reprehensive

Compare French répréhensif.

reprehensive (comparative more reprehensive, superlative most reprehensive)

1. Containing reprehension or reproof.
   • a. 1717 (date written), Robert South, “(please specify the sermon number)”, in Five Additional Volumes of Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions. […], volume (please specify |volume=VII to XI), London: […] Charles Bathurst, […], published 1744, →OCLC:

     Christ's reply ; in which , by a reprehensive shortness , he both clears the man's innocence , and vindicates God's proceedings , and so states them both upon a right foundation

   • 2012, Paul Caetano, The Enigma of the Sphinx, page 33:

     He stops at Winna's reprehensive stare.

   • 2021, Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2018, page 300:

     By the last two periods of the corpus, indeed, craindre deveolps a reprehensive interpretation, arising with certain specific contextual factors to yield a flavor of reproach (or apology).

2. Reprehensible.
   • 1948, United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on the Judiciary, Limitation of Venue in Certain Actions Brought Under the Employers' Liability Act, page 199:

     Well, there would not be anything particularly reprehensive in a plaintiff wanting to go to a forum where the verdict would be larger.

   • 1963 January, “The Color of God”, in Ebony, volume 18, number 3, page 82:

     But today in South Africa, a Black Christ is politically offensive; today in England a Black God is theatrically reprehensive; today in the United States, the only white-approved dark deity is Marc Connelly's De Lawd.

   • 2024, Arie de Pater and Ville Hoikkala, “Free Speech under Threat in Finland and Beyond?”, in Evangelical Review of Theology, volume 48, number 1, page 9:

     She added, 'Räsänen claims homosexuality is a negative and reprehensive personal attribute and identity, and that all homosexuals are inferior as human beings.'

• reprehensively