shrive

American  

[shrahyv] / ʃraɪv /

verb (used with object)

shrove, shrived, shriven, shrived, shriving

1. to impose penance on (a sinner).

2. to grant absolution to (a penitent).

3. to hear the confession of (a person).

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verb (used without object)

Archaic.

shrove, shrived, shriven, shrived, shriving

1. to hear confessions.

2. to go to or make confession; confess one's sins, as to a priest.

shrive British  

/ ʃraɪv /

verb

1. to hear the confession of (a penitent)

2. (tr) to impose a penance upon (a penitent) and grant him sacramental absolution

3. (intr) to confess one's sins to a priest in order to obtain sacramental forgiveness

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Other Word Forms

• shriver
  noun
• unshrived
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of shrive

First recorded before 900; Middle English shriven, schrifen, Old English scrīfan “to prescribe, impose a penance on (a penitent),” cognate with German schreiben “to write,” ultimately from Latin scrībere “to write, draw”; see scribe ¹

Explanation

To shrive is to hear someone's confession and forgive them. It's not easy, but once your brother has admitted to reading your diary and apologized, it's best to shrive him and move on. Though this verb is mainly considered to be archaic, you may occasionally come across it in the context of a Catholic priest absolving someone of sin. You can also shrive yourself by laying your sins or misdeeds on the table, in hopes of absolution and forgiveness: "After my friend was blamed for stealing those cookies, I decided to shrive myself and promise never to do it again."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

shrive shrived shriven shriving shrove

No play to make first-night audiences shrive themselves for past sins is American Landscape.

From Time Magazine Archive

For the sake of Simon Peter, Who so gladly would us shrive, We are walking in the sunlight, We are breathing and alive.

From Two Fishers, and Other Poems by Palmer, Herbert Edward

I pray thee, shrive me, that my guilty soul May quit in peace this tenement of clay.

From Olla Podrida by Marryat, Frederick

Let him shrive me, for I am not at all points ready to die....

From Idonia: A Romance of Old London by Wallis, Arthur F.

By our Lady, I will go with you!" he cried, "to shrive the dying.

From Corse de Leon, Volume I (of 2) or, The Brigand; a Romance by James, G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford)

The dying man's ears, nose, mouth, hands, feet by holy unction were shrived.

From Time Magazine Archive

"Father, thou hast shrived many a parting soul!" observed, rather than asked, the other.

From The Bravo by Cooper, James Fenimore

A holy friar who shrived the dying man told me the name of him who fell was Gaspar.

From Olla Podrida by Marryat, Frederick

The past has shrived and buried deep, All yesterdays; there let them sleep.

From The Optimist's Good Morning by Perin, Florence Hobart

He had affirmed his innocence to the end, had been shrived, had gone to the gallows with a dauntless tread, and there were palm branches on his coffin.

From Myths & Legends of our New Possessions & Protectorate by Skinner, Charles M. (Charles Montgomery)

Then I grab the lever, record myself with a manly fling, and walk out, shriven, to go to work.

From The New Yorker ● Nov. 5, 2018

I mean the midlife crisis story, in which a man suddenly finds himself shriven of the beliefs that have hitherto defined him.

From New York Times ● Feb. 15, 2017

But 30,000ft above the Atlantic, he is seized by the need to be shriven, and makes his confession to a cassette recorder he addresses as "Father Sony".

From The Guardian ● Feb. 21, 2011

She died, still pregnant, but properly shriven, and within a minute Dr. Corbit had her abdomen open and a 34-lb. girl in an incubator.

From Time Magazine Archive

“I swear by heaven, though now I must be shriven for doing so! Therefore come, let us go and together lose our sins.”

From "Ophelia" by Lisa Klein

For Italy's 45,000,000 people, surrender came as a national shriving, a chance for national redemption.

From Time Magazine Archive

There are those who suggest irreverently that Miss Nichols is shriving herself before the critics by importing accredited Art.

From Time Magazine Archive

"How can I die better than shriving a fellow sinner?"

From And Thus He Came A Christmas Fantasy by Brady, Cyrus Townsend

“They need little shriving that are opposite my culverin,” said this strange priest. 

From A Monk of Fife by Lang, Andrew

When I lack shriving, I will go to a priest.

From One Snowy Night Long ago at Oxford by Irwin, M. (Madelaine)

But the neighbouring wives, Who ne'er shrove in their lives,— Such wickedness Sathanas whispers!—

From The Baron's Yule Feast: A Christmas Rhyme by Cooper, Thomas

Shrovetide was, in times gone by, a season of such mirth that shroving, or to shrove, signified to be merry.

From Folk-lore of Shakespeare by Thiselton-Dyer, Thomas Firminger

It was I who shrove him when he lay dying of his wounds, and a nobler soul never passed from earth to heaven.

From The Brethren by Haggard, Henry Rider

To be shriven, or shrove, means to obtain absolution from one's sin.

From Old English Sports, Pastimes and Customs by Ditchfield, P. H. (Peter Hampson)