Other forms: devils
The devil is the chief evil spirit, or a wicked person. The devil himself, a devil of a job, poor devil.
In everyday English it is mostly idiom rather than theology: the devil is in the detail, speak of the devil, between the devil and the deep blue sea. Poor devil is sympathetic and a devil of a job simply means hard. Note that the Greek behind it means slanderer or false accuser.
1noundevilThe chief evil spirit.
“In the old story, the man sold his soul to the devil in return for riches.”
2nounwickedA wicked or unfortunate person.
“The poor devil lost his job and his house in the same month.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
devil is an evil spirit, or a person.
Old English deofol comes from Latin diabolus, from Greek diabolos, a slanderer — dia plus ballein, to throw across.
Middle English
devel
English, today
devil
Built from
From Middle English devel. From Middle English devil, devel, deovel, from Old English dēofol, from Proto-West Germanic diubul, from Latin diabolus, ultimately from Ancient Greek διάβολος (“false accuser, slanderer”), also as "Satan" (in Jewish/Christian usage, translating hbo שָׂטָן), from διαβάλλω (“to slander”), literally “to throw across”, from διά (“through, across”) + βάλλω (“throw”). The Old English word was probably adopted under influence of diabolus (itself from the Greek). Other Germanic languages adopted the word independently: compare stq Düüwel (“devil”), West Frisian duvel (“devil”), Dutch duivel, duvel (“devil”), German Low German Düvel (“devil”), German Teufel (“devil”), bar Teifl (“devil”), Danish djævel (“devil”), Swedish djävul (“devil”) (older: djefvul, gmq-osw diævul, Old Norse djǫfull). a doublet of diable and diablo and diabolus.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA