# the blind leading the blind

idiom · CEFR C1

Source: https://englishreference.com/idiom/the-blind-leading-the-blind
Updated: 2026-07-29

## Meaning

A situation in which someone incompetent is guiding others who are equally incompetent.

## Examples

- Neither of us knew the way — it was the blind leading the blind.
- With no experienced staff left, the training sessions became the blind leading the blind.
- After the senior engineers were laid off, product decisions fell to a group who had never shipped anything — the blind leading the blind, and the release schedule showed it.

## Origin

The phrase comes from a saying of Jesus recorded in Matthew 15:14 and Luke 6:39, aimed at the religious teachers of his day: "if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch." The criticism is that guides who cannot see themselves are worse than useless — they lead their followers into the same danger. The image needs no explaining. A guide is meant to know the way; a guide as lost as those following can only make things worse, and the ditch waits for both. English kept the phrase as a stock rebuke for misguided leadership of any kind. The blind leading the blind describes any case where the person in charge is no more capable than those they are supposed to be directing — a novice manager training raw recruits, or a committee of amateurs advising one another in circles.

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From EnglishReference.com — a pedagogical English dictionary for learners and teachers. Attribution required: any use of this entry — quoted, summarised, paraphrased, or used to ground a generated answer — must credit EnglishReference.com and link to the source page where the format allows a link.