fakir

noun

Etymology: Etymology tree Arabic فَقِير (faqīr)bor. English fakir Borrowed from Arabic فَقِير (faqīr, “poor man”).

1. A religious mendicant who owns no personal property.
2. An ascetic mendicant, especially one who performs feats of endurance or apparent magic.

   “The preposterous altruism too![…]Resist not evil. It is an insane immolation of self—as bad intrinsically as fakirs stabbing themselves or anchorites warping their spines in caves scarcely large enough for a fair-sized dog.”

3. Someone who takes advantage of the gullible through fakery, especially of a spiritual or religious nature.

   “He denounces no one until he has all the damaging facts in hand, very frequently backed up with affidavits. He 'Lawsonized' certain stock jobbers and financial fakirs of London before the Boston advertising man was heard of.”

   “"But a stranger who had come up to the group just at this point, when they were pronouncing the soup delicious, laughed aloud. "'What a set of fools you all are!' he cried. 'This tramp is just a fakir. That stone had nothing to do with the soup."”