BATH, BATHING The numerous cere monial washings required by the Mosaic law, to secure the proper cleanliness of the priests (Lev. viii. 6 ; Exod. xxviii. 4), and to serve as a purifica tion from the various kinds of Levitical or actual defilement (Lev. xii.-xx), or as a symbolical re presentation of innocence (Dent. xxi. 1-9 ; Matt. xxvii. 24), will be found described under ABLU TION. These religious ordinances were, however, closely connected with the ordinary rules of clean liness, to which they wisely gave a religious sanc tion. It was not until a late period of Jewish history that the Pharisaical spirit of formalism obscured their moral significance by attaching to them that intrinsic value, and insisting on that scrupulous and exaggerated attention to their small est particulars, which was exposed and discouraged by our Lord (Mark vii. 1-5 ; Matt. xxiii. 25 ; Luke xi. 39, etc.) The practice of bathing, which was thus incul cated as a civil and religious obligation, is in the East not only important, but necessary as the only sure preventive of cutaneous and other diseases (Lev. xiv. 8 ; xv. 5, etc.) The extreme heat and consequent perspiration, the arid and burning soil, the bites of insects, and the abundance of dust and sand, snake bathing a pleasure as well as a duty. Accordingly we find traces of the practice at all periods of Jewish history. In Egypt the bathing in the water of the Nile was universal (Exod. ii. 5 ; vii. 15; Herod. ii. 37), and with the Egyptians, as with the Hindus, it partook of the character of an act of worship. The obvious ad vantage of washing in a running stream, caused the Hebrews to resort to it when practicable (Lev. xv. 13; 2 Kings v. I I) ; but as the streams of Judea are few and small, often disappearing altogether at the hottest season of the year (Job vi. 15, 19, etc.), their place was supplied, as far as possible, by housebaths (2 Sam. xi. 2; Susan. xv.), and by public pools. Women, as in modern times, usually anointed themselves after the bath (Ruth iii. 3) with oil (2 Sam. xiv. 2), or sweet odours (Esth. ii. I2 ; Judith x. 3), and the use of oil for this purpose was also very general among men. [ANOINTING.] We
are told in the Mischna that women sometimes used bran as well as water (Pesach. ii. 7, quoted in Herzog .Encykl. s. v.) The Arabs to this day sometimes use earth for a similar pnrpose, but it is most improbable that there is any reference to such a custom in 2 Kings v. 17. (Winer, Reahart,s. v., Baden.) The pools (eoXtmghOpai) of Hezekiah and of Solomon were probably public baths (Neh. ii. 14 ; iii. 16 ; 2 Kings xx. 20 ; Joseph. de Bell yita'. v. 4. 2), as were also Siloam (John ix. 7) and Beth esda.* The latter, from its healing virtue, was adorned, like modern Oriental baths, with five colonnades for the protection of those who resorted to it. From Neh. iv. 23 we see that the use of the bath was not omitted even in times of great danger. Large buildings for bathing purposes, like those in use among the Romans, were probably unknown to the Jews, until they were introduced with other heathen customs in the time of Antiochus (Joseph. Antiq. xix. 7. 5). We must assume that a bath formed part of the Ephebeum built by Jason, the apostate high-priest, at Jerusalem (2 Mac. iv. 9, 13). Similar baths were built on a great scale by the Herods, at the hot springs of Tiberias, Gadara, and Calirrhoe. The medicinal value of sulphurous springs in bathing was known at a very early period, and the discovery of some, to the east of the Dead Sea, by Anah, one of the Dukes of Edom, is men tioned in Gen. xxxvi. 24 (where o+n+ should be rendered hot springs,' not mules,' as in A. V.) The promiscuous use of these public baths led the Jews, in some cases, to feel ashamed at the badge of their national covenant, and to obliterate its effects (i Mace. i. 15 ; Joseph. Autiq. xii. 5. I ; Cor. vii. The art of swimming was gene rally known,. hut is not often alluded to (Is. xxv. Is ; Ezek. xlvii. 5 ; Acts xxvii. 42).
The constant washing of the feet, rendered neces sary by the use of sandals and the nature of the soil, is mentioned in Gen. xviii. 4; xxiv. 32; 24. Like the pouring water on the hands' (2 Kings iii. si), it was usually performed by servants or inferiors (I Sam. xxv. 41 ; I Tim. v. so ; John xiii. 5, 6).—F. W. F.