Forfeit (Hastings' Dictionary)

From Old French forfait or forfet after late Latin forisfactum, a trespass, or tone (Lat. foris without, and facere to do), a ' forfeit ' was originally an act outside of rigliteou.sness, and ' to forueit ' was to act unrighteously, to sin. Thus IJerners, Froissnrt, I. cccc.\.\xi. ' Sir, ye know well the Flemings that he yonder have done us no forfeit' ; and Chaucer, Parsones Tale, 275 (Student's ed. p. 682"), ' And al this suflred Jesu Crist, that neuere forfeited.'

From this the mean- ing passed early into the expression of a penalty due for transgression, a fine ; and the veru came to signify to lose, or lose the right to, something, a meaning in which both subst. and vb. are still used. But in its only occurrence in AV the vh. ' forfeit ' (the subst. is not found) is used with direct reference to the authority or executi\Tj power to confiscate ; and in that sense it is marked by 0j7'. Enrj.

Diet, as obsolete : Ezr 10' 'And that whosoever would not come within three days, according to the counsel of tlie princes and the ehlers, all his substance should he for- feited ' (c"!r;;, A Vm and KVm ' devoted '). Cf. Dn '2* Wye. (1382), 'your housis shuln be maad comiMoun or forfctid.' UV introduces ' forfeit' into Dt 22' ' Thou slialt not sow thy vineyard with two kinds of seed ; lest the wliole Iruit be forfeited ' (u'-pn, AV ' defiled,' KVm ' consecrated ' ; Uriver, ' lit.

become holtj or .inrrrd, i.e. be forfeited In the sanctuary'); Mt 10-", .Mk 8^ 'forfeit his life' {{nuiuSii T^)l' i'vxv" auTou, AV ' lose his own sotil ') ; and Lk 9^ 'and lose or forfeit his own self {iavrir 5i diroX^ffds ■!) fTj/iicjflc/s, AV 'he cast away'). In the remaining occurrences of frj^ioCv (1 Co 3'*, 2 Co 7", Ph 38), RV renders ' eufler loss.' J. Ha.stincs.