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Atone vs Reconcile - What's the difference?

atone | reconcile |

As verbs the difference between atone and reconcile

is that atone is to make reparation, compensation, or amends, for an offence or a crime or a sin one has committed while reconcile is to restore a friendly relationship; to bring back to harmony.

atone

English

Verb

(aton)
  • To make reparation, compensation, or amends, for an offence or a crime or a sin one has committed.
  • (proscribed) To clear (someone else) of wrongdoing, especially by standing as an equivalent.
  • Synonyms

    * (to make reparation) expiate, propitiate

    Derived terms

    () * atonable * atoneable * atonement * atoner

    reconcile

    English

    (reconciliation)

    Verb

    (reconcil)
  • To restore a friendly relationship; to bring back to harmony.
  • to reconcile people who have quarrelled
  • To make things compatible or consistent.
  • to reconcile differences
  • * Alexander Pope
  • Some figures monstrous and misshaped appear, / Considered singly, or beheld too near; / Which, but proportioned to their light or place, / Due distance reconciles to form and grace.
  • * John Locke
  • The great men among the ancients understood how to reconcile manual labour with affairs of state.
  • To make the net difference in credits and debits of a financial account agree with the balance.
  • Derived terms

    * reconciliation