theocrat
Americannoun
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a person who rules, governs as a representative of God or a deity, or is a member of the ruling group in a theocracy, as a divine king or a high priest.
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a person who favors theocracy.
Etymology
Origin of theocrat
1820–30; back formation from theocratic < Greek theokrat ( ía ) theocracy + -ic
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.
The theocrat would express his distrust of the Americans, caution his emissaries to be vigilant, but then obliquely defend their efforts.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 24, 2025
Paolo Pierobon plays Pius IX as a reptilian, vengeful theocrat with his own deep-seated fears, borne of ceding ecclesiastical dominion to an increasingly progressive anti-papist world.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 31, 2024
His National Review co-founder and coauthor of a defense of Joseph McCarthy, L. Brent Bozell, even outdid Buckley in that department, being as ferocious a theocrat as Maistre had been more than a century earlier.
From Salon ● Jul. 1, 2023
“The weird thing is it has kind of worked… That’s just where we are now: The same person can be both a vicious former theocrat and a loveable Twitter rascal,” she continued.
From Fox News ● Dec. 12, 2018
The new Geneva was so cowed and subservient that the town council dared not install a new sort of heating apparatus without asking the permission of the theocrat.
From The Age of the Reformation by Preserved Smith
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
