abjure
Americanverb (used with object)
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to renounce, repudiate, or retract, especially with formal solemnity; recant.
to abjure one's errors.
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to renounce or give up under oath; forswear.
to abjure allegiance.
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to avoid or shun.
verb
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to renounce or retract, esp formally, solemnly, or under oath
-
to abstain from or reject
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of abjure
1400–50; late Middle English < Latin abjūrāre to deny on oath, equivalent to ab- ab- + jūrāre to swear; see jury 1
Explanation
Abjure means to swear off, and it applies to something you once believed. You can abjure a religious faith, you can abjure your love of another person, and you can abjure the practice of using excessive force in interrogation. Abjure is a more dramatic way to declare your rejection of something you once felt or believed. When you see its Latin roots, it makes sense: from ab- (meaning "away") and jurare ("to swear"). When you abjure something, you swear it away and dissociate yourself with it. You might abjure the field of astrology after receiving a bad fortune, or you might abjure marriage after a bitter divorce.
Vocabulary lists containing abjure
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
By 1907, when Sargent was 51, he’d had enough: “No more paughtraits,” he wrote in a now-famous note, “I abhor and abjure them and hope never to do another especially of the Upper Classe.”
From Washington Post • Mar. 5, 2020
Constitutionally, the role of the monarch is to keep his or her mouth shut, to abjure what Elizabeth, in “The Queen,” calls “the sheer joy of being partial.”
From New York Times • Nov. 6, 2019
People who are otherwise deemed sceptical abjure their reason and believe in miracles.
From The Guardian • Apr. 10, 2019
Johnson managed to abjure his past and, on the march toward an exceptionally successful career, leave it behind.
From The New Yorker • Dec. 12, 2018
On July 5 Zabarella and Peter d’Ailly sent for him and offered to let him deny the heresies proved by witnesses if he would abjure those extracted from his books.
From A History of The Inquisition of The Middle Ages; volume II by Lea, Henry Charles
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
