# Ritual purification

Ritual purification is the ritual prescribed by a religion by which a person, objects or places are considered to be free of uncleanliness, especially prior to the worship of a deity, and ritual purity is a state of ritual cleanliness.

## Quotes

* O angry great butting bull! O torch! O great bull of Enki, standing aggressively, coming forth from the abzu, the pure place! O Gibil the god of fire, [...] bringing forth the great torch from the abzu, lifting his head with the noble divine powers! [...] Destiny, prosperity -- the wood of destiny, wood of prosperity, and the reeds of destiny, reeds of prosperity, adorn the holy cattle-pen. Through the wool from a fair lamb and the wool from a fair kid, Gibil, the foremost, the right arm, lifting his head to heaven receives water from the holy teats of heaven. This water consecrates the heavens, it purifies the earth. It purifies the cattle in their pen. It purifies the sheep in their fold. It purifies Utu at the horizon. It purifies Nanna at the zenith of heaven. Thus may it cleanse.
** Anonymous, A hymn to Kusu, late 3rd millennium BCE, at The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature.
* Enki purifies the dwelling for you, he makes the dwelling shine for you. He consecrates the heavens for you, he makes the earth shine for you. He makes the E-kic-nu-jal, the house of the cedar forests, tower straight upward for you. He makes your majestic residence into a sacred place for you, the foundation of heaven and earth. He puts your ritual plans and majestic lustration rituals in order for you. [...] He makes the offering table resplendent for you in the sacred place. [...] He puts in order for you [...] your evening meals and morning meals. [...] He consecrates the lustration rituals and makes them shine for you. [...] Enki sets up for you the lustration rituals created in his abzu; Kusu establishes the lustration rituals created in their specific house -- the oven for oxen, sheep and bread beside the interior of the bathing chamber, those sacred lustration rituals beside the shrine! Kusu purifies the oil for the house. It is placed in readiness [...] to ensure the sacred lustration rituals are not neglected, from the majestic marshes, the vast, sacred bathing chamber, this destiny emerges: the E-kic-nu-jal, with its majestic, sacred dais, perfects the great, majestic divine powers of heaven and earth. You bathe on the majestic banks by the sacred bathing chamber; you put mountain oil on your sacred body; O Nanna, you are placed upon your majestic dais -- wrapped in majestic linen, with raised head, shining horns and the pectoral of lordship! With the majestic oil of the sacred body, the oil of lordship, oil from your great treasury, lord Ningublaga consecrates the hands on his lapis-lazuli quay, the majestic quay, the sacred quay. But from Eridug the stag of the abzu Enki purifies the oil for those hands. So that you should place sacred hands upon your offering table in the banqueting hall, the great place, your steward Kusu -- she who purifies hands and cleanses hands -- consecrates the hands. But from Eridug the stag of the abzu purifies the oil for those hands.
** Anonymous, A hymn to Nanna (Nanna E), late 3rd millennium BCE, at The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature.
* Enki, [...] the master of purification rites.
** Anonymous, A hymn to Nisaba (Nisaba A), Second Dynasty of Ur, at The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature.
* Cleanliness is next to Godliness, and had better come first. Purity means singleness. God is one. The Wand is not a Wand if it has something sticking to it which is not an essential part of itself. If you wish to invoke Venus, you do not succeed if there are traces of Saturn mixed up with it.
** Aleister Crowley, Magick Book IV : Liber ABA, Magick in Theory and Practice, Ch. 13 : Of the Banishings and of the Purifications.
* The Buddhas point out the path, and it is left for us to follow that path to obtain our purification.
** Narada Maha Thera, Buddhism in a Nutshell (1933)- Ch. 1: The Buddha.
* It is not within the power of a Buddha to wash away the impurities of others. One could neither purify nor defile another. The Buddha, as Teacher, instructs us, but we ourselves are directly responsible for our purification.
** Narada Maha Thera, Buddhism in a Nutshell (1933)- Ch. 3: Is It A Religion?.

## See also

* Baptism
* Ceremony
* Chant
* Festival
* Ganges in Hinduism
* Libation
* Rite
* Worship

## External links

* Laws of Islam concerning ritual purity
* Ritual Purity in the Torah and in the Code of Jewish Law of Maimonides
* On the Essence of Ritual Impurity in Judaism
* Guide to ritual impurity: What to do at the junctions of birth and death, Vedic Vaishnava approach