Predestination, n.
Etymology: [L. praedestinatio: cf. F. prédestination.]
1. The act of predestinating. Predestination had overruled their will. Milton.
2. (Theol.)
The purpose of Good from eternity respecting all events; especially, the preordination of men to everlasting happiness or misery. See Calvinism.
Shades of meaning
Predestination is a previous determination or decision, which, in the divine action, reaches on from eternity. Fate is heathen, an irresistible, irrational power determining all events with no manifest connection with reason or righteousness; necessity is philosophical, a blind something in the nature of things binding the slightest action or motion in the chain of inevitable, eternal sequence; foreordination and predestination are Christian, denoting the rational and righteous order or decree of the supreme and all-wise God. Foreknowledge is simply God's antecedent knowledge of all events, which some hold to be entirely separable from his foreordination, while others hold foreordination to be inseparably involved in foreknowledge.
Prepositions
Predestination of believers to eternal life.