profess

Verb

profess (third-person singular simple present professes, present participle professing, simple past and past participle professed)

1. (transitive, chiefly passive voice) To administer the vows of a religious order to (someone); to admit to a religious order.
   • This swayed the balance decisively in Mary's favour, and she was professed on 8 September 1578.2000, Butler's Lives of the Saints, page 118
2. (reflexive) To declare oneself (to be something).
   • They've professed themselves delighted with the results.
   • Kiefer professes himself amused by the fuss that ensued when he announced that he was buying the Mülheim-Kärlich reactor[…].2011 December 9, Alex Needham, “Anselm Kiefer: ‘Art is difficult, it's not entertainment’”, in The Guardian
3. (ambitransitive) To declare; to assert, affirm.
   • Having professed her belief in the remedy, she had little choice but to try it.
   • He professes to haue receiued no sinister measure from his Iudge, but most willingly humbles himselfe to the determination of Iustice[…].c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Measure for Measure”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
4. (transitive) To make a claim (to be something); to lay claim to (a given quality, feeling etc.), often with connotations of insincerity.
   • Many profess to despise what secretly they hunger after.
   • Ed Miliband professed ignorance of the comment when he was approached by the BBC later.2010 September 28, Hélène Mulholland, “David Miliband voices displeasure during Labour leader's speech”, in The Guardian
5. (transitive) To declare one's adherence to (a religion, deity, principle etc.).
   • [N]ow ſuch a liue vngodly, vvithout a care of doing the wil of the Lord (though they profeſſe him in their mouths, yea though they beleeue and acknowledge all the Articles of the Creed, yea haue knowledge of the Scripturs) yet if they liue vngodly, they deny God, and therefore ſhal be denied, […]1604, Jeremy Corderoy, A Short Dialogve, wherein is Proved, that No Man can be Saved without Good VVorkes, 2nd edition, Oxford: Printed by Ioseph Barnes, and are to be sold in Paules Church-yard at...
   • The remainder of the population, about two-thirds, belongs to the Mongolian race and professes Buddhism.1983, Alexander Mcleish, The Frontier Peoples of India, Mittal Publications, published 1984, page 122
6. (transitive) To work as a professor of; to teach.
   • he was a Spaniard, who about two hundred yeeres since professed Physicke in Tholouse[…].1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 12, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC
7. (archaic, transitive) To claim to have knowledge or understanding of (a given area of interest, subject matter).