To bow the knee to Rimmon
Preserved but no longer current.
To palter with one's conscience; to do that which one knows to be wrong so as to save one's face. The allusion is to Naaman obtaining Elisha's per- mission to worship the god when with his master (2 Kings v, 18).
Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)
Sources & notes
Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.
Common questions
What does “To bow the knee to Rimmon” mean?
To palter with one's conscience; to do that which one knows to be wrong so as to save one's face. The allusion is to Naaman obtaining Elisha's per- mission to worship the god when with his master (2 Kings v, 18).
Is “To bow the knee to Rimmon” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.