What do you Mean by the Idiom ‘Salt of the Earth’?

And why the salt has been so important through history?

If you refer to someone as the salt of the earth, you are saying he is the most genuine, honest, and morally sound person; he is the most decent, dependable, and unpretentious person.

This expression was first used by Jesus for his followers and devotees who were abused or ill-treated for their loyalty to him. In olden times, salt was considered one of the most precious and valuable commodities due to two qualities —

• It provides vital nutrients essential for human survival.
• Before the invention of refrigeration, salt helped preserve other perishable food items.

Due to these two reasons, salt was a rare and expensive commodity.

Thus, to refer to someone as the salt of the earth was to call him valuable and worthy of respect. In a modern scenario, it’s like calling someone a diamond because a diamond is one of the most precious and rare items today.

We have two more phrases with ‘salt’ that have the same origin as this one. We will discuss them in the next article. For now, let’s see an example —

“This little boy is really the salt of the earth — he returned my wallet full of cash and didn’t even accept the reward I offered him.”

It means that that boy is unpretentious and genuinely honest, he is a morally superior and decent person because he returned my wallet without accepting anything in return.

I hope you found this story interesting. If you did, buy my full course on Udemy or watch it for free on Skillshare by signing up here. This course covers nearly 380 idioms with their origins and backstories.

Hi, I am Gauri Shanker, a Vocab teacher and enthusiast. I teach vocabulary in a fun and engaging way. You can check out my courses here.