scapegoat
[ skeyp-goht ]
/ ˈskeɪpˌgoʊt /
noun
a person or group made to bear the blame for others or to suffer in their place.
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)
to make a scapegoat of: Strike leaders tried to scapegoat foreign competitors.
Words nearby scapegoat
scanty,
scanzoni's maneuver,
scapa flow,
scape,
scape wheel,
scapegoat,
scapegoatism,
scapegrace,
scapewheel,
scapha,
scapho-
Definition for scapegoating (2 of 2)
scapegoatism
[ skeyp-goh-tiz-uh m ]
/ ˈskeɪp goʊˌtɪz əm /
noun
the act or practice of assigning blame or failure to another, as to deflect attention or responsibility away from oneself.
Also called
scape·goat·ing.
Example sentences from the Web for scapegoating
British Dictionary definitions for scapegoating
scapegoat
/ (ˈskeɪpˌɡəʊt) /
noun
a person made to bear the blame for others
Old Testament
a goat used in the ritual of Yom Kippur (Leviticus 16); it was symbolically laden with the sins of the Israelites and sent into the wilderness to be destroyed
verb
(tr)
to make a scapegoat of
Word Origin for scapegoat
C16: from
escape +
goat, coined by William Tyndale to translate Biblical Hebrew
azāzēl (probably) goat for Azazel, mistakenly thought to mean ``goat that escapes''
Cultural definitions for scapegoating
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.