breatharian

/bɹɛˈθɛə.ɹi.ən/

Etymology

From breath + -arian.

Why this word is great

BREATHARIAN — [Noun] One who believes in or practices living without food, subsisting instead on prana or sunlight. From breath (referring to the act of breathing or life force) + -arian (a suffix denoting a person who practices or believes in something). Unlike "fruitarian" (who consumes only plant matter that falls naturally) or "inediate" (one who claims divine exemption from eating), breatharianism rejects all physical sustenance as superfluous. It is the sunburnt zealot charting their ribs like a xylophone, the glassy-eyed devotee mistaking dizziness for divinity, the emaciated prophet preaching that appetite is an illusion—proof that even desiccation can be dressed as transcendence.

noun

  1. One who lives without food, subsisting instead on prana or sunlight.“Those who suspect a growing homogeneity in the once-eccentric East Village may find comfort in Dr. David Jubb, a New Age health guru who runs Jubb's Longevity on East 12th Street and claims to be a breatharian, taking light and air as his primary nourishment.”