Word.ws English Dictionary

hide behind

hide behind verb: to use someone or something as a shield in order to avoid taking responsibility for something; to avoid attention by using someone or something as a shield.

Verb

hide behind (third-person singular simple present hides behind, present participle hiding behind, simple past hid behind, past participle hidden behind)

  1. (transitive) To use someone or something as a shield in order to avoid taking responsibility for something; to avoid attention by using someone or something as a shield.
    • Don't hide behind your spokesman, speak for yourself!
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see hide, behind.
    • Don't hide behind that rock, come out in the open!

Forms of hide behind

third-person singular presenthides behind
present participlehiding behind
pasthid behind
past participlehidden behind

Questions about hide behind

What does hide behind mean?
Hide behind means to use someone or something as a shield in order to avoid taking responsibility for something; to avoid attention by using someone or something as a shield.
What part of speech is hide behind?
Hide behind is a verb.
What is the past tense of hide behind?
The past tense of hide behind is hid behind.

Words near hide behind in the dictionary

  1. hide and go seek
  2. hide and seek
  3. hide away
  4. hide beetle
  5. hide beetles
  6. hide behind
  7. hide in plain sight
  8. hide in the closet
  9. hide nor hair
  10. hide one's light under a bushel
  11. hide out

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hide behind (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “hide behind.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hide_behind. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.