A vivid, often demonstrative feeling of great happiness or delight, frequently welling up and expressing itself outwardly..
A vivid, often demonstrative feeling of great happiness or delight, frequently welling up and expressing itself outwardly.
Higher and more exalted than happiness, and unlike that broad life-state, joy rises up and shows itself (“jump for joy”). Often used for a deep or spiritual fulfilment independent of circumstance. Broader and deeper than delight (a reaction to one specific thing), warmer and more active than serene bliss, more dignified than impish glee. Note: joy can take a darker object (joy at a rival's downfall) where gladness cannot.
c. 1200, from Old French joie, from Latin gaudia (plural of gaudium) “joy,” from gaudere “to rejoice,” from PIE *gau- “to rejoice.”
The noun sense has been stable for roughly 800 years. The native verb “to joy” (rejoice) was once common but is now archaic, displaced by enjoy and rejoice. No reliable recent-generation shift is sourced.