Definition of "expiate"
expiate
verb
third-person singular simple present expiates, present participle expiating, simple past and past participle expiated
(transitive, intransitive) To atone or make reparation for.
Quotations
The first change of regime came with the release of my more difficult mathematical, empirical, and scholarly work in a dozen articles in a variety of journals in an attempt to expiate my crime of having sold too many books.
2010, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, New York: Random House, page 335
(transitive) To make amends or pay the penalty for.
Quotations
And when it was required of him by the rigid laws of a haphazard justice, which in retrospect seems like every night of the week, he pressed his limp forelock into a filthy washbasin, clutched a tap in each throbbing hand, and expiated a string of crimes he didn't know he had committed until they were thoughtfully explained to him between each stroke by Mr. Willow or his representatives.
1986, John le Carré, A Perfect Spy
(transitive) To purify with sacred rites.
Quotations
Neither let there be found in thee any that shal expiate his ſonne, or daughter, making them to paſſe through the fyre: or that demandeth of ſouthſayers, and obſerueth dreames and diuinations, neither let there be a ſorcerer,
1609, The Holie Bible, […] (Douay–Rheims Bible), Doway: Lavrence Kellam, […], Devteronomie 18:10, page 435