profess Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. verb practice as a profession, teach, or claim to be knowledgeable about
    • She professes organic chemistry
  2. verb confess one's faith in, or allegiance to
    • The terrorists professed allegiance to their country
    • he professes to be a Communist
  3. verb admit (to a wrongdoing)
    confess; concede.
    • She confessed that she had taken the money
  4. verb state freely
    • The teacher professed that he was not generous when it came to giving good grades
  5. verb receive into a religious order or congregation
  6. verb take vows, as in religious order
    • she professed herself as a nun
  7. verb state insincerely
    pretend.
    • He professed innocence but later admitted his guilt
    • She pretended not to have known the suicide bomber
    • She pretends to be an expert on wine

WordNet

Pro*fess" transitive verb
Etymology
F. profès, masc., professe, fem., professed (monk or nun), L. professus, p. p. of profiteri to profess; pro before, forward + fateri to confess, own. See Confess.
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Professed ; present participle & verbal noun Professing
Definitions
  1. To make open declaration of, as of one's knowledge, belief, action, etc.; to avow or acknowledge; to confess publicly; to own or admit freely. "Hear me profess sincerely." Shak.
    The best and wisest of them all professed To know this only, that he nothing knew. Milton.
  2. To set up a claim to; to make presence to; hence, to put on or present an appearance of.
    I do profess to be no less than I seem. Shak.
  3. To present to knowledge of, to proclaim one's self versed in; to make one's self a teacher or practitioner of, to set up as an authority respecting; to declare (one's self to be such); as, he professes surgery; to profess one's self a physician.
Pro*fess" intransitive verb
Definitions
  1. To take a profession upon one's self by a public declaration; to confess. Drayton.
  2. To declare friendship. Obs. Shak.

Webster 1913