Meaning & use
meek
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Meaning
adjectivecomparable
Quiet and gentle, and often unwilling to argue or insist on your own wishes.
Grammar: Gradable: meeker, meekest; tone can be positive humility or negative lack of assertiveness.
Patterns
- a meek person
- meek and mild
- too meek to object
He was too meek to complain when the order was wrong.
Her meek reply surprised everyone at the meeting.
Do not mistake a meek manner for agreement.
Word forms
| comparative | meeker |
|---|---|
| superlative | meekest |
Common combinations
- meek and mild
- The advertisement promised a meek and mild cleaning formula.
- a meek smile
- She gave a meek smile and waited for instructions.
- too meek to complain
- He is too meek to complain about the noise.
Synonyms and how they differ
- gentle
- Focuses on kindness and softness without suggesting failure to stand up for oneself.
- submissive
- Stronger and more negative: willingly obeying or yielding to control.
- timid
- Emphasizes fear or nervousness, while meek emphasizes mildness and lack of push.
- mild
- Means not harsh in manner or effect, but lacks the idea of being easily imposed on.
Opposites
Word family
Commonly confused: meek or weak?
meek vs weak
Weak means lacking strength or power; meek describes a quiet, unassertive manner.
Practice
She ___ accepted the unfair schedule and said nothing.
Choose one answer.
Accepted needs an adverb, so meekly is correct. Meek is an adjective, meekness is a noun, and meeker wrongly adds a comparison with no second person or state.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “meek”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.