philistine

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A non-Semitic person from ancient Philistia, a region in the southwest Levant in the Middle East.

   Then the lords of the Philiſtines gathered them together, for to offer a great ſacrifice vnto Dagon their god, and to reioyce; for they ſaid, Our god hath deliuered Samſon our enemy into our hand.

2. 2
   noun

   An opponent (of the speaker, writer, etc); an enemy, a foe.

   In very truth what could poor old Abbot Hugo do? A frail old man; and the Philistines were upon him,—that is to say, the Hebrews.

3. 3
   noun

   Alternative letter-case form of philistine (“a person who is ignorant or uneducated; specifically, a person who lacks appreciation of or is antagonistic towards art or culture, and who has pedestrian tastes”).

   It is Shakespearean, you Philistine!

4. 4
   adj

   Alternative letter-case form of philistine (“ignorant or uneducated; specifically, lacking appreciation for or antagonistic towards art or culture, and having pedestrian tastes”).

   [Robert] Walpole, moreover, left England not only more corrupt than he found it, but crasser and more Philistine.

5. 5
   noun

   A person who is ignorant or uneducated; specifically, a person who lacks appreciation of or is antagonistic towards art or culture, and who has pedestrian tastes.

   [W]hen he [Christoph Friedrich Nicolai] wrote against [Immanuel] Kant's philosophy, without comprehending it; and judged of poetry as he judged of Brunswick mum, by its utility, many people thought him wrong. A man of such spiritual habilitudes is now by the Germans called a Philister, Philistine: Nicolai earned for himself the painful pre-eminence of being Erz-Philister, Arch-Philistine. [...] At present the literary Philistine seldom shows, never parades, himself in Germany; and when he does appear, he is in the last stage of emaciation.

6. 6
   adj

   Ignorant or uneducated; specifically, lacking appreciation for or antagonistic towards art or culture, and having pedestrian tastes.

   [Robert] Walpole, moreover, left England not only more corrupt than he found it, but crasser and more Philistine.

7. 7
   adj

   smug and ignorant and indifferent or hostile to artistic and cultural values

8. 8
   noun

   a person who is uninterested in intellectual pursuits

Etymology

The noun is derived from Middle English Philistyne, Philisten [and other forms], from Old English Filistina (genitive plural), from Old French Philistin (modern French Philistin) and Late Latin Philistinus, from Koine Greek Φυλιστῖνοι (Phulistînoi), a variant of Φυλιστιίμ (Phulistiím), Φυλιστιείμ (Phulistieím) (compare Koine Greek Παλαιστῖνοι (Palaistînoi)), from Hebrew פְּלִשְׁתִּים (p'lishtím, plural noun), from פְּלִשְׁתִּי (p'lishtí, “Philistine”, adjective), from פְּלֶשֶׁת (p'léshet, “Philistia”). An Anatolian origin should be considered, compare Hittite 𒁄𒄭𒅖 (pal-ḫi-iš /⁠palḫis⁠/, “wide,…