Wordnet 3.0
ADJECTIVE (2)
1.
morally or legally constraining or binding;
- Example: "attendance is obligatory"- Example: "an obligatory contribution"2.
required by obligation or compulsion or convention;
- Example: "he made all the obligatory apologies"
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Obligatory \Ob"li*ga*to*ry\, a. [L. obligatorius: cf. F.
obligatoire.]
Binding in law or conscience; imposing duty or obligation;
requiring performance or forbearance of some act; -- often
followed by on or upon; as, obedience is obligatory on a
soldier.
[1913 Webster]
As long as the law is obligatory, so long our obedience
is due. --Jer. Taylor.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
obligatory
adj 1: morally or legally constraining or binding; "attendance
is obligatory"; "an obligatory contribution" [ant:
optional]
2: required by obligation or compulsion or convention; "he made
all the obligatory apologies"
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
38 Moby Thesaurus words for "obligatory":
absolute, binding, choiceless, compulsory, conclusive, de rigueur,
decisive, decretory, demanded, dictated, entailed, essential,
exigent, final, hard-and-fast, imperative, imperious, importunate,
imposed, incumbent, indispensable, inevitable, involuntary,
irrevocable, mandated, mandatory, must, necessary, necessitous,
peremptory, prescript, prescriptive, required, requisite, ultimate,
urgent, without appeal, without choice