goy

noun

ˈgȯi 

plural goyim ˈgȯi-əm  also goys

sometimes disparaging

: a non-Jewish person : gentile sense 1

Our rabbi … used to tell us not to let the goyim, those people outside the invisible wall, know if we had any differences among ourselves.

—Nat Hentoff

… what we Jews call Torah and goys call the Old Testament …

—Robert Little

goyish

ˈgȯi-ish 

adjective sometimes disparaging

Jewish or goyish was the grand bifurcation of the universe. If, on rare occasion, my parent uttered a sentence that did not contain the word "Jewish," odds were it contained "goyish" instead.

—Aaron Lansky

"What kind of a name is Rosemary?" asked one of the girls … "It is a goyish name … Do you mean to say your best friend is not a Jew?"

—Jane Yolen

goyishness noun sometimes disparaging

Renee is a lapsed Orthodox Jew trying to embrace the life of the mind amid the "genteel goyishness" of Princeton.

—Frances Taliaferro

Word History

Etymology

Yiddish, from Hebrew gōy people, nation

First Known Use

1841, in the meaning defined above