Discharge as a legal concept: satisfaction of obligations or judicial release of a debtor's monetary liabilities. Discharge operates in two principal senses: the payment or satisfaction of a debt or other enforceable obligation, and the release of a debtor from monetary obligations following a bankruptcy adjudication. As a legal mechanism, discharge effects either completion of performance by satisfying the obligation or a judicially ordered release that extinguishes the debtor's monetary liabilities arising from insolvency proceedings.