purification rite


Concepts of purity and pollution

General concepts







Purity and pollution in relation to religious concepts


Pollution and the sacred


Pollution and sin


Pollution and the forces of evil


Categories and theories of pollution and impurity

Categories of pollution and impurity


Physiological processes


Violence and associated processes




Social classifications: classes and castes


Theories of pollution and impurity





Types of purification rites

Occasions and symbolism of purification rites

Purification rites are required whenever there has been some kind of polluting contact. In addition, cultures may institutionalize regular, periodic purification rituals on the general principle that pollution occurs all the time. Important changes of status or quests for special or sacred status may be viewed as progressions from lesser to greater states of purity, and such changes or quests thus entail rites that promote the anticipated progressions. Purification is invariably required before any contact with the sacred. Purification also is generally considered necessary after any kind of traffic with the demonic forces and black magic, because these contacts with the nether realm are viewed as polluting experiences. Purification rites also may be required before undertaking a major endeavour in order to ensure the participant’s success and a right relationship with the special powers involved in the project.

Though every culture has rituals to rectify unavoidable pollution, prescriptions of avoidance, abstention, separation, and seclusion are utilized to minimize contacts with polluting persons, objects, or places. Seclusion devices, which confine the very pure or the very polluted within an enclosed area away from other members of society, include menstrual huts, nuptial huts, and birth huts. Initiates are generally confined to special houses or isolated from the community by living for certain required periods of time in the bush or forest. Priests often withdraw to the inner rooms of temples to prepare for or to participate in contacts with the sacred; monks and nuns confine themselves or are confined to monasteries in order to remain undefiled by the world, among other reasons. Seclusion or containment may also be symbolically effected by the use of veils or by the drawing of circles or other enclosures around the object in question. Under the general heading of segregation, groups of different grades of purity may retire to their respective parts of a town when their periods of contact with other members of their community are completed for the day. Men may have special houses for their esoteric activities from which women are excluded. Impure persons may be required to cook over a separate fire; persons of different grades of purity often are not permitted to eat together, to sleep under the same roof or in the same room, and, almost universally, to marry or have sexual relations with one another. Finally, complete abstention, for a fixed period of time, from such polluting activities as sex, eating, and other sensuous indulgences is a significant aspect of purification processes in many societies around the world.

Classification of purification rites

Various kinds of avoidances and abstentions represent the passive aspect of purification. The active aspect consists of the purification rites themselves. Such rites may be classified according to the principle on which they operate.

The removal of pollution

Based on the analogy of cleansing outer dirt or stains by means of bathing or washing in everyday life, purification of man’s inner state of being is almost universally believed to be effected by rituals involving various forms of washing. The polluted individual might be required to swim or bathe in the sea, a river, a pond, or special tank. Bathing in swift-flowing streams is often considered especially effective because the rapidly flowing water not only removes the impurities but carries them away. A polluted person might wash his entire body with water or only certain parts of the body that represent the body or person as a whole—rinsing or cleaning the mouth by other means is common. Water may be poured, sprinkled, thrown, or blown upon a polluted person or object. Simply touching water is a purifying gesture in the Vedas; gazing at it is considered purificatory in Sri Lanka (Ceylon). In the absence of water various kinds of moist substances may be used—clay, mud, wet herbs, or plants. The Qurʾān (the Islāmic sacred scriptures) directs desert dwellers and travellers to rub themselves with high clean soil because of the scarcity of water. In cultures in which saliva is not considered polluting, expectorating or breathing on something may be viewed as purificatory gestures.

Other modes of purification based on the analogy of cleansing outer dirt include: the use of wind or aeration to blow or carry away the impurities; sweeping a house or certain area of the ground or brushing the polluted person or object, often with a brush made of fibres from a symbolically pure source; scraping the surface of a polluted object or utensil; shaving and cutting the hair and nails; removing clothing and washing it or destroying it; and putting on clean or new clothes.

The expulsion of pollution

Based on the analogy of expelling internal physical poisoning or corruption, a second category of purification rites involves the actions of expelling, ejecting, purging, or drawing out the pollution from the defiled person or object. The use of purgatives in purification rites to induce vomiting is not uncommon. Sweat baths and steam baths are believed to bring the impurities out of the person as symbolized by the emerging sweat. Some purification rites involve bloodletting in order to drain out impurities. The use of salt in some rites may be based on the fact that salt has drawing or draining properties. In corporate acts of expelling pollution, an entire community may purge itself of a polluted individual in its midst by excommunicating him and forcing him to leave the religious group, caste, tribe, or area.

The transfer of pollution

Closely connected with the practice of drawing pollution from the defiled person or object is the notion that pollution may be transferred from a person or community to another object that is either immune to pollution itself or that can be discarded or destroyed. The most dramatic rites embodying this principle are scapegoat ceremonies in which pollution is transferred to an animal or person by either touching, bathing with, or simply pronouncing the pollution transferred to the scapegoat. The scapegoat is then run out of town or killed, actually or symbolically. The victim may further be made into an offering or sacrifice to the gods on the general ritual principle of keeping the gods satisfied. In the classic scapegoat ceremony of the Old Testament, as noted in Leviticus, chapter 16, the animal—called Azazel (a desert demon)—was simply released to wander the wilderness; in Bali (in Indonesia) birds act as scapegoats and are then released to fly away.

Less dramatically, pollution may be transferred to a relatively worthless talisman (charm). Some talismans are regarded as convenient because they are disposable and of little value; after they have served their purposes in specific situations they are thrown away. In Bali a three-month-old child is purified by transferring his impurities to a chicken; this chicken may then become his pet and continue to absorb the pollutions to which the child is exposed. It may never be killed or eaten, and when it dies it is buried with respect.

The destruction of pollution

Pollution is also believed to be eliminated by destroying the polluted object. The killing of the scapegoat belongs to this general category; more dramatically, a severely polluted person may himself be killed rather than being allowed the opportunity to transfer his impurities onto a more dispensable animal or object. The execution of a polluted person or a scapegoat animal often takes the form of drowning, choking, suffocating, or clubbing so that the pollution might not escape with a flow of blood. Polluted metal objects may be melted down; polluted fires are extinguished; polluted clothing, utensils, and other items are torn, broken, and often buried.

The most common means of destroying pollution is by burning the polluted objects. Fire is a most efficient destroyer; when the flame no longer exists there is virtually nothing left of the objects. Fire is generally conceived, however, as having more positive purifying properties, not only destroying pollution but creating purity.

The transformation of pollution into purity

Fire is perhaps one of the most symbolically complex phenomena in the history of human culture. It renders raw meats and vegetables into cooked and edible food, base minerals into useful and durable metals, and porous dirt and clay into watertight pottery. It destroys the forests and brushlands, but its ashes make the earth fertile and productive. Fire is thus viewed as a powerful transformer of the negative to the positive. Because of such properties, fire is commonly found in purification rites throughout the world. Polluted persons may be required to walk around, jump over, or jump through fire. Polluted items may be singed, fumigated, or smoked. The widespread use of incense smoke in purification rites is based on the transforming powers of fire, as well as on the additional purificatory powers of sweet smells. Polluted persons or things may be rubbed with ashes or soot, and polluted objects may be boiled, subject to the double purificatory powers of fire and water. Exposure to sun and to intense heat are also regarded as practices falling into this same general category. The extinguishing of old fires in temples and villages and the kindling of new ones are common practices after a death or as part of annual renewal and purification ceremonies. Alchemic experiments, which attempt to purify mineral substances and turn them into gold, involve boiling or melting down the solution or elements over pure and intense heat and then recrystallizing them in newer and higher forms (see also alchemy; Taoism).

The introduction of purity

In addition to the cleansing, purging, destruction, and transformation of pollution, most purification rites involve the positive introduction of purity. Many phenomena are considered inherently pure; ingestion of, or contact with, or simply exposure to such phenomena is believed to bring purity to the object of the ritual.

Objects, activities, or persons commonly considered to have intrinsic purity cross-culturally include: fire; water; sweet smells created by flowers, fragrant plants and herbs, perfumes, fragrant oils, or incense; milk, ghee, and other dairy products; white objects; earth in its natural form; sacred objects (e.g., relics) and sacred personages (e.g., priests); the recitation of spells, incantations, and names of gods; magical amulets and stones; gold and, in one culture or another, silver, bronze, jade, and crystal; virgins; the right as opposed to the left side of things in many cultures (e.g., the Abaluyia of Kenya); morning, sunshine, and daylight as opposed to darkness; whole or perfect objects, including circles and wheels and perfect numbers—e.g., the number nine (because the digits of any of its square products always add up to nine) or four (because quaternity is viewed as perfection); and physically perfect specimens of their species. In addition, cultures idiosyncratically define certain things as pure because of special cultural associations: cow dung and cow urine are pure in Hinduism because of the sacredness of the cow; dogs are considered to be pure in Zoroastrianism (a religion founded in the 6th century bc by the Iranian prophet Zoroaster) because as scavengers they purify the world for everyone else (most cultures view dogs as impure because of their scavenging habits); and all cool things are considered pure among the Lovedu of South Africa because pollution is associated with heat.

Other purification rites

Purification practices in which pollution is introduced qua pollution in order to achieve purity are also found in various religions and cultures. These rather paradoxical practices work on several different principles. The use of garlic, sulfur, or an amulet made of impure materials apparently operates on the principle of like attracting like; the impure amulet draws the impurity encountered in some situation toward itself, thus preventing it from polluting the wearer of the charm. Another set of practices apparently works on an inoculation principle—a baby, a magical implement, or a special work area may be briefly exposed to menstrual blood, for example, to protect it against future pollution from the same kind of item. A third group of such paradoxical practices, found primarily in Asian religions, involves immersing oneself in what is viewed as utter pollution, either by meditating on foul things or by actually keeping oneself permanently unclean, in order to achieve transcendence over pollution. Ordeals, mutilations, and blood rituals in general may also be regarded as fitting the transcendence pattern.

In highly developed and elaborated systems of thought, purity and pollution meet and merge. Buddhist monks are considered to be extremely pure, yet they are directed to make their robes from cemetery cloths, and beds or litters used in funerals may be donated to their monasteries. Buddhist relics with great purifying power are often composed of bits of hair, nails, and bones (albeit of the Buddha or other great saints); in Sri Lanka the word (dhātu) for such relics is the same as the word for semen. Monks and nuns of Jainism (an Indian religion founded by Mahavira in the 6th century bc) are ordered not to bathe and under no circumstances to clean their teeth. In Hinduism, if a Brahmin (a member of the highest caste) enters a street of the untouchables (outcastes), he is polluted, but the whole street also falls prey to disease, famine, and sterility. In a Burmese folktale, an alchemist became discouraged with his experiments and threw his alchemic stone into a latrine pit; on contact with the excrement, the stone achieved purity—thus indicating that contacts with pollution may bring about purity.

Many rituals considered to effect purification do not utilize any of the specific purifying techniques outlined above. They simply make use of techniques believed to have generalized ritual efficacy, no matter what the disorder. Thus, some purification rites involve reversals, especially reversals of roles between men and women, on the general principle that they represent a return to chaos and then a change back to order. Another widely practiced ritual principle involving the symbolism of reversal is that of death and rebirth; man and the world, with all their disorders, are symbolically put to death and then symbolically renewed in a purer and better state. Because blood is associated with both life and death, the use of blood in purification rites is often central to the symbolic renewal process. Nearly all rituals involve the reading or reciting of spells, texts, or prayers that have a generalized efficacy over negative forces, and in many cases purification may be accomplished by these means without any further symbolization of cleansing or a re-creation of purity. When pollution becomes one of many possible offenses against the gods, purification may be accomplished simply by making sacrifices or offerings to the gods. Pollution often becomes identified with immoral or sinful behaviour and in such instances purification may be effected by punishment of the offender, by the offender’s spiritual atonement, or by acts of penance and virtue, such as giving alms. Purity also may become identified with the struggle against the demonic forces, and in this transcendent dimension purification is effected in rites of exorcism or in rites that placate the demons. The use of weapons in purification rites is often based on a symbolic battle with the forces of evil; the use of firecrackers in some purification rites is viewed as a means of frightening away the demons; the use of curses, abuse, ridicule, and ribaldry in purification rites among the ancient Greeks, for example, was regarded as forms of protection against the demons. Some purification rites involving blood are structured in terms of giving demons what they want in order to turn away their polluting presences (see also sacrifice).

Examples of purification rites

Most full-scale purification rites combine several of the principles outlined above. A few of the immense number of complex purification rites in the religions and cultures of the world follow.

Rite for purifying a cured leper in ancient Judaism

In the Old Testament purification rites for a person who has been cured of leprosy, as described in Leviticus, the leper and the priest meet outside the camp, and the priest examines the man to ascertain that he is cured. The priest then calls for two live, clean birds, cedar wood, a scarlet item, and hyssop (an aromatic herb). One of the birds is killed in an earthen vessel over running water. The live bird and the other ingredients are then dipped in the blood of the dead bird and used to sprinkle blood seven times upon the leper while the priest pronounces him clean. The live bird is then allowed to fly away. The leper washes his clothes, shaves off all his hair, and washes himself, after which he is allowed to enter the camp, although he must remain outdoors for seven days. On the seventh day he once again shaves off his hair, including his eyebrows, and washes his clothes and body. On the eighth day he goes to the temple to make various offerings to the Lord. The priest then takes some of the blood of one of the offerings and places it on the man’s right ear, thumb, and large toe of the right foot, after which he does the same with some oil that is being offered, also pouring some oil on the man’s head. The sacrifices are then offered to the Lord upon the altar, thus completing the required ritual: “the priest shall make atonement for him, and he shall be clean.”

The Navajo sweat-emetic rite

The Navajo sweat-emetic rite is part of most major Navajo ceremonials for curing illness or rectifying other ritual disturbances. It is specifically viewed as a rite of purification.

A ritual hut is prepared with sand paintings, and a fire is then built. A procession of patients, led by the chanter, enters the hut and circumambulates the fire, pausing at each of the four directions to sing an appropriate chant. In some cases there is fire jumping; the men are required to jump over the fire, and the women to walk as close to it as possible. The audience then enters, with men and women sitting in segregated groups. The chanter heats wooden pokers in the fire and applies them to himself, mainly on the legs, and then to all the patients. Basins in front of each patient are filled with the emetic formula, the fire procession is repeated, and the emetic is then drunk. Everyone is expected to vomit; if they do not, it is regarded as inauspicious. Vomiting is done into receptacles containing sand, and the contents of these receptacles may then be sprinkled with ashes from the pokers. A bullroarer (a heavy stone on a string that produces a deep roaring sound when whirled) is sounded outside six times and then brought in and applied to the patients. The audience leaves the hogan (hut) in procession, this time led by assistants who carry out the basins with their contents. The contents of the basins are deposited neatly in a row outside the hogan and allowed to be dispersed by the natural elements. The patients, however, remain inside the hogan, perspiring in the heat. Later, the audience re-enters; the fire is broken up and extinguished, and all remnants of it are removed to a place near the basin area. The chanter sprinkles all present with a medicinal lotion and then fumigates everyone with incense. All then leave in procession and dress outside.

The Zoroastrian “Great Purification” rite

The “Great Purification” rite (baresnum) of Zoroastrianism originally was intended for purification from serious polluting contacts, especially for corpse bearers after contact with death. The rite was later pre-empted for initiation into the priesthood, or for attaining higher statuses within it.

In preparation for this rite a priest seeks a piece of ground regarded as clean (i.e., dry and unfrequented by men or animals). He then cuts down any trees located on the area selected. Nine pits are dug in a certain arrangement; furrows are drawn around three, then around six, and finally around all nine pits. Thereafter, the whole area is covered with sand. After these activities have been completed, the priest stands outside the outer furrow, and the subject requiring purification advances to the first pit and is told to recite praises to the “Purity of Thought.” The priest, holding a stick with nine knots and with a spoon fastened to the end, uses the spoon to pour consecrated cow’s urine (gomez) upon the hands of the subject, who washes his hands with the urine three times. He then washes his entire body with gomez, progressing from the head down to the feet. The pollution is said to leave the toes in the form of a foul-smelling fly. After the one seeking purification has washed himself with gomez, the priest recites purifying formulas. This process is repeated at each of the first six pits; at a prescribed distance from the seventh pit, the subject sits down and rubs himself 15 times with sand, making sure that he is completely dry. At the seventh pit he washes his body once, from head to toe, with water; at the eighth pit he does this twice and at the ninth pit three times. His body is then fumigated with the smoke of fragrant wood, after which he dresses in clean clothes. In certain versions of the ceremony, a dog is presented to the candidate, who, after each washing at each pit, must touch the left ear of the dog with his left hand. At the end of the ceremony the candidate is required to recite the following formula: “The Evil Spirit of pollution is put down. The head and the body have become purified. The soul has been purified. The dog is holy, the priest is holy.”

The candidate then retires to a house and is required to have no contact with fire, water, cultivated land, trees, cattle, men, or women. On the fourth, seventh, and tenth days he again bathes with gomez and then with water. After the final bath he is considered “perfectly purified.”

Pollution beliefs in modern society

Pollution beliefs and fears occur in modern society as well as in any other, although they are not systematized and usually not understood as such. Racism and other forms of prejudice apparently play upon pollution fears. Of less serious consequence are such notions that warts result from masturbation (traditionally considered a polluting or impure practice in conventional Western societies), that there is something dangerous or polluting in intercourse with menstruating women, and that (as in a New York state law) men and women should not have their hair cut or beauty services performed in the same room. Physiological processes (e.g., urination and other forms of elimination) are often viewed with disgust, and as a result many modern notions of sanitation are based on not entirely rational principles. The highly developed mortuary profession (especially in Western countries) protects persons in contact with death not only from grief but probably from pollution fears as well. On the whole, however, there are fewer pollution beliefs in modern society than in traditional societies. This trend may be attributed in part to the assimilation of these beliefs into moral and religious concepts.