lust

Origin:
before 900; Middle English luste, Old English lust; cognate with Dutch, German lust pleasure, desire; akin to Old Norse lyst desire; see list⁴

Related forms

un·lust·ing, adjective

Synonyms
7. crave, hunger, covet, yearn.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2013.
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Link To lust

Collins

World English Dictionary

lust (lʌst)

—n
1.	a strong desire for sexual gratification
2.	a strong desire or drive

—vb
3.	(intr; often foll by after or for) to have a lust (for)

[Old English; related to Old High German lust desire, Old Norse losti sexual desire, Latin lascīvus playful, wanton, lustful. Compare listless]

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

lust

O.E. lust "desire, pleasure," from P.Gmc. *lustuz (cf. O.S., O.Fris., Du., Ger. lust, O.N. lyst, Goth. lustus "pleasure, desire, lust"), from PIE *las- "to be eager, wanton, or unruly" (cf. L. lascivus "wanton, playful, lustful;" see lascivious). In M.E., "any source

of pleasure or delight," also "an appetite," also "a liking for a person," also "fertility" (of soil). Sense of "sinful sexual desire, degrading animal passion" (now the main meaning) developed in late O.E. from the word's use in Bible translations (e.g. lusts of the flesh to render L. concupiscentia carnis [I John ii 16]); in other Germanic languages, the cognate words tend to still mean simply "pleasure." The verb is first attested early 13c., "to please, delight;" sense of "to have a strong sexual desire (for or after)" is first attested 1520s in biblical use.

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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American Heritage

Abbreviations & Acronyms

LUST
leaking underground storage tanks

Easton

Bible Dictionary

Lust definition

sinful longing; the inward sin which leads to the falling away from God (Rom. 1:21). "Lust, the origin of sin, has its place in the heart, not of necessity, but because it is the centre of all moral forces and impulses and of spiritual activity." In Mark 4:19 "lusts" are objects of desire.

Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary
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Example sentences

Greed is the lust for money that causes one to do immoral things to get it.

Music nuts lust after spatial sound: output so precise you can pinpoint each

instrument's location in the recording hall.

The next generation of battlefield weapons might be bombs that make enemy

soldiers fall in lust with each other.

But he delivered it in a ragged, world-weary voice, in a larger context of

angry lust and self-loathing.

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deadly sins elemental hunger lascivious lechery lewd

Matching Quote

"Love has meaning only insofar as it includes the idea of its continuance. Even what we rather glibly call a love affair, if it comes to an end, may continue as a memory that is pleasing in our lives; we can renew the sense of privilege and reward of having been allowed such intimacy and sharing. But Lust dies at the next dawn, and when it returns in the evening, to search where it may, it is with its own past erased. Love wants to enjoy in other ways the human being whom it has enjoyed in bed; it looks forward to having breakfast. But in the morning Lust is always furtive. It dresses as mechanically as it undressed and heads straight for the door, to return to its own solitude."

-Henry Fairlie