Definition of "absolve"

absolve

/əbˈzɒlv/

verb
third-person singular simple present absolves, present participle absolving, simple past and past participle absolved
1. (transitive) To set free, release or discharge (from obligations, debts, responsibility etc.).
  Quotations
  Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world.
  1841, Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance”, in Essays: First Series
  The Committee divided, and Halifax was absolved by a majority of fourteen.
  1851, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter XIV, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume III, London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, page 410
2. (transitive, obsolete) To resolve; to explain; to solve.
  Quotations
  […] he that can monsters tame, laboures atchive, riddles absolve […]
  1595, George Peele, The Old Wives’ Tale, The Malone Society Reprints, 1908, lines 331-332
  we ſhall not abſolve the doubt.
  1650, Thomas Browne, “Of the blackneſſe of Negroes”, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], 6th book, page 276
3. (transitive) To pronounce free from or give absolution for a penalty, blame, or guilt.
4. (transitive, law) To pronounce not guilty; to grant a pardon for.
  Quotations
  Abſolves the juſt, and dooms the guilty ſouls.
  1725, Homer, “Book XI”, in [Alexander Pope], transl., The Odyssey of Homer. […], volume III, London: […] Bernard Lintot, page 121, line 702
5. (transitive, theology) To grant a remission of sin; to give absolution to.
  Quotations
  To make confession and to be absolved.
  1597, William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, act 3, scene 5
6. (transitive, theology) To remit a sin; to give absolution for a sin.
  Quotations
  In his name I abſolve your perjury and ſanctify your arms: follow my footſteps in the paths of glory and ſalvation; and if ſtill ye have ſcruples, devolve on my head the puniſhment and the ſin.
  1788, Edward Gibbon, chapter LXVII, in The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume VI, London: […] W[illiam] Strahan; and T[homas] Cadell, […], page 447
7. (transitive, obsolete) To finish; to accomplish.
  Quotations
  and the work begun, how ſoon / Abſolv'd,
  1667, John Milton, “Book VII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […]; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, lines 93–94
8. (transitive) To pass a course or test; to gain credit for a class; to qualify academically.

Definition of "absolve"

absolve

verb

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