"inability to suffer fools

Posted by Smokey Stover on January 06, 2007

In Reply to: "Inability to suffer fools posted by Garry An on January 06, 2007

: What is the meaning of the phase "inability to suffer fools"?

It is an allusion to an almost two-thousand-year-old cliché, "to suffer fools gladly." There is an excellent discussion of this in the archives. Go back one page and type into the search box at the top, "suffer fools gladly." The verb "to suffer" is used in the meaning "to permit, to tolerate," as in "Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God." That's from the Gospel of St. Mark, Chapter 10, Verse 14.
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