cleanse

From Old English clǣnsian, from Proto-West Germanic *klainisōną, from Proto-Germanic *klainiz (“clean”). Cognate with archaic Dutch kleinzen (“to clean; to purify”).

• IPA^(key): /klɛnz/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛnz

cleanse (third-person singular simple present cleanses, present participle cleansing, simple past and past participle cleansed)

1. (transitive) To free from dirt; to clean, to purify.
   • 2013 June 1, “A better waterworks”, in The Economist‎, volume 407, number 8838, page 5 (Technology Quarterly):

     An artificial kidney these days still means a refrigerator-sized dialysis machine. Such devices mimic the way real kidneys cleanse blood and eject impurities and surplus water as urine.

2. (transitive) To spiritually purify; to free from guilt or sin; to purge.
   • 1626, William Methold [i.e., William Methwold], “Relations of the Kingdome of Golchonda, and Other Neighbouring Nations within the Gulfe of Bengala, Arreccan, Pegu, Tennassery, &c. ”, in [Samuel] Purchas, Purchas His Pilgrimes. , 5th part, London: William Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, , →OCLC, page 993:

     [T]he famous Ganges: whoſe vnknowne head, pleaſant ſtreames, and long extent, haue amongſt thoſe Heathen Inhabitants, (by the Tradition of their Forefathers) gained a beliefe of clenſing all ſuch ſinnes, as the bodies of thoſe that waſh therein brought with them: [...]

3. (transitive) To remove (something seen as unpleasant) from a person, place, or thing.

cleanse (plural cleanses)

1. An act of cleansing; a purification.

   Synonym: cleansing

   I regularly visit the spa for a massage and a facial cleanse.

• Senecal, canelés, elances, enlaces, enscale, scalene