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Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This

Jug·ger·naut

Audio Help [juhg-er-nawt, -not] Pronunciation Key

–noun

1.	(often lowercase) any large, overpowering, destructive force or object, as war, a giant battleship, or a powerful football team.

2.	(often lowercase) anything requiring blind devotion or cruel sacrifice.

3.	Also called Jagannath. an idol of Krishna, at Puri in Orissa, India, annually drawn on an enormous cart under whose wheels devotees are said to have thrown themselves to be crushed.

[Origin: 1630–40; < Hindi Jagannāth < Skt Jagannātha lord of the world (i.e., the god Vishnu or Krishna), equiv. to jagat world + nātha lord

]

—Related forms

Jug·ger·naut·ish, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
juggernaut

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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

jug·ger·naut Audio Help (jŭg'ər-nôt') Pronunciation Key
n.

Something, such as a belief or institution, that elicits blind and destructive devotion or to which people are ruthlessly sacrificed.
An overwhelming, advancing force that crushes or seems to crush everything in its path: "It doesn't assume that people need necessarily remain passive when confronted by what appears to be the juggernaut of history" (Christopher Lehmann-Haupt).
Juggernaut Used as a title for the Hindu deity Krishna.

[Hindi jagannāth, title of Krishna, from Sanskrit jagannāthaḥ, lord of the world : jagat, moving, the world (from earlier present participle of jigāti, he goes; see g^wā- in Indo-European roots) + nāthaḥ, lord (from nāthate, he helps, protects). Senses 1 and 2, from the fact that worshipers have thrown themselves under the wheels of a huge car or wagon on which the idol of Krishna was drawn in an annual procession at Puri in east-central India.]

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The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
juggernaut

1638, "huge wagon bearing an image of the god Krishna," especially that at the town of Puri, drawn annually in procession in which (apocryphally) devotees allowed themselves to be crushed under its wheels in sacrifice. Altered from Jaggernaut, a title of Krishna (an incarnation of Vishnu), from Hindi Jagannath, lit. "lord of the world," from Skt. jagat "world" + natha-s "lord, master." The first European description of the festival is by Friar Odoric (c.1321). Fig. sense of "anything that demands blind devotion or merciless sacrifice" is from 1854.

WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

juggernaut
noun
1.	a massive inexorable force that seems to crush everything in its way
2.	an avatar of Vishnu [syn: Jagannath]
3.	a crude idol of Krishna

American Heritage New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition - Cite This Source - Share This
Juggernaut [(jug-uhr-nawt)]

A deity in Hinduism, considered a deliverer from sin. His image is carried on a large wagon in an annual procession in India, and according to legend the wagon crushed worshipers who threw themselves under it.