hypostasis

plural hypostases · plural hypostaseis

1. archaiccountableuncountablemedicineA sedimentary deposit, especially in urine.First known use 14th c.

   Thus the kidneys also have their particular excrement which is contained in it and is the hypostasis (deposit).

   1999, Paracelsus, “Opus Paramirum”, in Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, transl., Essential Readings, North Atlantic Books, page 92

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   Phi[sitian]. I view’d your vrine, and the Hipoſtates ^([sic – meaning Hipoſtaſis]) / Thick and obſcure doth make your danger great, […]

   c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The Second Part […], 2nd edition, part 2, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act V, scene vi

2. countableuncountablelifestyleThe essential person, specifically the single person of Christ (as distinguished from his ‘nature(s)’, human and divine), or of the three ‘persons’ of the Trinity (sharing a single ‘essence’).First known use 16th c.

   the hypostases of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

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   What did the God who hammered the universe together have to do with virtue, redemption, the strange doctrine of hypostasis?

   1985 September 1, Anthony Burgess, The Kingdom of the Wicked, London: Hutchinson & Co., →ISBN

   As Gregory of Nyssa had explained, the three hypostases of Father, Son, and Spirit were not objective facts but simply “terms that we use” to express the way in which the “unnameable and unspeakable” divine nature (ousia) adapts itself to the limitations of our human minds.

   2000, Karen Armstrong, The Battle for God, Harper, published 2004, page 69

   As a result of this verbal pact, the Trinity consists of three equal hypostaseis in one ousia: three equal Persons (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) sharing one Essence or Substance (Trinity or Godhead).

   2009, Diarmaid MacCulloch, A History of Christianity, Penguin, published 2010, page 218

3. countableuncountablehuman sciencesThe underlying reality or substance of something.First known use 17th c.

   The One, Intellect and Soul, then, are the three transcendent sources – or hypostases – of existence.

   1999, John Gregory, editor, The Neoplatonists: A Reader, page 13

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   Rašnu, the "Judge", appears to be the hypostasis of the idea embodied in the common noun rašnu, "judging, one who judges".

   1975, Mary Boyce, History of Zoroastrianism, volume I, Brill, page 59

   as far as we know, Porphyry did not consider the divine intellect to be a hypostasis clearly distinct from the Soul, but he often designated it ‘hypercosmic soul’.

   2006, George E. Karamanolis, Plato and Aristotle in agreement?, page 320

   1. countableuncountablehuman sciencesA relationship between a name and a known quantity, as a cultural personification (i.e. objectification with personality) of an entity or quality.
   2. countableuncountablehuman sciencesReferring to the hypostatic model of personality; i.e., asserting that humans present themselves in many different aspects or hypostases, depending on the internal and external realities they relate to, including different approaches to the study of personality.
4. countableuncountablebiologyThe effect of one gene preventing another from expressing.First known use 20th c.

   When penetrance is suppressed altogether, the term ‘epistasis’ (and ‘hypostasis’ of the suppressed gene) is used.

   1997, Vogul & Motulsky, Human Genetics: Problems and Approaches, page 141

5. countableuncountablePostmortem lividity; livor mortis; suggillation.

   I am, of course, excluding the hypostasis produced by his having lain a whole week face downward in the cellar. That, naturally, is all in the front part of the body.

   1937, Dorothy L. Sayers, Busman's Honeymoon