be at home). Younger speakers also use invariant be more exclusively to indicate habitual action, whereas older speakers more commonly omit be forms (as in He walking) or use present tense verb forms (such as He walks), sometimes with adverbs like often or usually, to indicate habituality. · The source of invariant habitual be in AAVE is still disputed. Some linguists suggest that it represents influence from finite be in the 17th- to 19th-century English of British settlers, especially those from the southwest of England. Other linguists feel that contemporaneous Irish or Scotch-Irish immigrants may have played a larger role, since their dialects mark habitual verb forms with be and do be, as in "They be shooting and fishing out at the Forestry Lakes" (archival recordings of the Royal Irish Academy) and "Up half the night he does be" (James Joyce). Other linguists believe that it may have evolved from the does be construction indicating habitual action used by Gullah speakers from coastal South Carolina and Georgia and by Caribbean Creole immigants. Still other linguists suggest that invariant be is a mid- to late-20th-century innovation within AAVE, essentially a response to the wide range of meanings that the English progressive tense can express. See Notes at all, like2, zero copula.
Be\, v. i. [imp. Was; p. p. Been; p. pr. & vb. n. Being.] [OE. been, beon, AS. be['o]n to be, be['o]m I am; akin to OHG. bim, pim, G. bin, I am, Gael. & Ir. bu was, W. bod to be, Lith. bu-ti, O. Slav. by-ti, to be, L. fu-i I have been, fu-turus about to be, fo-re to be about to be, and perh to fieri to become, Gr. ? to be born, to be, Skr. bh? to be. This verb is defective, and the parts lacking are supplied by verbs from other roots, is, was, which have no radical connection with be. The various forms, am, are, is, was, were, etc., are considered grammatically as parts of the verb "to be", which, with its conjugational forms, is often called the substantive verb. ?97. Cf. Future, Physic.]1. To exist actually, or in the world of fact; to have ex?stence. To be contents his natural desire. --Pope. To be, or not to be: that is the question. --Shak. 2. To exist in a certain manner or relation, -- whether as a reality or as a product of thought; to exist as the subject of a certain predicate, that is, as having a certain attribute, or as belonging to a certain sort, or as identical with what is specified, -- a word or words for the predicate being annexed; as, to be happy; to be here; to be large, or strong; to be an animal; to be a hero; to be a nonentity; three and two are five; annihilation is the cessation of existence; that is the man. 3. To take place; to happen; as, the meeting was on Thursday. 4. To signify; to represent or symbolize; to answer to. The field is the world. --Matt. xiii. 38. The seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven churches. --Rev. i. 20. Note: The verb to be (including the forms is, was, etc.) is used in forming the passive voice of other verbs; as, John has been struck by James. It is also used with the past participle of many intransitive verbs to express a state of the subject. But have is now more commonly used as the auxiliary, though expressing a different sense; as, "Ye have come too late -- but ye are come. " "The minstrel boy to the war is gone." The present and imperfect tenses form, with the infinitive, a particular future tense, which expresses necessity, duty, or purpose; as, government is to be supported; we are to pay our just debts; the deed is to be signed to-morrow. Note: Have or had been, followed by to, implies movement. "I have been to Paris." --Sydney Smith. "Have you been to Franchard ?" --R. L. Stevenson. Note: Been, or ben, was anciently the plural of the indicative present. "Ye ben light of the world." --Wyclif, Matt. v. 14. Afterwards be was used, as in our Bible: "They that be with us are more than they that be with them." --2 Kings vi. 16. Ben was also the old infinitive: "To ben of such power." --R. of Gloucester. Be is used as a form of the present subjunctive: "But if it be a question of words and names." --Acts xviii. 15. But the indicative forms, is and are, with if, are more commonly used. Be it so, a phrase of supposition, equivalent to suppose it to be so; or of permission, signifying let it be so. --Shak. If so be, in case. To be from, to have come from; as, from what place are you ? I am from Chicago. To let be, to omit, or leave untouched; to let alone. "Let be, therefore, my vengeance to dissuade." --Spenser. Syn: To be, Exist. Usage: The verb to be, except in a few rare case, like that of Shakespeare's "To be, or not to be", is used simply as a copula, to connect a subject with its predicate; as, man is mortal; the soul is immortal. The verb to exist is never properly used as a mere copula, but points to things that stand forth, or have a substantive being; as, when the soul is freed from all corporeal alliance, then it truly exists. It is not, therefore, properly synonymous with to be when used as a copula, though occasionally made so by some writers for the sake of variety; as in the phrase "there exists [is] no reason for laying new taxes." We may, indeed, say, "a friendship has long existed between them," instead of saying, "there has long been a friendship between them;" but in this case, exist is not a mere copula. It is used in its appropriate sense to mark the friendship as having been long in existence.
Be"ing\, p. pr. from Be. Existing. Note: Being was formerly used where we now use having. "Being to go to a ball in a few days." --Miss Edgeworth. Note: In modern usage, is, are, was or were being, with a past participle following (as built, made, etc.) indicates the process toward the completed result expressed by the participle. The form is or was building, in this passive signification, is idiomatic, and, if free from ambiguity, is commonly preferable to the modern is or was being built. The last form of speech is, however, sufficiently authorized by approved writers. The older expression was is, or was, a-building or in building. A man who is being strangled. --Lamb. While the article on Burns was being written. --Froude. Fresh experience is always being gained. --Jowett (Thucyd. )
Be"ing\, n. 1. Existence, as opposed to nonexistence; state or sphere of existence. In Him we live, and move, and have our being. --Acts xvii. 28. 2. That which exists in any form, whether it be material or spiritual, actual or ideal; living existence, as distinguished from a thing without life; as, a human being; spiritual beings. What a sweet being is an honest mind ! --Beau. & Fl. A Being of infinite benevolence and power. --Wordsworth. 3. Lifetime; mortal existence. [Obs.] Claudius, thou Wast follower of his fortunes in his being. --Webster (1654). 4. An abode; a cottage. [Prov. Eng.] --Wright. It was a relief to dismiss them [Sir Roger's servants] into little beings within my manor. --Steele.
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Audio Help [bee-ing] Pronunciation Key 
