In Ps. 15:3, the rendering of a word which means to run about tattling, calumniating; in Prov. 25:23, secret talebearing or slandering; in Rom. 1:30 and 2 Cor. 12:20, evil-speaking, maliciously defaming the absent.
·vi To censure or revile the absent. II. Backbite ·vi To wound by clandestine detraction; to censur...
Webster's Dictionary of the English Language