self-righteous

adj

Etymology

From self- + righteous.

  1. inherited from rihtwīs
  2. inherited from rightwise
  3. formed as self-righteous — “self- + righteous

Definitions

  1. Piously self-assured and smugly moralistic.

    • Near-synonyms: smug, complacent; sanctimonious
    • And is it not possible, Mr. Hier, that people are reacting (in a contemptible way, certainly) against your self-righteous bawling?
    • “God's blood, Thomas, self-righteous prickery is not the preserve of the English!”
  2. Patronizingly moralizing and rebuking.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at self-righteous. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01self-righteous02smugly03self-satisfied04smug05offensively06offensive07indignation

A definitional loop anchored at self-righteous. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

7 hops · closes at self-righteous

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA