Emily Dickinson Lexicon

Gentile, proper adj. [Fr. < L. 'nation'.]

Christian; converted; no longer of the Jewish tradition; [lit.] European; Roman and Greek; of the Indo-European nations neighboring the Middle East; [irony] pagan; heathen; heretical; infidel; blasphemous; worldly; [word play on “gentle”] kind; Christ-like; [epithet] “the Gentile Drinker” possibly the emperor Constantine, whose mother Helena gathered relics from the Holy Land and brought them to Rome.