To confess/profess
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The Greek verb homologeō literally means 'to say the same thing' (homos = same, legō = to say). In the NT it is translated both as 'confess' and 'profess,' and that double translation reflects a genuine range: the word covers both the confessing of sin (saying about oneself what God says — that one has done wrong) and the confessing of faith (saying about Christ what the church's testimony says — that Jesus is Lord).
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Full entry for ὁμολογέω (G3670) · Open the biblical lexicon
The Greek verb homologeō literally means 'to say the same thing' (homos = same, legō = to say). In the NT it is translated both as 'confess' and 'profess,' and that double translation reflects a genuine range: the word covers both the confessing of sin (saying about oneself what God says — that one has done wrong) and the confessing of faith (saying about.
The BSB source-word alignment has 26 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include confesses (4), . . . (1), [when you made] (1), [you] confess (1), acknowledge (1).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Matthew 7:23. Its strongest book concentrations include 1 John (5), John (4), Matthew (4), Acts (3).
This entry includes 1 verse guide that explain exact original-language forms in context.
The Greek verb homologeō literally means 'to say the same thing' (homos = same, legō = to say). In the NT it is translated both as 'confess' and 'profess,' and that double translation reflects a genuine range: the word covers both the confessing of sin (saying about oneself what God says — that one has done wrong) and the confessing of faith (saying about Christ what the church's testimony says — that Jesus is Lord).
Both uses are theological acts of alignment: the confessor comes into agreement with a truth that exists prior to and outside themselves. In the OT the Hebrew equivalent (yādāh in its hiphil form) appears in contexts of public acknowledgment of sin before God and community (Josh. 7:19; Ps. 32:5; Neh. 9:2). In the NT the verb appears across three major registers: confession of Jesus as Lord (Rom.
10:9-10; 1 John 4:2-3), confession of sins to God (1 John 1:9), and public profession before authorities (Matt. 10:32; Heb. 4:14; Heb. 13:15). What unifies them is the social and verbal character of the act: homologeō is not a private internal assent but a speech-act in relation to God, to the community, or to the world. To confess is to take a public position.
Homologeō appears approximately 26 times in the New Testament. Its distribution across the Synoptics (public declaration before people), John and the Johannine letters (confession of Christ as the test of the spirits), Paul (the confession that effects salvation), and Hebrews (holding fast to the confession) shows that no single context exhausts its meaning.
That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.
Romans 10:9 is the most theologically concentrated use of homologeō in the NT. The confession is specific: 'Jesus is Lord' — a statement with political resonance (Caesar's claim was divine lordship) as well as theological precision (it applies to Jesus the divine title Kyrios, the LXX rendering of YHWH). Paul's pairing of mouth-confession with heart-belief (10:10) shows that homologeō is not merely mental assent given verbal form, but the public-social dimension of a faith that is already inwardly held.
If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
The sin-confession register of homologeō in its pastoral form. The promise is not based on the thoroughness of the confession but on the character of God: 'he is faithful and righteous.' The verb here names the act of saying about our sin what God says — not minimizing, not excusing, but agreeing with the divine assessment. And the result is double: forgiveness (the legal clearing) and cleansing (the purifying restoration).
By this you will know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God,
The doctrinal use of homologeō as the test of spirits. The Johannine community was facing proto-Gnostic teachers who denied the incarnation. The confession 'Jesus Christ has come in the flesh' is the christological boundary marker. homologeō here is not merely a personal commitment but an objective theological claim that either aligns with or contradicts the apostolic testimony.
Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we profess.
Hebrews uses homologia (the noun form) repeatedly as the thing the Christian community must 'hold fast.' The 'confession' here is the community's public theological position about Jesus as high priest and Son of God. Holding fast to it — in the face of the pressure to revert to a Judaism without Christ — is the pastoral exhortation of the whole letter. Confession here is not a one-time act but a sustained posture.
Then I acknowledged my sin to You and did not hide my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and You forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah
While the Hebrew here uses yādāh (not homologeō directly), Psalm 32 is the OT template for the act homologeō names in 1 John 1:9. David's movement from silence (32:3-4) to spoken acknowledgment (32:5) and the immediate divine response ('you forgave') shows the same pattern: naming sin as sin before God, and receiving forgiveness as the result. The LXX uses exomologeō (a compound of homologeō) here, directly linking the OT and NT confession vocabulary.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Verse-level guides showing how this original-language form works in its specific context, including grammar, verse function, and guarded interpretation.
Greek word. Public declaration of agreement or belief, often with covenant implications in Christian confession contexts.
Textus Receptus witness, full corpus Greek token appearances from Scrivener 1894 Textus Receptus in the full New Testament corpus.
16 of 24 Greek text appearances shown. Linked morphology labels have verse guides.
I confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseI confess, profess, acknowledge, praise
Read verseFull New Testament corpus: 260 chapters, 7,957 verses, 140,628 tokens. Data source: honza/textus-receptus (data only), with authority check against byztxt/greektext-textus-receptus.
How mood, tense, and voice shift the force of this verb in context.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
How this verb appears across 26 occurrences in the NT discourse index (MACULA Greek SBLGNT).
Aspect reflects grammatical form — not authorial emphasis. Participles and infinitives are verbal adjectives and nouns respectively.
Clause data: MACULA Greek (Clear Bible, CC BY 4.0) · SBLGNT (Logos/SBL, CC BY 4.0)
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Showing 8 selected witnesses from 26 lexical occurrence verses.
ὁμολογέω is built from these roots:
Public acknowledgment of Jesus as Lord demonstrates genuine faith. 1 John 1:5-10
Public allegiance to Christ carries eternal consequences. 1 John 2:18-23
Defines public allegiance to Christ. 1 John 4:1-6
Represents alignment with God’s evaluation of sin, forming the pathway to restored fellowship. 1 John 4:13-16
Public affirmation of Jesus as the Christ functions as the dividing line between truth and deception.
Public affirmation of Jesus’ incarnation marks alignment with the Spirit of God.
Public affirmation of Jesus as Son of God anchors abiding relationship.
Confession is not vague regret but agreement with God’s truth, restoring fellowship through reliance on His promise.
Public and doctrinal affirmation of Christ is essential to genuine fellowship with God.
Public affirmation of the incarnate Christ marks the Spirit’s work.
Doctrinal confession is inseparable from genuine abiding.
Compound and idiomatic phrases that include this word. Follow a link to study the phrase and how its parts work together.
Homologeō teaches the preacher that Christian faith is, by its nature, a public act. The privatization of Christianity — the reduction of faith to a personal and interior experience that need never be named aloud — is precisely what homologeō resists. Romans 10:9-10 makes mouth-confession an inseparable partner of heart-belief: not because speaking generates salvation, but because genuine faith produces the willingness to say aloud, before God and people, what one actually believes.
The same verbal character applies to confession of sin: 1 John 1:9 promises forgiveness to the person who says to God what God already knows — that we have sinned. The act of naming is not magic, but it is real: it positions the confessor in relation to the truth rather than in evasion of it. The preacher who handles homologeō well will press both directions: the ongoing confession of faith that 'holds fast' to who Jesus is (Hebrews), and the ongoing confession of sin that receives ongoing cleansing (1 John).
Both are sustained postures, not one-time events. And both resist the tendency toward a comfortable privatized religion that never has to say out loud, in relationship, what it actually believes or what it has actually done.
Rom.10.9
Homologeō is a compound of homos (same) and legō (to say): to say the same as, to agree with, to acknowledge. The related noun is homologia, and the intensified compound exomologeō adds the idea of full or open acknowledgment. The word's etymology is important pastorally: confessing is coming into agreement with a truth that stands prior to and outside oneself.
To confess sin is to agree with God's assessment; to confess Christ is to align oneself with the apostolic testimony. Neither is self-generated; both are a submission of the self to what is given.
The OT foundation is the yādāh-vocabulary of public acknowledgment before God and community. Leviticus 5:5 and 26:40 command confession of sin as part of the sacrificial and covenant-restoration processes; Joshua 7:19 uses it in Achan's case as the act of 'giving glory to God' by naming the truth about oneself; Psalm 32:5 provides the personal paradigm. The LXX bridges these with exomologeō, which the NT picks up in both confession-of-sin and confession-of-faith contexts.
Romans 10:9-10 and 1 John 1:9 are the NT's major pastoral deployments, and Philippians 2:11 ('every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord') extends the eschatological horizon: the confession that the church now makes by faith, the whole creation will eventually make by sight.
MorphGNT Strong's Dictionary XML — CC0 1.0 Public Domain
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible (morphhb/OSHB) — CC BY 4.0
Open Scriptures Hebrew Lexicon — CC BY 4.0
Berean Standard Bible (BSB) source-word alignment - CC0 Public Domain