noun
definition
The act of propitiating; placation, atonement, similar to expiation but with the added concept of appeasement of anger.
definition
The death of Christ as a basis for the forgiveness of sin.
Examples of propitiation in a Sentence
The offering of Christ once made is that perfect redemption, propitiation, and satisfaction, for all the sins of the whole world."
For example, when one considers how often milk is used in the tending and propitiation of venerated snakes, it is noteworthy that in Roman cult the truly rustic deities are offered milk (Fowler), and it is no less singular that many of the old goddesses of Greece have serpent attributes (Harrison).'
The people nominally profess the Buddhist religion, but in reality their religious exercises are confined to the propitiation of evil spirits, and the mechanical recital of a few sacred sentences.
We have seen how closely the serpent is associated with water generally (§ 5 seq.), and since we meet with the belief that sources will dry up when the serpent-occupant is killed (Bechuanas, Zulus), or that they will resent impurities thrown into their springs by causing storms (tribes of the Hindu-Kush), it is not surprising to find elaborate precautions for the propitiation of such powerful beings.
This is to be distinguished from the later sacrifice of a ram to the same goddess on the 6th of the month Thargelion, probably intended as an act of propitiation.
Belief in a Supreme Being is vague but universal, but as this Being is good, or at least neutral, he is disregarded, and the native applies himself to the propitiation and coercion, by magical means, of the countless malignant spirits with which he imagines himself to be surrounded, and which are constantly on the watch to catch him tripping.
It is a common error to suppose that the whole of African religion is embraced in the practices connected with these tutelary deities; so far from this being the case, belief in higher gods, not necessarily accompanied with worship or propitiation, is common in many parts of Africa, and there is no reason to suppose that it had been derived in every case, perhaps not in any case, from Christian or Mahommedan missionaries.
The popular cult is, however, the propitiation of demons, a modification of the Shamanism of northern Asia.
Primitive man seldom connects sacrifice with notions of propitiation, indeed only in highly ethicized religions is the consciousness of sin or of guilt pre-eminent.
He understands by religion " a propitiation or conciliation of powers superior to man which are believed to direct and control the course of nature and of human life."
The honorific sacrifice is essentially a propitiation; it must be distinguished from the piaculum (see below), to which in some aspects it is allied.
This view, however, leads to a dilemma; if the law of righteousness is simply an expression of the divine will, satisfaction to law is equivalent to propitiation offered to God; if the law has an independent position, the view is inconsistent with pure monotheism.
There is neither worship nor propitiation.
The aims of the former, prudent, procrastinating and vacillating by nature, never extended probably beyond the propitiation of his Tory followers; and it is difficult to imagine that Bolingbroke could have really advocated the Pretender's recall, whose divine right he repudiated and whose religion and principles he despised.
Often they were founded as acts of propitiation of the Almighty or of the saints, and the greater their size and splendour the more effective they were held to be for their purpose.
Commentary, p. 425 sqq, and especially his article " Propitiation" in Hastings's Dict.
In the earliest times of which any record remains the greater part of the west coast of India was occupied by Dravidian tribes, living under their kings in fortified villages, carrying on the simpler arts of life, and holding a faith in which the propitiation of spirits and demons played the chief part.