Ad`o*na"i (?), n. [Heb. adOnAi, lit., my lord.]
A Hebrew name for God, usually translated in the Old Testament by the word "Lord".
⇒ The later Jews used its vowel points to fill out the tetragrammaton Yhvh, or Ihvh, "the incommunicable name," and in reading substituted "Adonai".
© Webster 1913