burnt offering
nounUK /bɜːnt ˈɒfəɹɪŋ/ · US /bɝnt ˈɔfəɹɪŋ/
Etymology PIE word *h₁epi From Middle English brend offring, brend offringe, from brend (past participle of brennen (“to burn”)) + offring, offringe (“presentation of something as a religious offering; offering presented to God or another deity”), used in biblical texts to translate Late Latin holocaustum (“burnt offering wholly consumed by fire”) in the Vulgate version of the Bible. The English term is analysable as burnt + offering.
1
Biblical, Lifestyle, Religion A slaughtered animal offered and burnt on an altar as an atonement for sin.
- […] Job ſent for them, and clenſed them agayne, ſtode vp early, and offred for eueryone a brẽtofferinge [brentofferinge].1535 October 14 (Gregorian calendar), Myles Coverdale, transl., Biblia: The Byble, […] (Coverdale Bible), [Cologne or Marburg]: [Eucharius Cervicornus and Johannes Soter?], →OCLC, Job j:[5], folio i, recto, column 2:
- When they faſt I will not heare their crie, and when they offer burnt offering and an oblation I wil not accept them: but I will conſume them by the ſword, and by the famine, and by the peſtilence.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Jeremiah 14:12, column 2:
2
Lifestyle, Religion Broadly Any similar sacrifice to a deity or deities, or to a deceased person.
3
Humorous Overcooked food.
- A cooler oven would give heavy, doughy loaves while a hotter oven would provide the family with the inevitable burnt offerings.1991, Sara Minwel Tibbott, Baking in Wales, page 21: