Is soap necessary

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for cleaning I mean? Specifically dishes? Can any organisms or bacteria exist on Flatware or on glass or ceramic dishes, even pots and pans, that cannot be adequately removed with hot water and scrubbing.

And the human body. Other than for scent, is soap necessary to clean our body and hair or have we just been conditioned to believe that we are dirty and unsanitary, unhygienic, if we do not use large quantities of soaps, oils, lotions and emollients.

I frequently go to zen retreats in which we indulge in oryoki ceremonies which have a rather elaborate system of preparing utensils, eating routine, placement and cleaning of dishes and utensils.

Meal after meal we use our dishes, eating and drinking from our four bowls and, at the end using only the water remaining from what we used for drinking to clean our dishes and itensils. No soap involved, no waste. we put small amounts of water in one bowl at a time, rinse it out using our finger to wipe food remnants from inside the bowls. Tha water is transferred from bowl to bowl until every bow in front of each person is cleaned. Each person just then drinks the water that is remaining in his/her last bowl, which usually contains small remnants of everything that was in all four bowls. We then wipe out and dry all of our 4 bowls with our hand towel and then use the towel to tie all the bowls together, with chopsticks and spoon tied within the knot at top of bundle. Each person then puts their set on a shelf until the next meal.

We would do this for the duration of the retreat, never using more than warm water to clean after ourselves, never wasting a morsel or drop. I don't have recollection of anyone ever becoming ill from this practice. I have done it at home with no problem for short periods of time, but I always give in to conditioning within a week or so and throw some soap in the sink and clean things old school style, but really, I am thinking we are just taught all of this nonsense. Maybe its part of a consumption society. Have to keep Proctor and Gamble in business and wot, ya know. Really though, is it all necessary?

I like the smell of soap.

It reminds me of when i was a kid and I lived with the nuns.

I hate the smell of soaps, perfumes, lotions. All of it burns my nostrils. I think a good spell under some hot water will effectively clean and neutralize most odors. Why cant we learn to adapt to the reality that we are human beings. Smell is natural. Just not too much of it. And all those soaps, lotions, perfumes and cosmetics really taste like crap, as I am a face licker. Well, I like to lick everything. Even pieces of metal and leather in stores. And I eat flowers in stores an anywhere else

I always use shower gel in the shower and I do put bubbles in the bath.

I can't stand the perfume counters in the shops because that is too over powering.

I don't like air fresheners either. I threw the one we had at work out of the window because it kept going off automatically.

As for soap, i don't use it on my face except for about once a week just to freshen up a bit.

I couldn't stand not to use deodorant, but I have to use the 0% alcohol because the other stuff makes me itch.

The function of soap is to make fats and oils dissolve into the water. Without soap they will simply be smeared around the bowls. The fats and oils will rot/go rancid with bacteria and could cause food poisoning. However, considering this no-soap washing occurs at a Zen retreat there probably aren't many/any fats present in the food anyway - I'm assuming the meals are vegetarian hence free of animal fats and probably light on vegetable oils too?

You are aware that water doesn't actually go away, like gasoline, right? You can waste gas when you sit and let your car idle because once it's burned it's gone and there is only a finite amount of oil. As for water, when it goes back into the ground it's used, evaporated, becomes a cloud and then comes right back and taken to the water treatment plant to get ready to use again. I pointed that out because you were talking about only using a small amount of water to clean those dishes with and not wasting any of it. The concept of wasting water is because of a water bill or in places where you have to go a long way to get water. There is plenty of it.

Yes, soap is needed. You could probably use some type of scrubber to get rid of the dead skin and oils on you, but the smell really isn't going to go away unless you spend a lot of time in water. It still won't get rid of bacteria.

As for the dishes, well I read the thing about how ya'll washed your dishes at the retreat and then the last person drank the dishwater and I honestly think thats a bad idea and you should talk to somebody about why you were willing to drink somebody's dishwater. You can wash off a fork and use it a gain a little while later, but you don't want to put it up until it's been washed right. Also, you sure wouldn't want to try and wash out a frying pan with grease in it without soap, especially after cooking chicken or pork, or any kind of meat for that matter. It's dangerous and you could get sick. The only exception to that is cast iron skillets. You wipe them out with a paper towel after using, but you also season them well first in the oven and with bacon grease and that makes it where you can do that. You can't do that with regular pots and pans.

One summer when I was a teenager we lived in some apartments that had a pool. I was at that pool all day, every sunny day, from about 8 in the morning till about 10 at night. I swam a lot. I did shower every day though, even though I didn't smell and I did sweat a lot because I would lay out. The pool got most of the suntan oil off me but I could still smell an underlying odor of sweat on me before I showered at night after getting out of the pool. Water alone isn't going to get rid of all your bodily smells. I'm sure there is a soap out there with no smell. Neutrogena may not have a smell. That's the clear orange soap. It's hypoallergenic too. I personally like either Ivory or Safeguard. There are also other parts of your body that just water alone is not going to get the smell off of. Have you Googled something like "scentless soaps"? There has to be something, somewhere. I'm sensitive to smells I don't like, which is why I usually only buy the kind I like, so I bet there are people who hate all the smells and who need something.

I read the thing about you licking faces too. I'm not being ugly, I really want to know this. Do you lick a lot of people's faces or only close relatives and friends or what? Because most girls I know wear makeup and not only would that ruin their makeup but it would probably be extremely nasty tasting to you.

As for the consumption society thing, soap isn't just because of that. People made soap or used certain plants to clean with way before there were soap companies. Of course it was a lot harsher and now we have things that are gentle, but people would make their own soaps to use at home, and not buy them, so it's not just something made up to make money. Women used to make lye soap to wash with, and in medieval days they would use stale urine to wash clothes with because after it sits about a month it turns into amonia, which cleans and bleaches. Of course they didn't know about bacteria and they didn't use it on themselves or on dishes but it would get the actual dirt out of their clothes when water alone did not. If outside agents besides water weren't needed to properly clean things, I can't imagine why someone would use month old pee to wash their clothes with. Of course they used lavender after that too, to get the smell of the month old pee out of their clothes.

There is a plant called soap wort that will foam up when you crush it,it usually grows by the creek.Maybe it grows in your area.
If you want a natural soap,try Dr.Bonners or Kirks Castile.
Our retreat center uses soap and disenfectant,when you have a lot of people together it helps to keep from spreading germs.
You can make your own the old fashioned way,hog lard and leech hardwood ashes for the lye.
In the desert people scour with sand.

Viruses have to be taken into account when sharing water rinsed eating utensils surely.

Okay, I am a simpleton, but I just ate soybean paste stew, composed of soybean paste, ginger, water, anchovy, garlic, onions potato, peppers, tofu and sesame oil. Onions, garlic, fermented soybean paste and ginger all have very strong, persistent smells. Eaten in a clear glass bowl. After cleaning the clear bowl with nothing but hot water and a brush, and then drying, there was clearly no residue remaining and the only odor left was from the towel I used to dry the bowl.

Maybe I'm just a hillbilly but I think the need for all these soaps and fragrances are greatly exaggerated and even the boo-hoo about germs and bacteria on counters and such mostly scare tactics to sell Lysol, Spic n Span and Mr. Clean. As ridiculous as it may sound, I would feel completely comfortable eating off my counters or floors just cleaned with hot water.

But I am an Aspie licker. Have been all my life. Compulsive licking and tasting of pretty much anything that is not obviously contaminated by what I know without question is hazardous materials. Maybe I have just built up a natural resistance over the years.

Yes, I'm crazy

No. Because you still need to take into account the soy products and the nuts/seeds that are all rich in vegetable oils. So even at a Zen retreat, they're going to have to store soap.

I'm waiting patiently for billiscool's opinion on this subject.

I have seen soap in the kitchen but it was not used during the retreat. Only on the last day when we would do community work practice cleaning the center did I see soap used. I guess during Oryoki it is just ritual to do things this way. I have never stayed beyond one week.

Even though you can't see the residue on there, there are still microscopic germs that you need to kill. I know this is Wiki but read this short article about fomites. Fomites You really need to clean things with soap to get rid of that. Just because you can't see or smell something doesn't mean it's not there.

I guess I didnt make it clear enough. Utensils or water are not being shared. Each person has a set of 4 bowls, a spoon and chopsticks. Clean warm water is poured into one bowl after the food is eaten. That bowl is rinsed and wiped with fingers and the liquid is transferred to next bowl and continued until all 4 bowls are rinsed clean. It is not a giant communal soup bowl. You would have to participate to appreciate what is going on. I think we view it as unsanitary because that is how we have been conditioned

Each person, four bowls, used by that individual alone. The water used to clean that persons bowls does not enter the bowls of other participants of the retreat.

I do not believe that anyone who has participated in a zen retreat and been part of an oryoki style meal would say there is anything disgusting or unsanitary about the I have done it many, many times, and eat this way at home without any gastrointestinal discomfort or distress. It is quite possible that it has to do with the fact that there is typically no animal products involved, as Tallyman stated.

complete oryoki ceremony below. There are variations of oryoki practice but as you can see from the video there is nothing barbaric or cult like about the proceedings

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdZk2IGVUPE[/youtube]

Here are some other nontoxic ideas for cleaning.
http://www.rootsimple.com/2012/02/heavy ... d-vinegar/

I live alone, am extremely scant on the use of chemicals and cleaning agents yet I realise out the back of my home dogs are walked [crap area] and all the flies that land on my kitchen surfaces have potentially sat in some questionable substance prior to landing my kitchen.