benefit [ME] The source of benefit is Latin benefactum, ‘a good deed’, and that was the original meaning in English. The Latin is from bene ‘well’ and facere ‘to do’. The ordinary modern sense is recorded from the early 16th century, while the sense ‘a performance to raise money for a cause’ is late 17th century. To give someone the benefit of the doubt (recorded from the mid 19th century, but probably earlier) originally meant to give a verdict of not guilty when the evidence was not conclusive.