Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. In Jewish folklore, the wandering soul of a dead person that enters the body of a living person and controls his or her behavior.
Wiktionary
- n. A malicious possessing spirit, believed to be the dislocated soul of a dead person.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Jewish folklore) the wandering soul of a dead person, or a demon, that enters the body of a living person and controls that body's behavior. It may be exorcised by religious rites.
WordNet 3.0
- n. (Jewish folklore) a demon that enters the body of a living person and controls that body's behavior
Etymologies
- From Yiddish, from Hebrew דבק (dovek, "cling"). (Wiktionary)
- Yiddish dibek, from Hebrew dibbūq, probably from dābaq, to cling; see dbq in Semitic roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The wife replies that her husband is mistaken, the relative has been dead for three years, and what her husband saw was a dybbuk a Yiddish word used in this context to mean “evil spirit”.”
“The surname, Dibbuk, refers to the Yiddish word dybbuk that the Encyclopedia Britannica defines as "a disembodied human spirit that, because of former sins, wanders restlessly until it finds a haven in the body of a living person.”
“A dybbuk is the spirit of a dead man that enters the body of another living being and possesses it.”
“Just as the dybbuk is a confrontation between two identities within the same person, the dybbuk's outburst reflects a confrontation between the center and the periphery and a confrontation between cultures, East and West," she explains.”
“According to the kabbalist concept, the dybbuk is a soul - in most cases of a sinner - that has not found a home (it is in a liminal state) either in heaven or in hell.”
“In Jewish mythology, a dybbuk is a demonic spirit that inhabits a dead person.”
“Why else does the film begin with a hilarious but troubling parable about an ancient rabbi (Fyvush Finkel) who may or may not be inhabited by a wandering lost soul known as a dybbuk?”
“He himself was almost in the grip of a 'dybbuk' of documentation.”
“My favorite scene of the year is the opening "dybbuk" scene of A Serious Man.”
“Goyer, who will likely write and direct X-Men spinoff Magneto after launching his ABC series Flash Forward, found a fresh twist for The Unborn dybbuk spirits described in Jewish folklore.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘dybbuk’.
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nouns
enfleurage, fautor, mafia, haslet, chopine, sea-gate, cantillation, formicary, go-devil, Gongorism, mamzer, mazarine and 147 more...
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250 More Spelling Words
More words for intermediate and advanced spellers.
erethism, risus, zendik, agiotage, sciolism, fusain, mbaqanga, empyrean, chary, sialogogue, zingiber, kachina and 238 more...
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Yiddishkeit
There are a few short lists of Yiddish words, but none appropriate to the glory of the language, and none that are open. Thought I'd start one, and would love contributions. I'm tagging as I go, an...
schmuck, nosh, chutzpah, shtick, kvetch, oy vey, oy gevalt, shvitz, shtik, shiksa, putz, mensch and 94 more...
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All Soul Words
phytopsyche, pneuma, psychagogic, psychorrhagia, frankalmoigne, psychostasia, psychomancy, psychopannychism, shotten-souled, soul-paper, soul-cake, soul-ale and 31 more...
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philosophia obscura
a collection of strange, unusual, hidden and forgotten ideas and beliefs
xenophanean, ailuromancy, philology, scop, spagyric, obeah, tref, anhedonia, syssitia, dybbuk, helot, nescience and 2 more...
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bintalshamsa's list
My Favorite Words
weltschmerz, perspicacity, idée fixe, invigilator, salubrious, tchotchke, ex nihilo, invidious, malapropism, naïve, sardonic, elide and 1402 more...
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Manji's Random Wordlist
The title says it all
velour, vivacity, subterfuge, sable, divination, gentry, vindication, compendium, pistons, metamorphosis, methodology, polyphony and 91 more...
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Fictional beasties
elf, gnome, dwarf, sprite, troll, fairy, nymph, imp, brownie, sasquatch, yeti, wookiee and 574 more...
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junemoonchild's Favorite Words
Aubrey, astrology, Cancer, Taurus, dybbuk, enchantress, love, mystery, mysteriarch, spirit, melancholy, disintegration and 129 more...
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bertilak's Words
antidisestablishm..., feldercarb, wainscoting, eleemosynary, oxymoron, fuliginous, libration, lammergeier, saxifrage, ichor, lambent, smaragdine and 414 more...
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The "dark" things
grave, dead, death, die, died, dies, murder, murdered, murderer, murders, murdering, murderous and 115 more...
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tragedy of the commons
insomnia, arabesque, carousal, lucifer, riot, submerge, initiate, indigo, existence, magenta, opus, sleeplessness and 145 more...
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fbharjo's Words
jumelle, kef, kenspeckle, lautitious, essentic, pilpulistic, impavid, cicurant, clou, chrysostomic, miasma, teleology and 1625 more...
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rememberers
prolix, ageusia, animadversion, anodyne, antic, arabesque, beadle, brachymetropia, colophon, desquamation, diaphoresis, diegesis and 3251 more...
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Demongering
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diablerie, grimoire, ouija, dybbuk, sciomancy, necromancy, cacodemon, fallen angel, choronzon, kokomo, demonology, lilith and 650 more...
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Speak of the Devil
Different names for Old Boy, and other demons that might possess us.
vetala, mara, Lilith, dybbuk, incubus, succubus, bogle, boggart, wendigo, Asmodeus, diabolus, Belial and 45 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for dybbuk.
madmouth Like 'dibbick'. An example from a fictional drama title: Dybbuck Schybbuck; I said we need more ham! (-Eugene Levy) Apr 30, 2009
kneedeep Is the pronunciation "Dib - buck" or "die - buek" ?
Even if it isn't technically English, it's still a fun word. Apr 30, 2009
bilby Common? Matter of opinion. I wouldn't classify it as an English word at all. Mar 15, 2009
oroboros According to Chris Cole in Wordplay, the common word of length 6 with the most infrequently used letters. May 31, 2008