How to Use filial in a Sentence

filial

adjective
  • This was hero worship on steroids, with a strong filial twist.
    — James Marcus, The New Yorker, 11 Oct. 2021
  • How could there not be both pride and shame at the heart of this filial difference?
    — James Wood, New Yorker, 3 Nov. 2025
  • To find answers means more truth, less filial piety, and God knows how much more time.
    — Vinson Cunningham, The New Yorker, 30 May 2022
  • Chung felt the pangs of filial guilt and went to her trailer and apologized.
    — E. Alex Jung, Vulture, 1 Mar. 2021
  • The fact that both hero and villain look the same adds an extra layer of filial angst to the story.
    — Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 7 Nov. 2025
  • Those who do not marry—mostly men—will shoulder this filial burden alone.
    — Nicholas Eberstadt, Foreign Affairs, 7 Apr. 2021
  • That filial love is universal and the only way life persists.
    — National Geographic, 9 Oct. 2017
  • Walter Wang, who was one of his two sons, described feeling a kind of filial duty.
    — Lindsey Choo, Forbes, 11 Oct. 2024
  • But the single dark eye that’s not in shadow glistens with filial affection.
    — Sebastian Smee, Washington Post, 17 June 2023
  • There is also the filial aspect of caring for your elders in my tradition.
    — Sahaj Kaur Kohli, Washington Post, 19 Mar. 2026
  • Their noses touch in bed at night, and what courses between them is platonic, romantic, filial all at once.
    — Doreen St. Félix, The New Yorker, 16 June 2019
  • Only in this filial saga, the redemption never happens, the hero never shows up.
    — Jacob S. Hacker, Washington Post, 1 Aug. 2019
  • Besides filial duty, an election loss might have ruined the Ivanka brand.
    — Nina Burleigh, Newsweek, 1 Feb. 2017
  • Rarely has such a fevered outpouring of filial rage and a son’s hopeless love been channeled into one brief document.
    — Francine Prose, WSJ, 12 July 2018
  • Ah, the question that haunts the halls of greed, despair, self-worth, parental acceptance, filial devotion and how much is enough.
    — Neil Senturia, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 June 2023
  • Like a dorsal fin poking over the waves, their filial conflicts suggest the story’s dark undertow.
    — Jesse Green, New York Times, 10 Aug. 2023
  • Stevens is dutiful above all else, choosing his vocation over love, both romantic and filial.
    — Rumaan Alam, The New Republic, 12 Apr. 2021
  • Jay felt the project was too raw and vulnerable for his brand, and was unmoved by Peter’s appeal to his filial duty.
    — David Ehrlich, IndieWire, 28 Aug. 2025
  • One or multiple of his minions and peers—filial or otherwise—confront him on the battlefield.
    — Lauren Puckett-Pope, ELLE, 26 Mar. 2023
  • Westover is a keen and honest guide to the difficulties of filial love, and to the enchantment of embracing a life of the mind.
    — Rachel Aviv, The New Yorker, 17 Apr. 2018
  • That trustworthiness isn’t confined to the filial and social circles.
    — Jon Michail, Forbes, 24 June 2022
  • Paveena, founder and chairwoman of her own foundation, said that any young child asked by her parents to get married would agree out of filial devotion.
    — Eileen Ng, The Seattle Times, 2 July 2018
  • This is a hope that is fully in accord with the filial respect that faithful Catholics owe the Holy Father.
    — Daniel J. Mahoney, National Review, 6 Feb. 2020
  • This is highlighted even more by the way Mishima draws attention to the filial bond in the penultimate sentence.
    — Michael Brendan Dougherty, National Review, 7 Sep. 2020
  • The sons of both men were later elected to Congress, adding filial codicils to what had been a fraternal contract.
    — Kevin Mahnken, The New Republic, 1 Sep. 2020
  • In a show of filial piety, Meiling finally gives up her pursuit and wishes her mother happiness.
    — The Economist, 14 Sep. 2019
  • These kaleidoscopic turns in filial dynamics leave you eager to see where Franzen takes his family saga next.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 30 Sep. 2021
  • Both tell stories of filial piety, of conservative personal missions that are bound up with Zionism.
    — Daniel Drake, The New York Review of Books, 5 Nov. 2022
  • My brothers, meanwhile, were clever, sensitive boys, who had already accrued a bank of happy filial memories.
    — Ed Caesar, The New Yorker, 17 Oct. 2020
  • Navigating filial piety as a child in Vietnam and a parent in America.
    — Oanh Ngo Usadi, Washington Post, 7 May 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'filial.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: