A mikveh is a Jewish ritual bath traditionally used for a variety of religious purposes, most significantly for monthly immersions by married women before they sexually reunite with their husbands following their menstrual cycles, a body of law known as taharat hamishpachah, or the laws of family purity. But mikvehs have also long been used for a number of other purposes, both ritually required and customary. Immersion is mandated for converts to Judaism. Some Jews also immerse new food utensils in a mikveh prior to using them, a practice known as tevilat keilim. In some communities, primarily hasidic ones, it’s common for men to visit a mikveh prior to Shabbat.
For these reasons, constructing a mikveh is considered to be of paramount importance, with some Jewish law authorities holding that it should take precedence over the building of a synagogue or the acquisition of a Torah scroll. But for much of Jewish history, visiting the mikveh was largely the domain of married Orthodox women and hasidic men. Most liberal Jews shunned it, considering the requirement to immerse after menstruation to be patriarchal and sexist. But in recent years, mikveh immersion has soared among non-Orthodox Jews who have begun to reclaim the practice, often for non-traditional purposes.
Much of this movement is attributable to Mayyim Hayyim, a self-described “pluralistic” and “open” mikveh that started in suburban Boston in 2004 with a mission to “reclaim and reinvent” the mikveh for “contemporary spiritual use.” Today, Mayyim Hayyim is at the vanguard of what has been called the open mikvah movement, a network of community mikvehs open to all Jews for a range of purposes, both traditional and not. In 2018, five such mikvehs established the Rising Tide Open Waters Mikveh Network, which counts more than 40 mikvehs among its members.
Most of the contemporary re-embrace of the mikveh centers around its use to mark various life transitions, many of them related to grief, healing and the processing of trauma. Some have embraced the mikveh ritual as a way to prepare for treatment of a serious illness, or as a way to mark the completion of a successful course of treatment. Some use the mikveh to mark important celebratory milestones, like a wedding or bar mitzvah. And still others use the mikveh to mark tragic losses, like the end of the mourning period for a loved one or the dissolution of a marriage. A more recent trend has been to immerse in the mikveh to mark a gender transition or coming out as gay or lesbian.
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Many of the new progressive mikvehs will welcome any Jewish person who wishes to immerse for any reason, and some of traditional mikvehs will permit immersions for certain non-traditional purposes. Many permit appointments to be made directly online and most ask for a small donation. A directory of progressive mikvehs can be found here and a large directory of traditional mikvehs can be found here.
