Definition of "hypostasis" in English

noun

1. (medicine, now historical) A sedimentary deposit, especially in urine.

2. (theology) The essential person, specifically the single person of Christ (as distinguished from his two ‘natures’, human and divine), or of the three ‘persons’ of the Trinity (sharing a single ‘essence’).

   • the hypostases of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

3. (philosophy) The underlying reality or substance of something.

4. (genetics) The effect of one gene preventing another from expressing.

5. Postmortem lividity; livor mortis; suggillation.