cleansing rites
Sacred purifying ceremonies
Cleansing rites are ceremonial practices intended to purify a person, place, or object of spiritual contamination.
Many religions prescribe them after contact with death, illness, childbirth, or sin: The cleansing rites required seven days of isolation.
The rituals vary widely—bathing, burning incense, sprinkling water, reciting prayers—but share the purpose of restoring purity or readiness for sacred participation.
- sweat lodgeHeated structure for ritual purification
- lustrationCleansing rite or vetting
- ablutionRitualized washing of body
- fumigationDisinfection via airborne chemicals
- holy waterSacramental liquid for blessings
shamanic healing · baptism · smudging · mikveh · incense burning · exorcism · sin eater · confession booth · hyssop · sanctification · vision quests · detoxification · sacrament · anointing · initiation ceremonies · mindfulness practice · meditation · tea ceremony
- Biblical Ritualsburnt offerings, altar offering, drink offering, thank offering, temple worship
- indigenous beliefsshamans, ancestor spirits, nature spirits, spirit world, ancestor veneration
- Mosaic lawMoses, Mosaic law, Ten Commandments, tablets of stone, commandment
- puritypure, purity, pristine, spotless, spotlessness
- tribal healingmedicine man, medicine woman, traditional healers, healer, curandero
- ritual puritymikvah, mikveh, purity laws, impurity, tevilah
cleansing ritesdefilement
Act of corrupting purity
pollution · desecration · contamination · profanation · sacrilege
cleansing ritesdamnation
Eternal punishment decree
corruption · sin · spiritual death · condemnation · perdition
cleanse, cleansed, cleanser, cleansers, clean, cleans, cleaned, cleaning, cleaner