Is it ok to use convicted as an adjective in this sense?
The word "convicted" is generally used as the following:
"A convicted criminal"
"He was convicted"
However, I wanted to show that someone did something with conviction, in a form like this:
"He did so with convicted purpose."
Is this usage incorrect?
The OED sense 5 of the verb to convict relates to religious conviction. There are no more recent examples than from the seventeenth century.
Although the OED declares the sense obsolete, I can claim to have heard it used by an evangelical Christian to describe someone's realisation of spiritual prompting in the form 'he was suddenly convicted'.
But it is a very outdated mode of speech even among profound evamgelicals I suspect.
- To compel (a person) by proof, argument, etc. to acknowledge an assertion, confess an opinion, etc.; = convince v. 3. Obsolete.
1583 A. Golding tr. J. Calvin Serm. on Deuteronomie vii. 39 The people were conuicted of Gods mighty working in their behalfe.
1598 R. Grenewey tr. Tacitus Annales i. iv. 7 [He would] by his owne confession conuict him, that the Common-wealth was but one bodie.
1646 Sir T. Browne Pseudodoxia Epidemica i. i. 3 He did not indubitably believe, untill he was after convicted in the visible example of Abel. View more context for this quotation
1659 M. Casaubon in J. Dee True & Faithful Relation Spirits Pref. sig. D1v If by that time he be not convicted, he shall have my good will to give it over.