verb
be (highly irregular; see conjugation table)
As an auxiliary verb:
As a copulative verb:
As an intransitive lexical verb:
Examples
The dog was saved by the boy.
Study courses of Esperanto and Ido have been broadcast.
The woman is walking.
I shall be writing to you soon.
We liked to chat while we were eating.
In the possibility of radio uses of a constructed language — and such experiments are proving successful—vast sums of money and untold social forces may be involved.
I am to leave tomorrow.
They are to stay here until I return.
The season opener was to have been on Monday.
How were they to know the whole exercise was a ruse?
They were to have been married overseas but COVID forced a change of plans.
He is finished
He is gone
He is come
They are not yet come back.instead of the modern They have not yet come back.
instead of the modern They have not yet come back.
And he cryed mightily with a strõg voyce, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of deuils […]
‘I wish that he were come to me, / For he will come,’ she said.
He is not here; for he is risen […].
The King with half the East at heel is marched from lands of morning;
I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita: Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and, to impress him, he takes on his multi-armed form and says, "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." I suppose we all thought that, one way or another.
His origins are become remote as is his destiny and not again in all the world’s turning will there be terrains so wild and barbarous to try whether the stuff of creation may be shaped to man’s will or whether his own heart is not another kind of clay.
Women be shoppin’! You cannot stop a woman from shoppin’!
Niggas be tellin' these bitches 'bout business
There is just one woman in town who can help us.
It is just one woman in town who can help us.
Some men there are loue not a gaping Pigge: / Some that are mad, if they behold a Cat: / And others, when the bag-pipe sings i’th nose, / Cannot containe their Vrine for affection.
"There is a sort of domestic enjoyment to be known even in a crowd, and this you had."
"There has been lots of commentary on who is staying and who is staying out and this weekend will be the real test," said one senior media buying agency executive who has pulled the advertising for one major client.
Hi, I’m Jim.
3 times 5 is fifteen.
These four are the ones going to the quarter-finals.
François Mitterrand was president of France from 1981 to 1995.
This is how we do it.
Rex is a dog.
A dog is an animal.
Dogs are animals.
The sky is blue.
Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.
The sky is a deep blue today.
This building is three hundred years old.
I am 75 kilograms.
He’s about 6 feet tall.
I’m 20 .
It is almost eight .
It’s 8:30 [read eight-thirty] in Tokyo.
What time is it there? It’s night.
It has been three years since my grandmother died.
It had been six days since his departure, when I received a letter from him.
I saw her Monday was a week: I saw her a week ago last Monday .
On the morning of Sunday was fortnight before Christmas: on the morning of the Sunday that was two weeks before the Sunday prior to Christmas.
Miss Lardner saw you at St James's church on Sunday was fortnight.
And so, without as much as to return home to furnish myself for such a journey, volens, nolens, they prevailed, or rather forced me to come to Dublin to confer with those colonels, and that was the last August was twelvemonth.
That they were present at the Election in August was Twelvemonth, at which there was the strictest Scrutiny that ever they saw in their Lives, by all the Four Candidates.
Allow me to recommend some of the kipper—It was John Hay that catched it Saturday was three weeks.
“Did there come no young woman here—very young and pretty—Friday was a fortnight, to see Dinah Morris?”
'Twas there to-morrow is a week.
I killed my poor father, Tuesday was a week, for doing the like of that.
Theobald Green gent dead in the Marshalsea in August was twelvemonth
John Grey gent delivered out of the Marshalsea about August last by Mr. Secretary and remains in St. Mary Overies.
John Jacob gent delivered out of the Marsh. the XVII of May was twelvemonth and sent to Bridewell by order of the Council.
It is hot in Arizona, but it is not usually humid.
Why is it so dark in here?
"When I get sad, I stop being sad and be awesome instead."
"What do we do?" "We be ourselves."
When I play fantasy games, I always be a gnome.
Why is he being nice to me?
The Universe has no explanation: it just is.
That was the week that was.
Rachel wepynge ffor her chyldren / and wolde nott be comforted becauſe they were not.
To be, or not to be: that is the question: / Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer / The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, / Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, / And by opposing end them?
[…] it were great sottishnesse, and apparent false-hood, to say, that that is which is not yet in being, or that already hath ceased from being.
There is surely a peece of Divinity in us, something that was before the Elements, and owes no homage unto the Sun.
And after this death there is to be no resurrection. The old man of sin has ceased to be; once crucified, he lives no more. The death is utter; the end complete.
This parrot is no more! It has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet its maker! This is a late parrot! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed it to the perch it would be pushing up the daisies!
The genial hotel manager of the past is no more. Now owner of a trucking concern and living in Belgium, Rusesabagina says the horrors he witnessed in Rwanda "made me a different man."
Let them be for a few hours.
Leave us be until the guests arrive.
The cup is on the table.
When will the meeting be?
The postman has been today, but my tickets have still not yet come.
I have been to Spain many times.
We've been about twenty miles.
I have terrible constipation – I haven't been for several days.
They have been through a great deal of trouble.
Related words
synonyms
(to exist): See also Thesaurus:exist
(used to form passive): get
Etimology
A variant of by which goes back to Middle English be (variant of Middle English bi).
preposition
be
(dialectal, possibly dated) Alternative form of by. Also found in compounds, especially oaths, e.g. begorra.
Examples
O ful tru un pertikler akeawnt o... th' greyt Eggshibishun. Be o felley fro Rachde.
Go thy way vorth be tha vootsteps uv tha vlock.
Aw teuk me seat be day an' neet.
Fetchin' it yan... be a round about rooad.
Like a leeaf be firm decree / Mun fade an' fall.
‘I'll meet you agin to-morra,’ says he, ‘be the chapel-door.’
Etimology
Borrowed from Russian бэ (bɛ).
noun
be (plural bes)
The name of the Cyrillic script letter Б / б.