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scapegoating

 - 5 dictionary results

scape⋅goat

  [skeyp-goht]
Use scapegoating in a Sentence
–noun
1. a person or group made to bear the blame for others or to suffer in their place.
2. Chiefly Biblical. a goat let loose in the wilderness on Yom Kippur after the high priest symbolically laid the sins of the people on its head. Lev. 16:8,10,26.
–verb (used with object)
3. to make a scapegoat of: Strike leaders tried to scapegoat foreign competitors.
Origin:
1520–30; scape 2 + goat

scape⋅goat⋅ism

  [skeyp-goh-tiz-uhm]
–noun
the act or practice of assigning blame or failure to another, as to deflect attention or responsibility away from oneself.
Also called scapegoating.

Origin:
scapegoat + -ism
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To scapegoating
scape·goat   (skāp'gōt')   
n.  

  1. One that is made to bear the blame of others.

  2. Bible A live goat over whose head Aaron confessed all the sins of the children of Israel on the Day of Atonement. The goat, symbolically bearing their sins, was then sent into the wilderness.

tr.v.   scape·goat·ed, scape·goat·ing, scape·goats
To make a scapegoat of.

[scape2 + goat (translation of Hebrew 'ēz 'ōzēl, goat that escapes, misreading of 'āzā'zēl, Azazel).]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
Cite This Source
Cultural Dictionary

scapegoat

A person or group that is made to bear blame for others. According to the Old Testament, on the Day of Atonement, a priest would confess all the sins of the Israelites over the head of a goat and then drive it into the wilderness, symbolically bearing their sins away.

The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
Cite This Source
Word Origin & History

scapegoat 
1530, "goat sent into the wilderness on the Day of Atonement, symbolic bearer of the sins of the people," coined by Tyndale from scape (n.) + goat, to translate L. caper emissarius, a mistranslation in Vulgate of Heb. 'azazel (Lev. xvi:8,10,26), which was read as 'ez ozel "goat that departs," but is actually the proper name of a devil or demon in Jewish mythology (sometimes identified with Canaanite deity Aziz). Jerome's mistake also was followed by Martin Luther (der ledige Bock), Symmachus (tragos aperkhomenos), and others (cf. Fr. bouc émissaire). The Revised Version (1884) restores Azazel. Meaning "one who is blamed or punished for the mistakes or sins of others" first recorded 1824; the verb is attested from 1943.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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