the act of dispensing or dealing out; distribution; often used of the distribution of good and evil by god to man, or more generically, of the acts and modes of his administration.-that which is dispensed, dealt out, or appointed; that which is enjoined or bestowed-a system of principles, promises, and rules ordained and administered; scheme; economy; as, the patriarchal, mosaic, and christian dispensations.-the relaxation of a law in a particular case; permission to do something forbidden, or to omit doing something enjoined; specifically, in the roman catholic church, exemption from some ecclesiastical law or obligation to god which a man has incurred of his own free will (oaths, vows, etc.).