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(Hinduism) An ascetic or practitioner of yoga (yogi) who has given up pursuit of the first three Hindu goals of life: kama (enjoyment), artha (practical objectives) and even dharma (duty).
1953 November, 'Erca', “Ticket Frauds in the East”, in Railway Magazine, page 778:
Then again these figures take no account of the thousands of beggars who travel free in India. Many of these are religious "Sadhus", dressed often in nothing but a loin-cloth, or even less, and their bodies smeared with ashes. A large number of these men are nothing but impostors, but the Hindu railway staff usually are afraid to interfere with them.
1983, Lawrence Durrell, Sebastian (Avignon Qutet), Faber & Faber, published 2004, page 994:
It was clad in white in the manner of an Indian sadu or holy man, and it was walking barefoot on the grubby pavements.
1993, Will Self, My Idea of Fun:
So for the meanwhile I continued with my ritualised observances, obsessively counting the number of steps it took me to walk to any given location, carefully avoiding the cracks in the pavement for fear that the bears of the id might get me, and attending to my bodily functions with the pure metrical devotion of a sadhu.
