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Or [[Text:EBD:Washing (EBD)|washing]], was practised, (1.) When a person was initiated into a higher state: e.g., when [[Text:EBD:Aaron (EBD)|Aaron]] and his sons were set apart to the [[Text:EBD:Priest (EBD)|priest]]'s office, they were washed with water previous to their investiture with the priestly robes (Lev. 8:6).

(2.) Before the priests approached the [[Text:EBD:Altar (EBD)|altar]] of [[Text:EBD:God (EBD)|God]], they were required, on pain of [[Text:EBD:Death (EBD)|death]], to wash their [[Text:EBD:Hand (EBD)|hands]] and their feet to cleanse them from the soil of common life (Ex. 30:17-21). To this practice the Psalmist alludes, Ps. 26:6.

(3.) There were washings prescribed for the purpose of cleansing from positive defilement contracted by particular acts. Of such washings eleven different species are prescribed in the [[Text:EBD:Levite (EBD)|Levitical]] law (Lev. 12-15).

(4.) A fourth class of ablutions is mentioned, by which a person purified or absolved himself from the guilt of some particular act. For example, the [[Text:EBD:Elder (EBD)|elders]] of the nearest village where some [[Text:EBD:Murder (EBD)|murder]] was committed were required, when the murderer was unknown, to wash their hands over the expiatory [[Text:EBD:Heifer (EBD)|heifer]] which was beheaded, and in doing so to say, "Our hands have not shed this [[Text:EBD:Blood (EBD)|blood]], neither have our eyes seen it" (Deut. 21:1-9). So also [[Text:EBD:Pilate, Pontius (EBD)|Pilate]] declared himself innocent of the blood of [[Text:EBD:Jesus (EBD)|Jesus]] by washing his hands (Matt. 27:24). This act of Pilate may not, however, have been borrowed from the custom of the [[Text:EBD:Jew (EBD)|Jews]]. The same practice was common among the [[Text:EBD:Greek (EBD)|Greeks]] and Romans.

The [[Text:EBD:Pharisees (EBD)|Pharisees]] carried the practice of ablution to great excess, thereby claiming extraordinary purity (Matt. 23:25). Mark (7:1-5) refers to the ceremonial ablutions. The Pharisees washed their hands "oft," more correctly, "with the fist" (R.V., "diligently"), or as an old father, Theophylact, explains it, "up to the elbow." (Compare also Mark 7:4; Lev. 6:28; 11: 32-36; 15:22) (See WASHING.)