Chapter IX.—Why We are to Use the Bath.

There are, then, four reasons for the bath (for from that point I digressed in my oration), for which we frequent it: for cleanliness, or heat, or health, or lastly, for pleasure. Bathing for pleasure is to be omitted. For unblushing pleasure must be cut out by the roots; and the bath is to be taken by women for cleanliness and health, by men for health alone.620    [The morals of Clement as to decency in bathing need to be enforced among modern Christians, at seaside places of resort.] To bathe for the sake of heat is a superfluity, since one may restore what is frozen by the cold in other ways. Constant use of the bath, too, impairs strength and relaxes the physical energies, and often induces debility and fainting. For in a way the body drinks, like trees, not only by the mouth, but also over the whole body in bathing, by what they call the pores. In proof of this often people, when thirsty, by going afterwards into the water, have assuaged their thirst. Unless, then, the bath is for some use, we ought not to indulge in it. The ancients called them places for fulling621    ἀνθρωπογναφεῖα. men, since they wrinkle men’s bodies sooner than they ought, and by cooking them, as it were, compel them to become prematurely old. The flesh, like iron, being softened by the heat, hence we require cold, as it were, to temper and give an edge. Nor must we bathe always; but if one is a little exhausted, or, on the other hand, filled to repletion, the bath is to be forbidden, regard being had to the age of the body and the season of the year. For the bath is not beneficial to all, or always, as those who are skilled in these things own. But due proportion, which on all occasions we call as our helper in life, suffices for us. For we must not so use the bath as to require an assistant, nor are we to bathe constantly and often in the day as we frequent the market-place. But to have the water poured over us by several people is an outrage on our neighbours, through fondness for luxuriousness, and is done by those who will not understand that the bath is common to all the bathers equally.

But most of all is it necessary to wash the soul in the cleansing Word (sometimes the body too, on account of the dirt which gathers and grows to it, sometimes also to relieve fatigue). “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!” saith the Lord, “for ye are like to whited sepulchres. Without, the sepulchre appears beautiful, but within it is full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.”622    Matt. xxiii. 27. And again He says to the same people, “Woe unto you! for ye cleanse the outside of the cup and platter, but within are full of uncleanness. Cleanse first the inside of the cup, that the outside may be clean also.”623    Matt. xxiii. 25, 26. The best bath, then, is what rubs off the pollution of the soul, and is spiritual. Of which prophecy speaks expressly: “The Lord will wash away the filth of the sons and daughters of Israel, and will purge the blood from the midst of them”624    Isa. iv. 4.—the blood of crime and the murders of the prophets. And the mode of cleansing, the Word subjoined, saying, “by the spirit of judgment and the spirit of burning.” The bathing which is carnal, that is to say, of the body, is accomplished by water alone, as often in the country where there is not a bath.625    Isa. iv. 4.

Τίνος ἕνεκεν τὸ λουτρὸν παραληπτέον. Βαλανείου τοίνυν–ἐντεῦθεν γὰρ ἀπετράπην λέγων– τέσσαρές εἰσιν αἰτίαι, καθ' ἃς ἐπ' αὐτὸ παραγινόμεθα· ἢ γὰρ καθαριότητος ἕνεκα ἢ ἀλέας ἢ ὑγιείας ἢ τελευταῖον ἡδονῆς. Ἡδονῆς μὲν οὖν ἕνεκα λοῦσθαι παραπεμπτέον· ἄρδην γὰρ τὴν ἀναίσχυντον ἡδονὴν ἐκκοπτέον. Παραληπτέον δὲ τὸ λουτρὸν ταῖς μὲν γυναιξὶ καθαριότητος ἕνεκεν καὶ ὑγιείας, ὑγείας δὲ μόνης ἀνδράσι. Περιττὸν δὲ τὸ τῆς ἀλέας ἐξὸν δὲ καὶ ἄλλως παραμυθεῖσθαι τὸ κατεσκληκὸς ὑπὸ κρύους. Αἱ δὲ τοῦ βαλανείου συνεχεῖς χρήσεις καθαιροῦσι τὰς δυνάμεις καὶ τοὺς φυσικοὺς χαλῶσι τόνους, πολλάκις δὲ ἐκλύσεις ἄγουσι καὶ λειποθυμίας. Τρόπον γάρ τινα πίνει τὰ σώματα, ὥσπερ τὰ δένδρα, οὐ μόνον τῷ στόματι, ἀλλὰ καὶ τῇ δι' ὅλου τοῦ σώματος κατὰ τὸ λουτρόν, ὥς φασι, ποροποιίᾳ. Τεκμήριον τούτου· διψήσαντες πολλάκις ἔπειτα ἐμβάντες εἰς τὰ ὕδατα τὴν δίψαν ἠκέσαντο. Οὔκουν εἰ πρός τι ὠφελεῖ τὸ λουτρόν, ἤδη σφᾶς ἐκλυτέον αὐτῷ· ἀνθρωπογναφεῖα ἐκάλουν αὐτὰ οἱ παλαιοί, ἐπεὶ θᾶττον ἢ προσῆκεν ῥακοῖ τὰ σώματα καὶ προγηράσκειν ἀναγκάζει καθέψοντα κατὰ τὰ αὐτὰ τῷ σιδήρῳ μαλασσομένης τῇ θερμότητι τῆς σαρκός· ἐντεῦθεν οἱονεὶ τῆς βαφῆς καὶ τῆς στομώσεως τοῦ ψυχροῦ δεόμεθα. Οὐδὲ μὴν ἑκάστοτε λουτέον, ἀλλ' εἴτε λίαν τις εἴη κενὸς ἢ αὖ πλήρης ἄγαν, παραιτητέον τὸ βαλανεῖον· ναὶ μὴν κατὰ τὴν τοῦ σώματος ἡλικίαν καὶ τοῦ ἔτους τὴν ὥραν· οὐ γὰρ πάντας ἀεὶ οὐδὲ ἀεὶ ὀνίνησιν, ὡς οἱ περὶ ταῦτα σοφοὶ ὁμολογοῦσιν. Ἡμῖν δὲ ἀπόχρη ἡ συμμετρία, ἣν πανταχοῦ βοηθὸν ἐπικαλούμεθα τῷ βίῳ· οὐδὲ γὰρ τοσοῦτον ἐνδιατριπτέον τῷ βαλανείῳ ὡς δεῖσθαι χειραγωγοῦ, οὐδὲ συνεχῶς καὶ πολλάκις τῆς ἡμέρας λούεσθαι καθάπερ εἰς ἀγορὰν θαμίζοντας. Ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ ὑπὸ πλειόνων οἰκετῶν καταιονεῖσθαι ἐξυβρίζειν ἐστὶν εἰς τοὺς πλησίον, πλεονεκτούντων τῇ τρυφῇ καὶ συνιέναι μὴ ἐθελόντων, ὡς κοινὸν ἐπ' ἴσης εἶναι τῶν λουομένων τὸ βαλανεῖον δεῖν. Λούειν δὲ δεῖ μάλιστα μὲν τὴν ψυχὴν καθαρσίῳ λόγῳ, καὶ τὸ σῶμα δὲ ἔσθ' ὅτε διὰ τὴν ἄσιν τὴν ἐπιφυομένην αὐτῷ, οὐ μὴν ἀλλ' ἔσθ' ὅτε καὶ ὑπεκλύειν τοὺς καμάτους. Οὐαὶ γὰρ ὑμῖν, γραμματεῖς καὶ Φαρισαῖοι ὑποκριταί, φησὶν ὁ κύριος, ὅτι ὅμοιοί ἐστε τάφοις κεκονιαμένοις· ἔξωθεν ὁ τάφος φαίνεται ὡραῖος, ἔνδον δὲ γέμει ὀστέων νεκρῶν καὶ πάσης ἀκαθαρσίας. Καὶ πάλιν τοῖς αὐτοῖς φησιν· Οὐαὶ ὑμῖν, ὅτι καθαρίζετε τὸ ἔξω τοῦ ποτηρίου καὶ τῆς παροψίδος, ἔνδοθεν δὲ γέμουσιν ἀκαθαρσίας. Καθάρισον πρῶτον τὸ ἔνδον τοῦ ποτηρίου, ἵνα γένηται καὶ τὸ ἔξωθεν καθαρόν. Τὸ μὲν οὖν ἄριστον λουτρὸν τῆς ψυχῆς ἀποσμήχει τὸν ῥύπον καί ἐστι πνευματικόν, ἐφ' οὗ διαρρήδην ἡ προφητεία λέγει· Ἐκπλυνεῖ κύριος τὸν ῥύπον τῶν υἱῶν καὶ τῶν θυγατέρων Ἰσραήλ, καὶ καθαριεῖ τὸ αἷμα ἐκ μέσου αὐτῶν, τὸ αἷμα τῆς ἀνομίας καὶ τῶν προφητῶν τοὺς φόνους. Καὶ τὸν τρόπον τῆς καθάρσεως ἐπήγαγεν ὁ λόγος εἰπών· ἐν πνεύματι κρίσεως καὶ ἐν πνεύματι καύσεως. Τὸ δὲ τοῦ σώματος τὸ σαρκικὸν καὶ διὰ μόνου ὕδατος ἀποπληροῦται, καθάπερ ἐν ἀγροῖς γίνεται πολλάκις, ὅπου βαλανεῖον οὐκ ἔστιν.