dervish

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a member of a Sufi Muslim religious order, traditionally committed to poverty and devotional discipline

   The dervish traveled with little property and depended on hospitality.

2. 2
   noun

   an itinerant Sufi mystic, sometimes associated with ecstatic music, chanting, or whirling

   The dervish entered a meditative dance accompanied by drums and flute.

3. 3
   noun

   figurative: a person moving or acting with intense, almost uncontrolled energy

   She became a dervish of activity before the guests arrived.

Through Ottoman Turkish dervis from Persian darvish, 'poor or needy person; religious mendicant,' ultimately related to an Iranian word for poverty. In Sufi traditions voluntary poverty signified detachment from material concerns. The energetic figurative sense grew from the famous whirling practice of the Mevlevi order.

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