sanctimonious
23
8.5
- adjective
- /ˌsæŋk.tɪˈmoʊ.ni.əs/
:
santurrón
- I know such suggestions may seem sanctimonious with the gall still in your throat.
- sanctimonious and hypocritical
- sanctimonious and righteous
- sanctimonious and smug
You can have that high handed, self-righteous, sanctimonious philosophy somewhere else.
- You can have that high handed, self-righteous, sanctimonious philosophy somewhere else.
- Doing it to be like a hall monitor, sanctimonious type situation, I oppose it.
- The Democrats pretty much as they're defining trait, are so sanctimonious, they're so self-righteous.
- It's, I mean, the, you guys, the, the Bible thumpers are so exhausting and sanctimonious and stupid.
- Which means while the sanctimonious experts don't get it, people who have been through it get it.
- And another faction of the left started associating PC culture with like this kind of sanctimonious, purely symbolic kind of politics.
- I mean, already he's, he's trying to, you know, that the sanctimonious thing.
- What is, what is Trump, Call him Rhonda, Sanctimonious.
- So science, some people, let's just pick on the paradigmatic example of the modern day scientist who's sanctimonious of Neil deGrasse Tyson here.
Examples
-
The tone of the classroom was sober but not sanctimonious.
Academic text (1995) -
She gave a sanctimonious lecture about honesty, even though she had lied about her own mistakes.
-
The same boring, sanctimonious speech.
-
For some reason, it had not sounded sanctimonious, as it might have done.
Fiction book (1990) -
You can have that high handed, self-righteous, sanctimonious philosophy somewhere else.
-
" Was he deliberately baiting her, or was he really as sanctimonious as he sounded?
Fiction book (1999) -
And another faction of the left started associating PC culture with like this kind of sanctimonious, purely symbolic kind of politics.
-
Others were vulgar, sanctimonious, histrionic, sympathetic, mean-spirited, or simply bizarre.
Academic text (2016) -
In his fury, he sounded almost tearful, agonized, amazed, and ludicrously sanctimonious all at the same time.
Fiction book (1993) -
Their radical beliefs are tied to sanctimonious religiosity that "browbeats" anybody who opposes their radical agenda.
Blog text (8)
Synonyms
83
6.1
Acting like you have strong moral rules when you do not follow them
55
7.8
Thinking you are better than other people about right and wrong and judging them
5
8.7
Acting as if morally better than other people
3
8.6
Acting like you are better than other people
2
8.2
Behaving as if you are better than others to show you are good
1
9.9
Pretending to be morally better than other people
Pretending to be morally better while judging others
Showing false moral pride and judging others harshly
Pretending to be very religious to seem morally better than others
Showing false religious feeling to seem very religious
Antonyms
How Self-Righteous
Surface Forms
Morphology
sanctimonious = sanctimony (semi-transparent) = sanctimony + ous
The adjective is directly formed from the noun 'sanctimony' with the productive suffix '-ous', but the noun base is relatively uncommon and its meaning ('hypocritical piety') may not be obvious to many learners.
Etymology
The word sanctimonious comes from the Latin root sanctus, which means 'holy', the same idea you see in saint and sanctuary. It now describes someone who 'shows off' being holy or more moral than others, so the origin explains why it means pretending to be better.