The concept of tuhr [cleanliness] in the Koran

The concept of tuhr, which denotes cleanliness, the essence of everything, literally means: to be clean and pure; to recover from menstruation; to purify, clean, and disinfect something; to get cleaned, washed; to avoid all sins and bad things, and all the situations and behaviors, to repent, to get cleansed by performing financial and bodily services.While in Islamic jurisprudence cleanliness is defined as removing the situations that legally prevent the performance of religious services, in Islamic creed it is defined as purging one?s belief from qualities that contradict belief, such as şirk (associating other deities with God), kufr (blasphemy), and riya (pharisaism). In ethics, it denotes one?s cleaning one?s heart and intention from all things other than God, practicing sincerity and mbellishing one?s morality.The uses of the concept of ?tuhr? in Koran comprise all theree kinds of physical, spiritual and legal/nominal cleanliness. Physical cleanliness is purification of the body, the attire, the space, the weather, and water from all kinds of physical dirt and filth. Spiritual cleanliness is the purification of the creed, the heart, the intention and the morality from the dirt of all kinds of şirk and sin. Legal/nominal cleanliness, on the other hand, refers to the ritual purity ?such as ablution and bodily ablution- required for performance of such services as prayer and tavaf.What Koran demands from us is to be equipped with cleanliness in all its senses and to realize the ideal of clean individual, clean society, and clean environment, and thus to preserve the uncorrupted human nature.Key Words: Tuhr, Cleanliness, physical, spiritual, legal/nominal.