To find the meaning of an unknown word you should look at the 'contextual clues' provided by the words that are around it.
To really know a word, you must be able to use it 'in context'. [=in a sentence with other words]
When taken 'out of context', his comments sound cruel, but he was really only joking.
(..) What was it? Years ago, your father and I were recruited for a project. Biological warfare. A virus. What killed those men? Something l won't even write about. We have no context for what it is. Or any appreciation of the scale at which it will be unleashed. A plague? The plague to end all plagues. (..)1998 The X Files