Greek word · G3435

μολύνω

molynō

to defile

To soil, stain, smear, dirty. Figuratively to defile, pollute, make impure. Also used of violating a woman.

Appears 3 times in 3 verses of the Greek New Testament. · Updated October 23, 2026

What it means

μολύνω

[in LXX: Genesis 37:31 (טָבַל), Isaiah 59:3 (גָּאַל ni.), Zechariah 14:2 (שָׁכַב ni.), Sirach 21:28, al. ;]

to stain, soil, defile; in NT always symb. and figuratively: 1 Corinthians 8:7, Revelation 3:4 14:4.†

SYN.: μιαίνω, q.v (AS)

From G. Abbott-Smith, A Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament (1922), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

Range of meaning: To soil, stain, smear, dirty. Figuratively to defile, pollute, make impure. Also used of violating a woman.
Against the English: 'Defiled' can suggest ritual or food impurity to a modern reader. The Greek picture is a stain or smear. Here the thing stained is the person's own inner judgment, not the food or the body.
Used elsewhere in the period: LXX Genesis 37:31 (Joseph's tunic stained with blood); Isaiah 59:3 (hands defiled with blood); Jeremiah 23:11; Sirach 13:1 ('whoever touches pitch will be stained'). NT: Revelation 3:4 (soiled garments); 14:4. Related noun in 2 Cor 7:1 ('defilement of flesh and spirit').

Range of meaning: To soil, stain, smear, or make dirty, often said of clothes. By extension it means to defile: to make ritually or morally unfit. In the New Testament it is used of a 'weak conscience' that is 'defiled' (1 Cor 8:7) and of garments not soiled (Rev 3:4).
Against the English: 'Defiled' is a fair rendering, but to modern ears it sounds like moral filth or shame. The Greek picture is a stain that makes someone unfit for holy space or holy service. NIV and ESV make it reflexive ('defiled themselves'). The Greek is passive ('were not stained'), though the sense comes close to the same thing.
How it drifted: Modern readers do not share the ancient category of ritual purity. In that system some things that were not sins at all (childbirth, touching a corpse, sex within marriage) still made a person temporarily unfit for worship or holy war. Without that category, 'defiled with women' sounds as though women or sex were sinful in themselves.
Used elsewhere in the period: LXX: Gen 37:31 (Joseph's coat 'stained' with blood); Isa 59:3 (hands 'defiled' with blood); Jer 23:11 (prophet and priest 'defiled'); Zech 14:2. A striking parallel is 1 Enoch's story of the Watchers, angels who left heaven and 'defiled themselves with women' (Greek 1 Enoch 9:8; 10:11; 12:4; 15:3–4). The Greek there mostly uses the close synonym miainō. The Watchers abandoned their holy station. The 144,000 are the reverse picture: holy ones who did not.

Range of meaning: To stain, smear or soil something physically. Then to defile it in a ritual or moral sense, making it unfit for contact with the holy.
Against the English: 'Soiled' (BSB, ESV, NIV, NASB) keeps the picture of dirty clothes. 'Defiled' (KJV, WEB, YLT) keeps the sense of religious impurity. Each English word holds half of what the Greek holds together.
How it drifted: Modern 'defile' often sounds mainly sexual. In Greek molynō was broader: any staining that makes a person unfit to approach God.
Used elsewhere in the period: LXX Genesis 37:31: Joseph's brothers 'stained' his tunic with blood. LXX Song of Songs 5:3: 'I have washed my feet; how shall I soil them?' LXX Isaiah 59:3: hands 'defiled with blood'. 1 Corinthians 8:7: a weak conscience 'defiled' by eating food offered to idols. Revelation 14:4: the 144,000 'were not defiled with women', which in Revelation's imagery stands for idolatrous unfaithfulness.

1 Corinthians · 1

1 Corinthians 8:7 μολύνεται. it is defiled.

But not everyone has this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that they eat such food as if it were sacrificed to an idol. And since their conscience is weak, it is defiled.

Here: Present passive: it is being soiled or smeared. The stain does not come from the food. It comes from doing what one's own inner judgment counts as taking part in idolatry.

Revelation · 2

Revelation 3:4 ἐμόλυναν soiled

But you do have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their garments, and because they are worthy, they will walk with Me in white.

Here: Aorist tense, which views their conduct as a completed whole: 'did not stain'. The word can mean physically dirtying something and also making it ritually or morally impure. Both senses are present in this clothing image.
Revelation 14:4 ἐμολύνθησαν, was defiled,

These are the ones who have not been defiled with women, for they are virgins. They follow the Lamb wherever He goes. They have been redeemed from among men as firstfruits to God and to the Lamb.

Here: Aorist passive, "were not stained/soiled." It is the picture of a dirtied garment. Revelation uses the same verb in 3:4 for the few in Sardis "who have not soiled their garments." The category is purity, fitness to stand before God, more than shame.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.