ADJURATION. - In a broad sense, it means the interposition of any higher moral authority, in order to move a person to perform or omit a determined action. Thus one appeals to maternal love, to patriotism, to honor, etc., in order to impel more effectively to act in a determined way (cf. Cant. 2:7; 3:5; 5:8-9; 8:4). Understood as an act of religion, adjuration consists in the direct or indirect invocation of the name of God in order to induce others to something by command or by prayer.
By adjuration a twofold effect is intended: to impel the person adjured to grant what is commanded or asked, and to move God to induce that person to the desired result. Adjuration, however, is not directed in itself to creating an obligation, but only to arousing a sentiment of love or fear toward God, by virtue of which the person adjured may be moved to grant what is intended. Adjuration must be distinguished from the oath (v.), in which the divine authority is invoked to "confirm" what one says or promises, and from prayer (v.), by which one "asks" something of God.
Adjuration can be deprecative or imperative, according as it is made with prayer or with command. Indeed, one who adjures sometimes supplicates and sometimes commands, according to the superior or inferior condition of the person adjured. Deprecative adjuration is, for example, that which the devil himself uses: I adjure thee, do not torment me (Mk. 5:7; cf. Lk. 8:28). Imperative is, for example, that addressed by Caiaphas to Jesus: I adjure thee, by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou art the Christ, the Son of God (Mt. 26:63). Imperative adjuration, in order to be lawful, requires that the one who adjures have the authority and the right to command and not overstep the limits of his power (cf. I Thess. 5:27).
Strictly speaking, God cannot be adjured, because one cannot have recourse to a perfection or power superior to His. This is possible only by analogy, whether the adjuration is made by God Himself, or by His attributes, by His Son, etc. Thus the formulas of adjuration must be understood: Per Dominum Nostrum I. C.; Per nativitatem... per crucem et passionem tuam, etc., libera nos, Domine. In any case, an imperative adjuration evidently cannot be addressed to God. To adjure God is more properly called obsecration. It is not lawful to adjure the devil deprecatively or imperatively in order to know or obtain something from him, because with him no friendship can be established and toward him there can be no submission (cf. I Cor. 10:20); it is lawful, however, to adjure him imperatively, so that, in the name of God, he cause no harm, whether spiritual or temporal (cf. Mk. 16:17; Lk. 9:1; 10:19; Acts 19:13). This adjuration is properly called exorcism (v.). Adjuration can be addressed only to intelligent beings, who alone are capable of undergoing the moral influence of the invocation that is expressed. To adjure, therefore, directly irrational creatures (the sun, the clouds, the hail, the storm, the water, etc.) is nonsense, unless the adjuration is addressed indirectly to the higher powers (God, the angels, the saints, the devil), on which their action, useful or harmful to us, may depend.
Adjuration is private or solemn, according as it is made by a person in a private capacity or by a minister of the Church invested with a special power.
Adjuration, in the strict sense, is an act of religion, because it is suited to express both the superiority of God and our submission to Him. Adjuration is lawful, as results from its nature, from the use of Sacred Scripture and from liturgical practice. It is required, however, that it be used with honesty (iustitia) and discretion (iudicium). Justice demands that not only the thing that one wishes to obtain by command or by prayer be honest, but also the command itself and the prayer itself. Discretion (iudicium) requires a sufficient motive, the lack of which, however, is only a slight matter. Besides these conditions, for solemn adjuration a legitimate mandate or license is required (can. 1151). Commonly, for the lawfulness of adjuration, a third condition is also enumerated, truth (veritas), in the sense that in adjuration one must have recourse to the true God, that the one who adjures truly intends to obtain the thing, and that the motivating cause be true and not deceitful (cf., on the other hand, B. H. Merkelbach, Summa theol. moralis, II, Paris 1931, n. 762). For adjuration in the sense of an act to drive away the evil eye, v. MALOCCHIO E VANA OSSERVANZA.
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Angelo Criscito