Why Did Leaders of the Christian Church Once Rule That Bathing Was a Sin?

It’s true that leaders of the Christian church once ruled that bathing was a sin.

In A.D. 500, the Christian church, seeing how the lewd Romans had thrived in their social hot tubs, decreed that exposing one’s skin was a sin against God.

As a result, bathing fell out of favor and people resorted to dousing themselves in perfume.

The decree also led to the belief that bathing was how disease was spread: that the warmth and the water opened up one’s skin to “pestiferous vapors” that caused diseases like the plague.

Diseases flourished as a result of these attitudes, yet they simply furthered the belief that even infrequent bathing was the culprit.

During this era of bathroom history, bathing once a year was not uncommon.

Instead of regular bathing, people wiped their bodies with pieces of thy white cloth. When they did get up the courage to bathe, they were very careful.

They got plenty of rest both before and after the event.

Then as soon as they were scrubbed clean, they quickly wrapped their bodies completely in cloth to block it from harmful diseases.

This attitude lasted for over a millennium in some places.

In fact, Benjamin Franklin was a pioneer in the 1700s for promoting bathing as a healthy activity.