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''Pharisee'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260331180822-00-⌔

Pharisee - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Noun

Pharisee (plural Pharisees)

  • (historical) A member of an ancient Jewish political party, a social movement, and a school of thought among Jews that flourished during the Second Temple Era (536 B.C.E. –70 C.E.). The movement was ultimately the basis for most contemporary forms of Judaism.
    • ✤ Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees.1
    • ✤ I cannot tell. They[Jews]are always doing it. The Pharisees, for instance, say that there are angels, and the Sadducees declare that angels do not exist.2
  • (figuratively, by extension; derogatory) A person who values the letter of the law over its spirit or intention.
    • ✤ He was, and is yet most likely, the wearisomest self-righteous Pharisee that ever ransacked a Bible to rake the promises to himself and fling the curses to his neighbours.3
    • ✤ The spider fattens himself on flies, and the Pharisee has his reward. Foolish persons are easily entrapped by the loud professions of pretenders, and even the more judicious cannot always escape.4
    • ✤ The Pharisees of the bourgeoisie love the saying: de mortuis aut bene aut nihil (speak none ill of the dead). The proletariat needs the truth both about living politicians and about the dead for those who truly merit the name of politician do not die for politics when their physical demise comes.5

Etymology

From Latin Pharisaeus, from Ancient Greek Φαρισαῖος (Pharisaîos), a transliteration of Aramaic פְּרִישַׁיָּא (pərîšayyâ’), emphatic plural of פְּרִישׁ (pərîš, “separatist”, literally “separated”), related to Hebrew פרוש (parush), qal passive participle of the verb פָּרַשׁ (pāraš), meaning one who is separated for a life of purity.

Pronunciation

  • (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /ˈfɛɹɪsiː/
  • Audio (Southern England): 🔊
  • (General American) IPA: /ˈfɛɹɪsi/
  • Rhymes: -ɛəɹɪsi

Printed 2026-06-28.

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Footnotes

  1. 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC: ↩

  2. 1904, Oscar Wilde, Salomé: ↩

  3. 1847 December, Ellis Bell [pseudonym; Emily Brontë], “chapter III”, in Wuthering Heights: […], volume, London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC: ↩

  4. c. 1870, Charles Spurgeon, Morning and Evening: ↩

  5. 1989 July 6 [1988 October], Dmitriy Volkogonov, “Triumph and Tragedy: A Portrait of I.V. Stalin”, in JPRS Report: Soviet Union, number 043, Foreign Broadcast Information Service, sourced from Moscow, Oktyabr, No 10, translation of original in Russian, →OCLC, page 1, column 1: ↩

Link to original

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