sanctimonious
Americanadjective
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making a hypocritical show of religious devotion, piety, righteousness, etc..
They resented his sanctimonious comments on immorality in America.
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Obsolete. holy; sacred.
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of sanctimonious
First recorded in 1595–1605; sanctimony + -ous
Explanation
The sanctimonious person sounds like a hypocrite when he preaches to a friend about the evils of drugs, while he drinks one beer after another. Sanctimonious is a twist on the words sanctity and sacred, which mean holy or religious. A sanctimonious person might think he's holy, but their attitude comes across more like "holier-than-thou." Though sanctimonious people might try to act like saints, their actions are far from pure or holy, which just makes them sound like hypocrites.
Vocabulary lists containing sanctimonious
"Letter from Birmingham Jail" by Martin Luther King, Jr. (1963)
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Sanctimonious waffle, thought his audience at the Herzliya conference, an annual Israeli security-policy gathering.
From Economist • Jun. 12, 2014
Sanctimonious purists would have considered them "betrayals of some abstract ideal."
From Salon • Jan. 24, 2011
But Smithers—evidently the Reverend Sanctimonious Smithers—was already placidly seated in the witness chair, his limp hands folded across his stomach and his thin nose looking interrogatively toward Mr. Tutt.
From By Advice of Counsel by Train, Arthur Cheney
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
