Scapegoat

    替罪羊

    A: I hear that Tom was fired.

    B: He was made the scapegoat, but it was the others who made mistakes.

    Note: Scapegoats are found in the Bible, Leviticus 16:8, 10, 26. The scapegoat was released, in a ceremony, into the wilderness to carry away the sins of Israel away from the camp. The Hebrew word for the goat set free in the original Biblical text was "Azazel." Translators of the Bible into English interpreted "Azazel" as a variant on the Hebrew phrase for "goat that departs," and thus came up with "escape goat." But it's possible that they were mistaken. "Azazel" was, some authorities believe, the name of a powerful demon who was believed to rule the wilderness. In any case, "scapegoat" entered the English language with Tyndale's translation of the Bible in 1530, and by the early 19th century was being used in a secular sense to describe anyone who is blamed for the sins or faults of another.