What does ' we are of ' mean on the mentioned sentence?

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jesicaporter

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Hello Teachers,
In the below sentence :
We are of different religions, but we have similar spiritual beliefs and values.
What is the meaning of 'we are of '?
I couldn't find the phrase on dictionary.
I am not a native english speaker, so how can i find out what does the phrase mean?
Please help,thanks in advanced.
 

charliedeut

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Hi,

"We profess different faiths/religions", that is, for example: "I'm a Catholic, you're a Presbyterian, Ahmed is a Muslim and Rizwan is a Buddhist, but we have similar spiritual beliefs and values".

charliedeut
 

jesicaporter

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Hello,
Thanks for your reply.
But i know what is the right meaning of' having different religions',my main mean of posted the question was :
what is the meaning of 'we are of ' ?
Why use 'we are of' instead of 'we have'?
And 'we are of' is the constant phrase that can be use all the time as a " be + of " ?
 

tzfujimino

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Hello,
Thanks for your reply.
But i know what is the right meaning of' having different religions',my main mean of posted the question was :
what is the meaning of 'we are of ' ?
Why use 'we are of' instead of 'we have'?
And 'we are of' is the constant phrase that can be use all the time as a " be + of " ?

Hello, jesicaporter.:-D
Please see the definition #9 here: Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary
And...#3 here of - Definition and pronunciation | Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary at OxfordLearnersDictionaries.com

I hope those links will help you sort out your problems.:-D
 

jesicaporter

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Hello, tzfujimin
Sorry for my question,but i need to understand somethings in a resonable way.
And Really thanks for your informative answer,that was great,helpful,best,perfect,understandable answer
Thanks alot again. :)
You are BEST Teacher who i have ever seen him/her...
 

5jj

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Sorry for my question,spacebut [STRIKE]i[/STRIKE]I need to understand somespacethings in a reasonable way.
And [STRIKE]R[/STRIKE]really thanks for your informative answer,spacethat was a great,spacehelpfulspace,best,perfectspace,understandable answer.
Thanks aspacelot again. :)
You are BEST [STRIKE]T[/STRIKE]teacher who [STRIKE]i[/STRIKE]I have ever seen. [STRIKE]him/her..[/STRIKE].
Start working on your written English, jesicaporter.

Begin each sentence with a capital letter.
Use a capital letter for the first person pronoun 'I'.
Leave a space after each punctuation mark.
 

JMurray

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For me, the more appropriate definitions in the links that tzfujimino has provided are #2 in both cases. I think the meaning of "we are of different religions" is similar to "we are members of different teams".

not a teacher
 

jesicaporter

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Certainly 5jj,
I think my writing make you angry.I am really sorry about it.
Thanks a lot for your help my great teacher. :)
I will try to do that in a better way.
 

jesicaporter

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For me, the more appropriate definitions in the links that tzfujimino has provided are #2 in both cases. I think the meaning of "we are of different religions" is similar to "we are members of different teams".

not a teacher


I agree with you too.I think what you and tzfujimino said have a similar meaning.
 

5jj

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I think my writing makes you angry.spaceI am really sorry about it.
Your writing does not make me angry, and there is no need to apologise for making mistakes. We are all here to learn, and some of us are able to help a little.
 

tzfujimino

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Hello, again.:-D
As you may know, I'm not a native speaker of English. JMurray is.
JM has a better grasp of the English language.:-D
 

jesicaporter

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One of the most basic forms in English is, "to be". "to be" indicates a certain state. "are" is the plural version of "to be". In the old language, a person could say, "I be", as in, "I be a sailor". This has changed and now a person would say, "I am a sailor". If there is more than one person involved in this, they could say, "we are sailors". You could read this to say that, of all possible states, our state of being is that of a sailor. A person could also be a dancer, a husband, a drunkard, or an officer of the law, but, at this point, he is calling himself a sailor.

"We are" is not the same as "we have". "We have" points to possessions, things that owned by a person or persons. You could say that we have religion in the sense that we possess religious ideas. We don't possess a state of being, we don't own what we are. "I am a man", points to a fact, this is my state of being. I have a car is different in that this points to my possessions.

We are (our state of being) of (read this to mean, members of, or, we belong, or, subscribe to) different religions...


Wow!Really perfect.Thanks so much.Extremely informative answer.
I am so confused on tense in English language.
Is it possible for you to help me on the below post:
https://www.usingenglish.com/forum/ask-teacher/175233-why-we-use-past-perfect-two-mini-story.html
 
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