2. Belonging to, characteristic of, or constituting another and very different place, society, or person; strange. See Synonyms at foreign. 3. Dissimilar, inconsistent, or opposed, as in nature: emotions alien to her temperament.
n, pl -thens or -then. 1. (Alternative Belief Systems) a person who does not acknowledge the God of Christianity, Judaism, or Islam; pagan. 2. an uncivilized or barbaric person. 3. (Alternative Belief Systems) the heathen (functioning as plural) heathens collectively.
Sentence Examples. Â» more... Most of the inhabitants continued heathens until, according to the legend, Salsa, a Christian maiden, threw the head of their serpent idol into the sea, whereupon the enraged populace stoned her to death. Heathens felt in the religion of Israel an escape from their growing scepticism, and a solution to the problem of life.