Dictionary

fakir en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /fəˈkiɹ/
• /fəˈkɪəɹ/
• /fɑˈkiɹ/
• /ˈfeɪkəɹ/
• (Southern-England) audio

Etymology

Borrowed from Arabic فَقِير (faqīr, “poor man”).

Meanings

1. A religious mendicant who owns no personal property.
2. (Hinduism, qualifier:more loosely) An ascetic mendicant, especially one who performs feats of endurance or apparent magic.
   • The preposterous altruism too![…]Resist not evil. It is an insane immolation of self—as bad intrinsically as fakirs stabbing themselves or anchorites warping their spines in caves scarcely large enough for a fair-sized dog. 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVI, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
3. (derogatory) Someone who takes advantage of the gullible through fakery, especially of a spiritual or religious nature.
   • He was, as the undercover agent concluded, a fabulous raconteur or, as one other person summed him up, "a monumental fakir and liar." 1994, Michael Barry Miller, Shanghai on the Métro: Spies, Intrigue, and the French Between the Wars, Univ of California Press, →ISBN, page 252:
   • "But a stranger who had come up to the group just at this point, when they were pronouncing the soup delicious, laughed aloud. "'What a set of fools you all are!' he cried. 'This tramp is just a fakir. That stone had nothing to do with the soup." 1927, The Rotarian, page 30:
   • From what I hear of him he's a fakir, and I won't encourage him in his attempts to get into society at my expense. 2009, Gelett Burgess, The Heart Line: A Drama of San Francisco, Lulu.com, →ISBN, page 175:
   • He denounces no one until he has all the damaging facts in hand, very frequently backed up with affidavits. He 'Lawsonized' certain stock jobbers and financial fakirs of London before the Boston advertising man was heard of. 1905, Eclectic Magazine, Foreign Literature, Science, and Art:

Forms

Deriveds

fakirism

Translations (51)

fi fakiiri (ascetic mendicant) · et fakiir (ascetic mendicant) · ja 苦行僧 (ascetic mendicant) · hi फकीरन (ascetic mendicant) · cs fakír (ascetic mendicant) · ps دروېش (ascetic mendicant) · ca faquir (ascetic mendicant) · ps فقير (ascetic mendicant) · fr fakir (ascetic mendicant) · it fachiro (ascetic mendicant) · bn ফকির (ascetic mendicant) · hi फ़क़ीर (ascetic mendicant) · ar فَقِير (ascetic mendicant) · tr fakir (ascetic mendicant) · sv fakir (ascetic mendicant) · fa درویش (ascetic mendicant) · uz faqir (ascetic mendicant) · de Fakir (ascetic mendicant) · eo fakiro (ascetic mendicant) · hu fakír (ascetic mendicant) · ug پېقىر (ascetic mendicant) · nl fakir (ascetic mendicant) · ru факи́р (ascetic mendicant) · az fakir (ascetic mendicant) · da fakir (ascetic mendicant) · cmn 苦行僧 (ascetic mendicant) · hi फकीरनी (ascetic mendicant) · ta பக்கிரி (ascetic mendicant) · tt фәкыйрь (ascetic mendicant) · cmn 法基爾 /法基尔 (ascetic mendicant) · pt faquir (ascetic mendicant) · no fakir (ascetic mendicant) · ja 托鉢僧 (ascetic mendicant) · bg факи́р (ascetic mendicant) · pl fakir (ascetic mendicant) · hi फकीर (ascetic mendicant) · mr फकीर (ascetic mendicant) · az fəqir (ascetic mendicant) · hy ֆակիր (ascetic mendicant) · fa فقیر (ascetic mendicant) · id fakir (ascetic mendicant) · mk фа́кир (ascetic mendicant) · ur فقیر (ascetic mendicant) · el φακίρης (ascetic mendicant) · kk пақыр (ascetic mendicant) · tg фақир (ascetic mendicant) · ms fakir (ascetic mendicant) · bn দরবেশ (ascetic mendicant) · tg дарвеш (ascetic mendicant) · ky факир (ascetic mendicant) · es fakir (ascetic mendicant)