CANNONICAL

Ca*non"ic, Can*non"ic*al, a Etym: [L. cannonicus, LL. canonicalis, fr. L. canon: cf. F. canonique. See canon.]

Definition: Of or pertaining to a canon; established by, or according to a , canon or canons. "The oath of canonical obedience." Hallam. Canonical books, or Canonical Scriptures, those books which are declared by the canons of the church to be of divine inspiration; -- called collectively the canon. The Roman Catolic Church holds as canonical several books which Protestants reject as apocryphal.

– Canonical epistles, an appellation given to the epistles called also general or catholic. See Catholic epistles, under Canholic.

– Canonical form (Math.), the simples or most symmetrical form to which all functions of the same class can be reduced without lose of generality.

– Canonical hours, certain stated times of the day, fixed by ecclesiastical laws, and appropriated to the offices of prayer and devotion; also, certain portions of the Breviary, to be used at stated hours of the day. In England, this name is also given to the hours from 8 a. m. to 3 p. m. (formerly 8 a. m. to 12 m.) before and after which marriage can not be legally performed in any parish church.

– Canonical letters, letters of several kinds, formerly given by a dishop to traveling clergymam or laymen, to show that they were entitled to receive the cammunion, and to distinguish them from heretics.

– Canonical life, the method or rule of living prescribed by the ancient cleargy who lived in community; a course of living prescribed for the clergy, less rigid that the monastic, and more restrained that the secular.

– Canonical obedience, submission to the canons of a canons of a church, especially the submission of the inferior cleargy to their bishops, and of other religious orders to their supriors.

– Canonical punishments, such as the church may inflict, as excommunication, degradation, penance, etc.

– Canonical sins (Anc. Church.), those for which capital punishment or puplic penance decreed by the canon was inflicted, as idolatry, murder, adultery, heresy.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition