I am

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jump to navigation Jump to search
See also: iam, IAM, i-am, -iam, and Iam

English[edit]

Etymology[edit]

Originally after Biblical usage (Exodus 3:14), translating Hebrew אֶהְיֶה ('ehyeh).

Proper noun[edit]

I am

  1. God, seen as self-sufficient and self-existent.
    • 1611, The Holy Bible, [] (King James Version), London: [] Robert Barker, [], →OCLC, Exodus 3:14:
      And God said unto Moses, I Am That I Am: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I Am hath sent me unto you.
    • 1817, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Biographia Literara, I.13:
      The primary imagination I hold to be the living Power and prime Agent of all human Perception, and as a repetition in the finite mind of the eternal act of creation in the infinite I AM.
  2. (colloquial, frequently with great) A self-centred, arrogant person.
    • 2003, Alasdair Gray, “Miss Kincaid's Autumn”, in Every Short Story, Canongate, published 2012, page 751:
      Joe entered and said, ‘Dinner-time. The Great I Am upstairs has grudgingly assented to oxtail soup, bangers and mash, tinned peaches with ice cream.’

Interjection[edit]

I am something or someone

  1. Indicates solidarity or a support of a shared conviction with the person or object upon which a perceived injustice is being inflicted.
    I am Charlie Hebdo!
    I am Spartacus!

Antonyms[edit]

Related terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

Anagrams[edit]