Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use shirk in a sentence

13 example sentences · verb, noun

Shirk means to avoid, especially a duty, responsibility, etc.; to stay away from. Example: “If you have a job, don't shirk from it by staying off work.”

Examples of shirk by meaning

verbTo evade an obligation; to avoid the performance of duty, as by running away.

  • If you have a job, don't shirk from it by staying off work.
  • Shapiro and Stiglitz (1984) develop a dynamic model in which firms induce workers to work hard by paying high wages and threatening to fire workers caught shirking.1992, Robert Gibbons, A Primer in Game Theory, Prentice-Hall, page 107

nounThe unforgivable sin of association (claiming something or someone can share in the oneness of God).

  • A person can have committed shirk in their lifetime and still find forgiveness (especially by saying the Shahada and becoming a Muslim).2013, James R. White, What Every Christian Needs to Know About the Qur'an, Baker Books, →ISBN

More sentences with shirk

  • Coalworker's pneumoconiosis is a compensable disease in various countries, and it is a preventable disease where the costs of its prevention are not shirked as externalities.From the entry compensable
  • Every move in her career appears to be one more shirking of categorization.1983 December 3, Walta Borawski, “The Saga of Baby Divine (review)”, in Gay Community News, volume 11, number 20, page 10. From the entry shirking
  • If clerks do not try to shirk their work, our whole great commercial system breaks down.1910, Gilbert K[eith] Chesterton, “The Modern Slave”, in What’s Wrong with the World, London; New York, N.Y.: Cassell and Company, […]…. From the entry inroad
  • There is no shirking of that bare truth, no attempt to soften it.1900, Eleanor Vere Boyle, Seven gardens and a palace. From the entry errand-ghost
  • Shirk may be committed in ascribing to other than God functions of protection, providence, knowledge, worshippability, that belong only unto God.1959 July, Kenneth Cragg, “The Meaning of Ẓulm in the Qurʾān”, in The Muslim World, volume XLIX, number 3, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Blackwell…. From the entry worshippability
  • And may none of us shirk!"2020 October 27, Andrzej Sapkowski, “In which Scharley Makes an Appearance”, in David French, transl., The Tower of Fools (The Hussite…. From the entry mi-parti
  • For years, China and the United States have engaged in a dangerous Alphonse-and-Gaston routine, using each other's inaction to shirk their responsibility.2009 September 23, New York Times, editorial. From the entry Alphonse and Gaston
  • My personal success or failure is insignificant; the rise or fall of the nation is my responsibility and must not be shirked.1980 August 1 [1980 May 1], Ching-kuo Chiang, “President Chiang Ching-kuo continues his period of mourning and finds that visits to…. From the entry father
  • More people would pay, wrote Deputy Minister Pokrovskii, less to satisfy the need for revenue and more as come-uppance for the past shirking that was now unacceptable.2014, Yanni Kotsonis, States of Obligation: Taxes and Citizenship in the Russian Empire and Early Soviet Republic, →ISBN. From the entry come-uppance
  • In Allah's view, the greatest crime a human being can commit is shirk - which is worshipping an unIslamic God, or worshipping God unIslamically (assigning companions etc).2012 February 1, Sentenced to die, The Express Tribune. From the entry unislamically

Meaning of shirk

  1. verb To avoid, especially a duty, responsibility, etc.; to stay away from.
  2. verb To evade an obligation; to avoid the performance of duty, as by running away.
  3. verb To procure by petty fraud and trickery; to obtain by mean solicitation.

Full definition of shirk

Questions about shirk in a sentence

How do you use shirk in a sentence?
Shirk is used as a verb and noun. For example: “If you have a job, don't shirk from it by staying off work.”
What is a short sentence with shirk?
“And may none of us shirk!"”
What does shirk mean?
Shirk means to avoid, especially a duty, responsibility, etc.; to stay away from.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: shirk (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use shirk in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/shirk. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.