O you whose hearts have been touched with the divine hand: When you intend to perform your act of worship, ablution becomes a duty. Wash your faces , your hands and the forearms up to the elbows, and with your wet hands wipe your heads, then wash your feet to the ankles. And if you are spiritually unconditioned following sexual congress or seminal emissions then purify yourselves to render the obligation "pure": you bathe before you pray. But if you are sick or on a journey or have defecated or touched women and the sensation of contact stirred you to passion, and you found no water, metaphoric ablution becomes a religious rite: apply clean sand, dust or dry earth lightly to your faces and hands. Allah does not intend to put you in difficulty but to set you upon the course of purity of thought and action, for the actions of men are the best interpreters of their thoughts. He means to make all grace abound in you that you may hopefully impel yourselves to the feeling of gratitude and gratefulness and lift to Him your inward sight.