Word.ws English Dictionary

pilgrim's progress

pilgrim's progress noun: a morally or spiritually testing journey, often filled with obstacles, learning experiences, and eventual transformation or enlightenment.

Noun

pilgrim's progress

  1. A morally or spiritually testing journey, often filled with obstacles, learning experiences, and eventual transformation or enlightenment.
  2. Any slow, difficult, dour or funless journey.
    • Lady Rosie - so mad-cap in the gaiety of summer's full-blowing that even the organizer of the prim-and-properness forgot about it. Thus what has been planned to be a sort of pilgrim's progress turned out to be a fairy frolic[.]1961, Xavier Herbert, Soldiers' Women, Netley, SA: Fontana Books, published 1978, page 74
  3. Moral, spiritual, meaningful, or redemptive progress.

Origin of pilgrim's progress

Referring to the Christian allegory The Pilgrim's Progress, 1678, by John Bunyan.

Questions about pilgrim's progress

What does pilgrim's progress mean?
Pilgrim's progress means a morally or spiritually testing journey, often filled with obstacles, learning experiences, and eventual transformation or enlightenment.
What part of speech is pilgrim's progress?
Pilgrim's progress is a noun.

Words near pilgrim's progress in the dictionary

  1. pilgrim's barrel
  2. pilgrim's gourd
  3. pilgrim's gourds
  4. pilgrim's hat
  5. pilgrim's hats
  6. pilgrim's progress
  7. pilgrim's pumpkin
  8. pilgrim's scallop
  9. pilgrim's scallops
  10. pilgrim's shell
  11. pilgrim's shells

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pilgrim's progress (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.

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