Noun

Singular evangelist

Plural evangelists

evangelist (plural evangelists)

1. (Christianity) An itinerant or special preacher, especially a revivalist.
2. A preacher of the gospel.
3. A writer of a gospel, especially the four New Testament Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), usually Evangelist.
4. (primitive Church) A person who first brought the gospel to a city or region.
5. (Mormon Church) A patriarch
6. A person marked by extreme enthusiasm for or support of any cause, particularly with regard to religion.
   • 1992, J. D. Douglas, Who's Who in Christian History, ISBN 0842310142, p. 94.

     Booth, William (1829-1912) English evangelist; founder and first general of the Salvation Army ... his subordinates being expected to give him unquestioning obedience.

   • 1994, Frank Lambert, "Pedlar in Divinity", ISBN 0691096163, p. 10.

     Yet in the spreading consumer market of the mid-1700s, his renditions competed with others offering a far different account of the evangelist and his message. The famous artist William Hogarth mocked Whitefield in two engravings presenting the revivalist as a religious fanatic who held sway over the superstitious lower orders.

   • 1996, Peter J. Conn, Pearl S. Buck: A Cultural Biography, ISBN 0521639891, p. 149.

     The film implies that the evangelist, as a type, is a fanatic, a sanctimonious prig, and ultimately a hypocrite.

Related terms

• angel
• angelic
• evangelize
• televangelist

Evangelist can refer to:

Religion

• one of the Four Evangelists, the authors of the canonical Christian Gospels in the New Testament
• a Christian who explains his or her beliefs to a non-Christian and thereby participates in Evangelism
• Evangelist (Latter Day Saints), an office in the ministry of certain denominations in the Latter Day Saint movement
  • Presiding Patriarch, a leadership office in certain Latter Day Saint denominations that may also be referred to as the Presiding Evangelist
  • Quorum of Seventy Evangelists, a leadership body in The Church of Jesus Christ (Bickertonite)
• Evangelicalism, Christian theological view emphasizing personal conversion and the authority of the Bible

Other

• The Evangelists, a 1992 play by Romanian author Alina Mungiu-Pippidi
• The Evangelists (band), an Irish rock band
• The Three Evangelists, a 1995 award-winning novel by French author Fred Vargas