(“bath”) Bathing is likely the most widely practiced Hindu
religious ritual, as it is required prior to completing any ceremony or devotion.
Almost all Hindus take an early morning bath, and this has
been the case for millennia.
Because some of the early European visitors bathed just a
few times throughout their lifetimes, this habit was always noted.
Bathing is a technique for Hindus to reclaim ceremonial
purity by removing any cause of pollution via the use of water (most often).
Cleaning one's teeth and tongue, washing one's mouth
(achamana), and voiding one's bladder and intestines (just before bathing) are
usually the final parts of one's morning rituals.
These later activities are necessary in life, but they also
make one ritually dirty, which the bath cleanses.
People usually practice their daily devotion just after
washing, when the ceremonial purity is still intact.
The majority of people simply wash in the morning, while
individuals who are very concerned with cleanliness (usually brahmins or
ascetics) will bathe more often.
The bath itself is generally quick, consisting of only
immersing oneself in a natural body of water or dumping a bucket of water over
one's head in certain situations.
People nowadays often use soap, yet earth has long been
recommended as a washing medium.
Swimming with rushing water is desirable because it cleanses
by eliminating the impurities (ashaucha) and taking it away; although bathing
in a huge pond is permissible, bathing in a bathtub is considered as just
spreading the impurity about rather than eradicating it.
Although water is the most popular bathing medium, if this
is not possible, one might ritually wash oneself with oil or with mantras,
which use holy sounds to eliminate contamination and restore one to a state of
ceremonial purity.
Snana is the sixth of sixteen customary upacharas
("offerings") made to a god as part of devotion, and is based on the
paradigm of treating the deity as an honored guest.
The god is bathed in this sacrifice, either literally or
metaphorically.
The fundamental aim, like with other upacharas, is to
demonstrate one's affection for the god and to minister to the deity's
necessities.
